Update and pics

  Phoenix and I had a great day out at the ranch on Friday.  We rode English and worked on more basics and lead changes.  Though we still have a ways to go before we can always get the correct lead on the left and do awesome flying lead changes, Phoenix is steadily improving and it is taking less to get her to pick up the correct lead.  I was nervous at first to ride my girl in her corkscrew snaffle (the bit I rode when she threw me off into the fence at the December show) but Phoenix was fine and still worked good off of it.
  When we were done in the arena, Phoenix and I decided to mess around on the mini cross country course out in the back.  We started by walking over some of the logs and hay bales and then we worked over the 1ft jumps at a trot.  She did good and we kept a steady pace.  The only problem we had was everytime we passed the stallion, Little Joe Skippa, Phoenix would refuse to move and consistently pee and call out to him.  I kept kicking her away from his pen and then she was fine though.  I decided to just go for the 2 ft jump and Phoenix didn't hesitate and did great.  We worked a mini course going over 2 small logs next to eachother, over another 1ft log to the left, circling around and trotting straight towards a 2ft jump, then doing a rollback towards another short log.  Next was jumping the wider 1ft logs we started with, rolling back to the left and hopping over a row of hay bales.
  We decided to call it good after that since we haven't jumped in awhile and I hadn't put protective boots on Phoenix.  I was super proud of my girl for not hesitating and it really helped me to go outside of my comfort zone and trust Phoenix.  Now I'm pretty sure her hesitating at the horse show at every jump was my nerves since the jumps were way easier and Phoenix was great today.  She can and will do a lot to please her rider, but she is a little hesitant and without a confident rider Phoenix won't go through with everything.  I do admit I am more comfortable with solid jumps than poles because I don't like having the empty space underneath.  I'm not really sure why cause most people have the opposite problem, but Phoenix and I will have to play around with that more after fair.
  I hosed Phoenix off and put her away so she could have dinner.  Here are some pics that I took, including some of the adorable new colt born that morning.