Unbelievable

I can NOT believe how well EVERYTHING went today!

When we got there, we went to the pasture with some sweet feed. She came right up, and trotted off a few times.. but she wasn't very difficult to catch. I did put the chain on her, just because we were leaving the pasture and I wanted as much control as possible. Well, amazingly... she loaded right in the trailer. She was a little hyped up, but I mean come on. I was expecting rearing, bolting, refusing to move.. etc etc. What a GOOD GIRL! 

So when we got back to the barn, I unloaded her and walked her to the round pen. She was very alert, but not hard to control. I let her loose in the round pen and let her calm down a bit. I wasn't expecting to work with her at all today.. but it just kind of happened! 

I wanted to get her into a more sturdy halter, so that's what I did first. I chose a rope halter. I thought she would put up a fight switching halters, but she did great. She was already following me around, but I decided to round pen her a bit anyways. Within 3, maybe 4 minutes she was licking and chewing. I stopped her and she came right to me, and followed me around. I snapped the lead rope on and walked her around the round pen, doing frequent stops and backs. There is a little bridge type thing in there, so I thought I'd ask her to go over it. She stepped right on like it was nothing! That really amazed me considering just last week I watched someone fight with a horse for 10-15 minutes trying to get him to walk over the bridge! I also took her over some ground poles, and a larger pole, that were in the round pen. Next I picked up all four feet, she did pretty well.. didn't try to kick out or anything but I did have to work at it for a minute.

Ollie was doing so well with everything that I threw at her, I tied her up. She acted just fine, so I groomed her. She stood there perfectly still until I was finished. Next came the saddle pad. She did perfect with it, I threw it all over her body, including sitting it on her back then tossing it off the other side. She shuffled around a bit, but did very good. I put the bridle on her then realized I have the 4 1/2" bit on that headstall for Bones. 

THEN, I saddled her! She stood there like a good girl for the whole process (she wasn't tied, either). I took off the lead rope and made her walk on. She did one lap of just walking, then started to trot and thennnn BUCK BUCK BUCK BUCK! Lol it was so funny. She did maybe two laps of bucking, stopped, snorted, sighed, and stood still. I tightened up the cinch a notch or two and kept it on her for 10 minutes. I stopped there, that seems like a more than accomplished first day to me!

I'd say that's $200 well spent.