Sometimes its hard.

Whew! That's what I have to say today about my lesson on Bella with Judy Whyte.  It was hard.  It was hard mentally.  It was hard physically.  It was hot outside too!

I love that Judy has such high expectations for Bella and me.  She pushes us to our limits and expects us to rise to all that she asks of us.  And boy can it be hard sometimes.  It was hard today.  Started the warm up and I was pushing Bella off her pace a little bit.  After the warm up Judy gets right down to business.  Bend, bend, bend, sit, sit, sit, steady, steady steady, push, push, push, engage, engage, engage, soft, soft, soft, sharp, sharp, sharp... there it is! Haha after all that and doing all that at the same time we have some moments of loveliness. And that is pretty much how the lesson continued and it pushed  me and it pushed Bella and it made us better.  And if we continue to follow through with all of it then we will continue to improve and before I know it we just might be ready to show Third Level.  Because that is the goal that I've set for myself with Bella.  So watch out 'cause I'm geared up after today's lesson and I will work my butt off and help Bella to be the best she can be!

Can she do it?

Let me start this post by saying the journey with Bella has not been the easiest but somewhere along the way I think we both found respect and love for one another and now I wouldn't trade her for the world.

Today I had my lesson on Bella and if you've been reading my blog you'd know that we just came out of a sticky spot.  She was being quite a nasty girl because she hadn't been getting her proper dosage of hormones/drugs.  And during her nasty spell I was being overly demanding and riding to much through physical strength and not finesse.  But we have moved past that and the last two weeks things have just been getting better and better.  I really have been concentrating on using less of my hands and more of my seat and Bella is responding.

So in the lesson today we just built on the last two weeks and threw back in our flying changes.  We have worked on them a little through the winter but never consistently got them down either from weather or other issues.  But if we are going to be doing 3rd level any time in the future then we really need to get these down solid.  So after some really steady work we moved into doing the flying changes.  If Bella has one thing in common with me it is wanting to power through things and use strength.  She does this when she finds things difficult and little does she know that in the long run it will only make things harder.  So that is what she wants to do in her changes.  She grabs the bit, pulls her head up and charges away.  It's not very pretty!  But with Judy's guidance I was able to keep her rounder and much steadier in the connection and within a few attempts we had some pretty decent clean changes.  Yay Bella!

Now you might think that we are done for the day but nope much bigger things came about in today's ride.  Judy wanted to go through a 3rd level test but I don't have them memorized yet and she didn't have the booklet down at the barn.  So she runs up to the house to get the booklet and tells me to keep Bella engaged and not let her think we were done yet (once Bella thinks we are done for the day she totally goes into sleep mode).  So I gather up my reins and think to myself "keep Bella active" and what happens Bella offers some half steps.  I mean nothing that anyone else would probably be excited about but to me it was amazing.  So I kept my seat light but active and we went around doing kinda little half steps then walk and so on and so forth and Judy comes down and is like wow you really kept her engaged didn't even recognize you two.  (that put a giant smile on my face).

It just gets even better from here. Judy proceeds to read 3rd Level Test 1 to me and I say okay I got it.  And then I did.  I rode the entire 3rd Level test on Bella.  What?!  Bella, my girl who I never thought would make it past first level.  Bella who keeps telling me that she can do more.  Bella the horse who has a great work ethic but is also highly opinionated.  She makes me so proud.  She makes my heart happy.  Even if I never enter the show ring at 3rd level it was such a joy to ride it today and feel connected with my horse.  It was a joy to feel my horse give me her all.  So Bella I will never doubt you again. I will allow you to show me what you think you are capable of and I will also believe you when you tell me you have done enough.  It is a partnership and one that I cherish.