CANTER Mid Atlantic’s Dixie Rumble

Ah, jumping babies a source of endless amusement. I fully admit I tend to focus more on the flat than the jumping and we have done a lot of trail riding with Dixie. The jumping..well a few x-rails here and there which he had all figured out. Time for some more serious stuff. My husband loves to watch me jump the babies so he can laugh at me when they do stupid stuff or I look stupid. I love him for that because it reminds me just to relax and have fun.

Dixie let me know he was getting bored with the smaller jumps so I wanted to bring up the height and jump some oxers. We had jumped some scarier stuff at the small heights and he felt good over that. I started out with just an x-rail…boring he said!

We made it a vertical and jumped that a few times. He acted a bit suprised and jumped awkwardly the first time over the vertical probably because it looked different. Then we made it an oxer. That impressed him. As for me..no comment It looks like he really thrusted off the ground and twisted his back a bit so who knows what i did?

His expression was funny and you gotta love the legs. I do not even judge a horse when they are first starting to jump because they just have no clue as to where the parts are supposed to go. The next jump was better and I managed not to fling myself up the neck.

Jumping goes hand in hand with the flat work and as the flat work gets better and he gets stronger behind the jumping will improve. He was a bit worried about what to do and wanted to rush away from the jumps so we just landed and came to a walk on the straight line.

In between horses for the farrier I lunged dixie in the ring over some barrels and smaller jumps. I am learning to embrace ground work more and more with some of the horses I have. Dixie is a horse I would probably never do ground work with because he is just so easy but when short on time it is a great way to build confidence and see how the react. I lunged him both directions over some poles and then made an x-rail which he just stepped over. Then I made a jump with three barrels all laying on their side and put a pole on the last barrel to keep him from running out. He trotted up to it and gave it a good look and then lauched himself over and cantered away fast..gotta get out of here that was scary! Then he came back around and refused it. I find sometimes when they do jump it so big the first time they scare themselves. I let him walk up and look at it and then next time he jumped it w/o a second thought and was very soft over it. It was time for me to switch horses for the farrier but that was a fun 15 min of work.