November 28

So Andy and I went out with the goal to repeat the dance and get it on video so we could share our success.  The only goal of what I was doing with him is to get him to stay with me… stay connected.  You will see I kind of lost him toward the end, but overall he stayed with me.  (By the way, you’ll also hear the commentary from Andy as he tried to video with FanciPants [our other youngin’] as “director”)

I’m also posting videos of some of the other work we did yesterday… we played the friendly game again and he’s given us almost 100% permission to be in his Zone 2 – his neck area.  He still prefers his right side to his left side (this is mainly due to the fact that when he was beaten [by former owners] it always came from the left.  So naturally he doesn’t like people being on his left side.  That’s ok…. we will work up to that.

The friendly game – this is basically a game we play with the horse to get him used to the stuff we’re carrying, like the lead rope, the halter and the  carrot stick string, almost as if they are just extensions of ourselves…. they mean nothing at this point.  It is kind of a desensitization thing for the horse.  Today I was able to swing the string in front of me and still have him come to me.  He wanted to be with me more than going away… it doesn’t seem like much to most, but this takes A LOT of effort on his part so this is real progress…

I think Jen is going to be pleased with our progress with she is here again on Tuesday!  I am excited to show her what we’ve been doing and to learn what direction we need to go in next.