I can hardly believe it’s already April! So far, this year has been terrifying and wonderful and oh so busy, but I love what I do so much that I don’t mind. I am quite happy with the universe because each day I grow more aware of how I walk hand in scarred Hand with the King.

So, let’s have a look at our goals.

Arwen’s goals:

• Get her fit – A work in progress, but I’m happy with the progress. She survived the 2125m, 17-effort course at Le Godimo, albeit with a stack of time penalties, despite the horrific heat. At the moment, our most intense workout was 9.9km at an average speed of 22.9km/h (380mpm), our top speed 59kph (980mpm). We’re not event fit yet, but making good progress.
• Build her upper neck muscle – A resounding success. I really, really like her musculature now. She looks strong without being butch. She just needs to lose weight, but those neck muscles are where I want them.
• School Elementary Medium successfully – This one will take a while. We’ve been working on collected trot, counter-canter, medium trot, shoulder-ins and more difficult leg-yields. We also got a flying change yesterday, more or less by fluke, and the Mutterer is drilling us in lessons, which is exactly what we need.
• Introduce scary-looking jumps – Haven’t done a lot on this one, except at shows and clinics. She’s been as brave as the day there.
• Have her go through water more easily – Done. We did have a look at the Le Godimo water complex but she didn’t stop or even walk. Just trot, peek, and jump in. Super happy with that.
• Show graded in EV70 – Not yet, but we’ve done EV60 at a graded show, and will do unaffiliated EV70 at the end of May.

Exavior’s goals:

• Complete advanced halter training – Done. We can now trot, stand squarely, walk on a loose lead, turn on the forehand, and turn on the haunches in hand. Also no standing on top of people or dragging them around. This is a big one, so it’s just about all we accomplished so far, but it’s the basis for everything else.
• Leading over, through and under scary things
• Leading away from his group
• Bathing – Started on this but he still doesn’t like water to be on his bottom.
• Desensitisation to noise and sight
• Loading preparation
• Loading
• Injections
• Be gelded
• Lowering of the head when requested by pressure on the halter – Total win. You barely have to breathe on his halter and you have ears around your knees. Also he keeps his head down while I switch halter and fly mask.
• Basic lunging with a halter and long line only
• Wearing a roller
• Lunging over poles
• Wearing boots
• Preparation for clipping

Magic’s goals:

• Improve fitness – Win. He’s a thoroughbred. He was basically born fit. He can canter around an 80cm course without being breathless, which is all I need from him right now.
  
• Tie up – Eh, more or less. He ties up just fine until he gets a huge fright, and then he’ll still break his lead.
• Load – Done. Self-loads now, sweet creature.
• School Novice  – Work in progress; he still flips his head in transitions and sometimes in the canter. Lengthenings are good, simple changes are good, leg-yields are getting there.
• Survive a hack – Nothing yet, but it’s in the pipeline.
• Be confident at 80cm  – Done! Okay, so I’m not confident, but the height is not a problem for me at 80cm with him. We’re schooling 90cm at the moment with success.
• Show graded at 70cm showjumping – Showed ungraded at 60cm, and would have showed ungraded 70cm this weekend, but he came up mysteriously lame. Maybe God’s just saying we need another couple weeks.

Thunder’s goals:

• Fix his mild tendency to get in your space – He doesn’t do it with me anymore. With submissive or timid people he does still stand over you but never with malicious intent and he knows he’s not allowed to move anyone’s feet.
• Get him to stand dead still for a bath – I didn’t bath him, but I hosed him off alone, and he stood like a stone.
• Introduce flying changes
• Improve on sliding stops, spins and rein backs
• Log as many trail miles as possible

As for the old warrior Queen, she’s as happy as a bird, fat, healthy, and tries to throw me off on a regular basis just to remind me who’s the Queen around here. And that’s all she needs to do.