Thursday, April 23, 2009

Can't think of a good title

I hate that title thing sometimes. If I want to get on and just talk, do I say thursday talk? lol I suppose I could.

Anyhow, update on riding last night....it went really good. Only took a few little tries to get her to lope to the left. Of course she got all hot and squirly after that because apparently that's not what SHE wanted to do, but she did it and I stopped after getting her to take the left lead twice. Ended on a good note. She was a good girl. IS a good girl I should say. My husband kept telling me I'd better let her just stop and calm down, but the trainer said not to because then she knows to get hot and snorty and throwing her head will get her to not do anything. I pushed a little more, but not too much and let her stop when she did it right. So hopefully I'm reinforcing the good. Rode again today. I didn't lope though. I figured I'd change it up a little so that it's not the same thing all the time and she expects to lope and starts her little jumping around. I do know last night though that my husband said when we were loping to the left, while we were loping she would try to do this funky little two step thing that would get her back on the wrong lead. Very strange. So as long as I keep her going and don't let her slow down too much, she can't do it, it's only when we slow down enough for her to do it.

As some of you may notice, I decided to go back public. Like I said before, I really have nothing to hide from anyone. If people want to be nosey, so be it. If I didn't want everyone to know everything then I guess I shouldn't have started a blog I suppose. :) I will still be irritated, but oh well.

I'm going to say this. I'm kind of impressed with my son's school. It is a catholic school, but it's well worth it and today definitely made me feel a little better. I'm not going to say I have nothing to do with school, but I definitely don't volunteer and participate as much as I should be. My mom was in the PTA and everyone knew her and she was always a room mother. With a full time job, that was a little difficult for me. I could take some time to drive on field trips, and I did, but that was about it. Today I went to the office to see if it was too late to turn in the lunch order form for May since it was due yesterday. I'm such a slacker. I let my older one order lunch once a week so that he has change from the humdrum everyday peanut butter sandwhich. He enjoys it and I know he gets a good meal and really, it's only $2.50 and that includes milk. So I think it's worth it. So anyhow, I was lazy and my little man had only slippers on. So when we got to the office he said he would just stand in the hall so no one would look at his slippy's. I didn't think anyone would see, so as I was going in the door, he was just peering in through the glass next to it. I kind of waved my hand for him to come in, and the receptions said "Is that Tater out there?" lol I was like how the heck does she know him?? I wouldn't be able to pick that lady out of a lineup and she's asking if it's tater without even seeing him. So I'm impressed that these people actually know me AND know tater's name. lol Then, as we were leaving, there was the 2nd grade teacher who my son doesn't have, and she startes talking to us. I honestly don't think I've ever even talked to her, and it's not my son's teacher, but when we were heading out the door, she says "Bye Tater!!" He looks at me and screams (gotta love kids) "How does SHE know MY name???" She says "well, I know your big brother lucas and he talks about you ALL the time because he loves you!" Tater says "he's GOT to stop talking about me momma." lol I'll have to see what it is he's saying about him. But my point is, these people actually care enough to know who we are, and that makes me really happy. I don't expect them to and I really don't think in public schools that this sort of thing happens all that often. Of course, most parents any more just send their kids to school and treat it as a daycare, so you never see the parents anyhow. No one goes to parent teacher conferences anymore. My sister's got a senior this year (my niece) and when my sister went to parent teacher conferences, the teacher was surprised because no one (parents) ever goes. THAT is sad.

By the way, if anyone has any good idea for school lunches, I'm open for suggestions. lol He takes peanut butter sandwhiches and salads once in awhile. They do have a microwave, so I've started getting him little ravioli bowl type things, like Chef Boyarde. They work, but that cost adds up too and I might as well just let him buy lunches more often. Oh well. Like I said, if you have any ideas, let me know :))

It's supposed to be 80 here this weekend. It's definitely starting to finally warm up. I can't wait to give the girls the first bath of the year. They are so dirty!! And I think it would help with shedding, although they are starting to have less and less hair each day. Have a great day all!! I'm going to start trying to catch up on all my blogs since I'll be having a little more time now.

4 comments:

Leah Fry said...

I always found the school caf to be cheaper than just about everything except PB&J. I don't remember what it cost (he's 23 now), and both parents were working, so it's probably a different dynamic. Since we were always so busy, I always knew he was getting a halfway decent meal at least once a day.

BrownEyed Cowgirl said...

It sounds like you are making great strides with that left lead. I am glad to hear your trainer say to keep working on it until you get it and your mare settles down. As it gets easier for her, she will not get as "hot". Her muscle tone and coordination will improve and it will get easier for her. And that funny little skip she is doing trying to get back in the other lead is normal. Any horse that is particularly one-leaded will try to revert back to the lead they feel comfortable on.

Did I ever tell you that it took Megan and I months to get her blue roan horse, Rip to even be able to pick up his right lead? We did every exercise we could think of to strengthen his muscles and get him in the correct position to just be able to step off in the right lead. There were sooooo many times it felt like he was going to pick it up and he would do that stutter step and take off in his left lead. I did a whole lot of roll-backs on the fence and spanked his butt a bunch of times to "help" him. He would get so mad. He is not a "hot" horse, by any stretch of the imagination, and even he got chargy and nasty for a little while. The first few times he picked that right lead up, I was kicking like crazy to just keep him loping fast enough so he could not switch on me. It was like riding a freight train. He had a very difficult time for quite a while. By the end of the summer, he was doing flying lead changes for Megan.

ezra_pandora said...

LF: You are totally right. I always remembered school food being disgusting when I was in school, but the boys school is CATERED. Can you believe that?? So it's usually actually good food. And pizza every friday.

BEC: I'm getting worried now that the boys' soccer season is going to start, and with trainer showing and still in training with HER horse, that there isn't going to be a whole lot of time to spend with her. So I will just keep working on fine tuning what she does teach me when we have time. Your story with Roan Dog definitely gives me hope. I'm going to be dumb though and ask about roll backs. What are they and how do I do them? That might help a lot.

Laughing Orca Ranch said...

I'm glad you're back to being public again, Ezra. I'm embarassed to say that I just kept forgetting to chek each day for updates. I look on my blogroll for updates and if I don't see any, then I typically don't open up the blog to read it.

So, I've been MIA around here...forgive me, eh?

I hear ya about the public schools. That's one of the reasons we choose to homeschool our kids. Of course, there are some days when things get so challenging, that I think, "Ooooh, sure wish I could just send my kids to public school so someone else could deal with them all day!" lol! Am I a bad Mom or what?

Lunch ideas: buy one of those itty bitty canape style cutters in different shapes (stars, circles, diamonds, hearts, spades, etc) and cut meats (pepperoni, turkey, balogna, ham) into shapes.
Place them inside a container with crackers, carrot/peppers/celery strips, and some grapes. Include a little container or ziplock of mustard.
Kids love these and when you make them yourself, it's much cheaper than those Lunchables kits.

I'm glad you had a great ride, even though your mare was being bratty. Baby Doll acts the same way sometimes. Opinionated mares!ugh!

~Lisa

 

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