A couple of weeks ago I had a lesson with my coach-probably the first one in over a year. I tend to just plug away by myself and I sometimes lose track of how long it's been since I've checked in with my trainer. My namesake horse and I are attempting to get the changes nailed down, although recently I've been playing with the beginnings of pirouettes and some passage so neither of us get bored.
So my trainer's first question was "What do you want to look at today" to which I replied: changes and pirouettes...his response? "Well that's ambitious"...I had to laugh
Except...we did it. Played with pirouettes, touched on some changes (of which we had several clean ones to each direction
)...but we had about 10 minutes left at the end. He asked me if I had anything else I wanted to look at but I was already so pleased with how things were going I didn't want to push it. So when he asked for my whip and instructed me to start down the rail so we could play with half-steps I almost fell off my horse. ME??? HALF STEPS??? I mean...I've asked her for some just to play around but it was unsanctioned and so therefore felt somewhat taboo. I couldn't stop smiling like an idiot 
So my little home trained BLM mustang is gonna do it. I can feel it. We're gonna get to Grand Prix (the first horse I've ever trained to that level) and she's going to go out there and show folks how nice those mustangs can be <3
It isn't easy, so it is very exciting to hear people getting there.
