Making Hay in the Sunshine

Today was beautiful.  Deep blue skies and warm sun.

After breakfast, Brett and I schooled the horses in the arena.  Brett put his trail saddle on Flash and worked on mounted patrol stuff -- swinging his saber/billy club thing around and picking stuff up off the ground while mounted.  Winston and I zoomed around them doing our thing.  Today, that thing was relaxation and stretch as well as conditioning work.  (read: lots of zooming).  All the cardio work I've been doing at the gym is paying off.  Winston got tired before I did -- and he can go for a long time.  He seems happier with the old bit that came with him but still not comfortable with the contact.  It will be interesting to see how he does with comfort snaffle when it arrives. 

When the vet was up here to do his teeth, he recommended that I keep a fly mask on Winston every day.  He has some little bumps around his eyes that can develop into melanomas -- appys and Paints are prone to this, apparently.  Living at a high-ish altitude in a sunny climate doesn't help matters.  Winston doesn't mind the fly mask and I'm hoping his pasture mates don't remove it.

We seem to have difficulty with keeping clothes on the animals around here.  The bandana that Sedona wears keeps showing up on the ground in various places.  Brett caught the culprit on camera:

Later in the day, I groomed Jackson and washed his tail.  I also washed the really bad dirty spots but didn't give him a full on bath.  His hair is super thick and I'm afraid it wouldn't dry before dark -- and with lows dropping into the 30s, that wouldn't make for a happy horse.  I let him graze around the property while he dried. 

We are scheduled to take a lesson tomorrow morning with Gayle.  There is also rain in the forecast.  I am crossing my fingers that it doesn't start until the afternoon.  Brett and I loaded up the trailer with our tack so we are ready to go bright and early.  I have the video camera battery charging and will hopefully be reporting all about our first lesson together tomorrow.