Pony Love

 This was when I first bought her.  I discovered she LOVES head hugs.  She will bury her head in your arms.

I bought a dressage saddle for Mochs!  I had been looking for an Isabell because I have ridden her in one before and it was comfortable for both of us.  Also she will change shape with work so the Isabell will be able to change with her.  Ideally I wanted one that was flocked instead of CAIR, but they are a pretty rare find, plus you can have a fitter easily remove the CAIR and flock it.  

I found a really nice, lightly used, Isabell in beautiful condition with CAIR and bid on it.  Of course, after I commit to one, I stumble upon a flocked, newer model Isabell.  I had put up an ISO ad on a FB group and someone randomly commented on it saying they had one for sale they just posted.  There was a day left on the auction for the CAIR Isabell and I was the only bidder.  I REALLY wanted a flocked Isabell, plus this one was newer, came with the full gullet set and full set of knee blocks, which the other one did not have.  You can retract a bid on eBay but it's kind of a process and you look like a dbag.  I decided I was just going to buy them both and sell the CAIR model immediately.  

Luckily with four hours to go, somebody else came in on the CAIR Isabell and outbid me.  YES.  THANK YOU!  So I ended up only having to buy the flocked Isabell.  I had already paid for it by that point anyway.  There was no way I was going to let that slip away.  I jumped on it immediately and paid the minute the seller sent me the PayPal invoice.  It shipped and will be here sometime next week.

Mochs has been doing great lately.  Her work has been a mixture of hacks, lunge line work, and flat work.  Yesterday evening I rode her and we worked on halts, leg yielding at the walk and halt, and turn on the forehand.

 

 Stretching down all by her little pony self during her warm up before a lunge line work out.  I'm looking forward to watching that hay belly slowly disappear with more work.

 I'm pretty excited for Mochi right now.  I'm looking forward to really getting her going for once.  In this excitement I've been buying her stuff left and right...see this bridle below:

I ordered one for her today.  I'm boot shopping right now for her...  She needs her own things, because, well...nothing Klein has will fit her.  They can use the same lead rope but uhhh, that's about it.

A friend has also convinced me to ride with her in a 25 mile distance ride in April on Mochs.  We are not riding to be competitive.  We are looking at it like a long, slow, fun trail ride with our ponies.  Why not?  That's not what I want to get into with Mochs, but it will be a fun time with a friend and it gives us our first goal to reach together.  We are also going the night before so we'll stay a night.  That will be a good bonding experience for Mochs and I.  I have taken her to a lot of different places but never taken her overnight.  It will be a good confidence builder for her and some bonding time for us.

 One of our adventures together, chaperoning a Wounded Warriors trail ride at a local facility.  I know, I had my helmet on, I can't do anything about the facility we were at not enforcing a helmet rule.

 Once I brought her home for the day to hang out with us.  That was The Other Half's idea actually.  And at one point, I brought her in the house.  I'm telling you, when I say she'll go anywhere, I'm serious.