Great play day with Vicki and Hana

Thanks to Vicki for use of her camera and to Hana for taking some of them!!

My favourite pic of the day - Merlot trying to kiss Vicki under the umbrella!

Shiraz showing off - she LOVES the pedestal.

Vicki shaking the flag as vigorously as she could!! Hana took the pic.

Had a fantastic day with Vicki and Hana teaching the twins to tie and learning about clicker training. Vicki has some great pictures on her blog - thank you both for taking them and helping me out!

I thought that umbrellas would be a good distraction for the twins as they have only seen them twice before - once when they were yearlings and on Sunday, when Claire and I did a little bit. Then Shiraz was quite worried even in the paddock but Merlot didn't seem to care. Cam was the one who spooked most though.
Interestingly, Shiraz was fine yesterday and we had a job to get them to pull back. Cam was heaps better too - must have done something right.. Vicki had to sneak up on Merlot to cause him to jump (we felt mean but needed to test it out) and even then he put no tension in the line. We did manage to get him to step back by Vicki very vigorously waving the 'flag' right infront of his nose and Hana twirling an umbrella behind.

I was very pleased that I could yoyo Shiraz back between Vicki and Hana madly twirling the umbrellas - she wasn't fussed at all. Her favourite thing was showing off he trick that she taught herself - on the pedestal.

Then in the late afternoon I went and rode Hebee - Claire kindly gave me a walk and (fast at times) trot passenger lesson. Hebee lost an eye some months ago, so Claire has been figuring out how to support him. She has done a great job. He is a lbi but she has found the key with a few treats - wow he is a different horse. Before he had no go button but he has an excellent go and stop button now - stop when he spots a tasty patch of grass and even when trotting FAST sticks his head down and stops so fast that he slides!! Helped my independent seat no end - if we hadn't walked for a good 10 or 15 minutes first just getting more in harmony I would have been off over the front I'm sure. Had us in stitches. We even got a few circles with Claire on his blind side. She is one savvy girl. I was very pleased to see no ruffled hairs when I took Hebee's saddle off. There were some quite acrobatic manouvers compard to what I'm used to, as well. So it isn't just me when I ride Cam - well, we have a lot to practice. What a great day!! (and how much more interesting a blog is to read with more pics...must take my camera out more but possibly not today - raining again..)