One thing at a time

Beautiful dry, frosty morning
Perfect for a wander

Today was a good day...as we marched out,I realised for the first time in a loooooong time, we were on a loose rein! Purposeful, striding,but none of the recent piaffe/passage moments I have sat through (calmly) while killer sheep pop up from ditches and plastic feed bags lie in wait in gateways, or horror of all horrors a leaf has dropped,silently,menacingly....

We spent 20 minutes in the school first....always useful to check the brakes after a day off and in due to apocalyptic rain!!

On thing I have learned over the last year is that every moment counts when you are schooling your horse...I no longer sit without a plan or purpose, it is not merely exercise...I see it as education (for both of us)
I wouldn't go into one of my lessons in school without a plan...and now I never enter the school without a focus in mind. I HAVE to be disciplined....how else can I expect him to be the same?
I ask: What do I want to achieve? HOW are WE going to achieve it? Always useful to me to then reflect and see where we could improve...always improvements to be made!

Was interesting to read Kyra Kirklands ideas about focusing on one thing at a time...
So today we did!
I always warm up for 10 mins in walk,lots of shapes, circles, half circles, shoulder in, traver, leg yield, free walk to medium, medium to collected, collected to extended...whilst focusing in the mirrors on my posture, position, balance.
Today we focused on the trot work:
Elementary 44 involves working trot to halt. Halt to collected trot. Collected trot to medium trot to collected again,10m circles and half circles, so our focused active 10mins work was just that. Lots of centre lines, 10m  half circles on and off the CL. Halting at different places with a definite focus on the quality of the collected trot,really riding from the seat and forward and 'up' into the halts. relaxation in the halt and then a crisp transition back to a lovely forward, active trot. LOTS to think about....Small Brown was pinging so my job was to remember relaxation and control of the neck. He is so much fun!!!
Tomorrow I am back to work, so time is more limited, so sessions will need a lot of thought before hand....lesson on Thursday!