Enough is enough!

Well let me begin this post with last night's team penning fun.

I got invited to join my neighbor in team penning last night and told her that I couldn't go until I bought Prettygirl a blanket to keep her warm and to dry her off afterwards.
She said she would go with me to purchase one as I had no clue of what to get. I ended up with a really nice canvas one and good thing Donna was with me as I hadn't measured properly and would have ended up with one way to small for her.

Donna came to pick me up at 6:00 so that we would have time to warm up the horses as I haven't ridden Prettygirl in a few weeks. The fun began trying to load her in the trailer, she didn't want to go but we finally got her in there. Donna's two geldings were already in there and normally Prettgirl is such a floozy and loves the boys but not last night. During the whole five minute ride to the arena we could feel the trailer rocking and knew that she was acting up back there but we didn't want to risk stopping.

We got to the arena and opened the door to discover that she had cut her back leg. Not really bad, just a nick but of course there was blood and she had worked herself up into a lather (you would have thought she had been worked really hard). The quiet time I was hoping for to warm her up and settle her down didn't happen as the place was already alive with riders and all the good hitching spots were taken.

After riding for a few minutes I realized that my cinch wasn't quite tight enough so got off and was about to tighten it when that little twit stuck her foot up and caught it through the reins!!

Well panic immediately set in and she started jumping, rearing, kicking and bucking and I couldn't hold her so had to let her go. She ran across the arena in a full blown panic and finally came to a stop in a corner where I was able to catch up to her. She now had the lead rope wrapped around her leg but luckily the rein had broken and had released the pressure on her mouth. I am just so thankful no one was in her path and that she didn't cause the rest of the horses to panic. Well talk about being embarrassed.

Now the story gets better!

I tied her in the alley way quite a distance from any other horse and ran out to Donna's truck to borrow her reins, when I got back the guy next to me was trying to saddle his horse who was quite agitated. He said to his horse" what is your problem" and a guys voice answered down the row, "that paint mare just up and booted him with both feet".... Do you think there was any other paint mares in the building?"... No of course not, it was my problem girl.

Well we bravely continued on... Does the story end there? No! of course not.

Out we went for our turn to pen three innocent little calves. My team mates did a grand job of cutting them out and sending them down to the other end while I tried to get my little ball of nerves under control and in doing so ended up chasing the calves (quite by accident) back down to the herd.

Once again a red face!

The next run I thought I would stay back out of the way and just try and keep the ones they chased down behind the line. Simple task right? Nope, of course not.

Once again the calves were on to us and just slipped right on by and back to the herd. Now in all fairness to Prettygirl, most of this was my fault. All the previous events had rattled me to the point I had no confidence left.

Well half time came and the people I was with decided to quit and head for home, his excuse being he had to be up at four in the morning. I really think they were just being kind to me as I think they knew I had reached the end of my rope and things could only get worse.

I am really hoping that she was just going into season and that this isn't going to be her attitude from now on.

We put her spiffy new blanket on her and loaded the horses in the trailer, she must have been tired enough as the ride home was uneventful.

I have decided though that enough is enough and I am really going to have to make the effort to ride her more often as it really isn't fair to only ride her in these events with no training sessions in-between. Now if only the weather will cooperate with my plans.



Here is Miss attitude this morning in her spiffy new blanket.



Something so cute happened today I have to share. Remember Mystery, my shy little pony, the same one that would see a halter and do everything in her power not to have it touch her?

Well I walked out this morning with the halter to catch Prettygirl to take off her blanket and when I turned around Mystery was standing right behind me. She didn't even flinch when she saw the halter and let me put the lead rope over her neck and didn't pull back. I really think she wanted some extra attention and I couldn't help but think back to the days when getting caught was like a huge scary ordeal for her. Miracles do happen. She has come such a long way from the day she kicked me to get away from the halter and she was just what I needed today to renew my faith in why I wanted horses in the first place. She did get an extra treat for that one.



Isn't she adorable!