Ebony goes to Class

Kira and Ebony at their first ride together in Westernaires.

As you know, Ebony has been is school, ground manners school. We have been working with her on walking calmly and not trying to get ahead or around whomever is leading her. We have had great results around the house but we still have some work to do around Westernaires. She still gets a bit nervous. But we decided to try her out in a class and see how she did.

When she first came into the staging arena she didn't want to stand still. Kira got on (the first picture) and she calmed down a bit but was still a fairly agitated. Kira had to get off to lead her into Red Arena and I was a little concerned about that. Ebony has not quite mastered standing still during mounting.

But Kira wasn't bothered at all and when she went to mount Ebony in the arena, Ebony started to spin. Not fast, far to crowded to spin fast, but Kira just swung her leg over Ebony's back and all was well.

Ebony behaved perfectly. Thank you Carly Davis! Ebony did everything Kira asked of her and she looked good doing it! Really good. She was nicely collected, nice leg action, held any gate Kira asked for; the only problem was that every now and then she would let out a cry for help in the form of a really loud whinny.
From my position in the bleachers, I could here what people were saying. "Wow! Look at that black horse! She's really pretty!" That was kind of fun to here. After the ride was over one of the JI's (Junior Instructors - other Westernaires riders that volunteer to help train the tenderfoots) came over to Kira and said, "I wish your horse was a Westernaires horse, she is so pretty." That left Kira with a big smile on her face.

After we got Ebony back to the trailer we had to go get some water. We have water in the trailer but at this time of year it is usually frozen so we have to go fill buckets. The closest spigot is in the Fort Westernaires compound so off we went. While Kira was waiting for a bucket to fill, a young Tenderfoot came by with her hand up in the air pretending to lead a horse. She looked and Kira and said, "Do you like my horse? Her name is Buttercup and she looks exactly like that loud black horse in class this morning." Kira just smiled. Looks liek Kira and Ebony are rider so we are going to declare that she is an owner and Ebony will be her Westernaires horse from this point on.


Cool icicle picture.