So with all of this extra time now, I got the truck hooked up to the trailer, made sure the current Coggins was in the truck and went inside to start getting my family ready. My youngest son is very hard to wake up in the morning, we call him the bear, so it takes some time to get him up and ready to go. He growled and moaned until I threatened to throw water in his face (works every time!). Ok, so let me tell you that by this time it was 8:30 am and I put all the kids to bed the night before at 9 pm. Plenty of sleep. Hubby said he wanted to leave at 9:30 am to give us enough time (we had to be there at 10 am) so these kids needed to get breakfast and dressed. On a school day it we give them an hour or so to get ready so I figured we had better plan on the same time frame.
At 9:00 am I got Zoe from her breakfast. She was still eating. Seriously. Still eating. I tied her to the trailer and did a thorough grooming. She was as shiny as a horse without a bath can get. Her mane was nice (except for the spot where she rubbed her mane out and is starting to come back in so it stands straight up!) and her tail was gorgeous. I trimmed up her bridle path but left her whiskers and her fuzzy ears alone. No point in taking the fuzz off with all of the flies - we're not going to a show so I never trim up those areas. I sprayed her good with fly spray and cleaned her feet. Then it was time to go! Hubby was impatiently waiting for me to load Zoe. While I was grooming, he had loaded the kiddos in the truck so he was ready.
I led Zoe into the trailer but she only put her front feet in and stopped. WTH? She always loads so I didn't know what was different this time. Oh wait! The smell is probably different than the last time. We own a stock/horse combo gooseneck trailer and a neighbor (our feed guy) borrowed the trailer to haul some steers. When we got it back, it was disgusting. We cleaned it the best we could but I'm sure that's what she was smelling and wasn't so sure about. I just gave her a little time and coaxed her a little and she jumped the rest of the way in. I shut the door, climbed into the truck and we were off!
The drive was uneventful and we got the the trainer's barn in plenty of time. Zoe was calling excessively when we arrived. There is a beautiful, palomino stud there and he wasn't even interested in her, although a big bay gelding was VERY interested. He answered her every call. It didn't take long and the trainer was out at the trailer. We talked some business talk about what she was going to do, what I expected, money, etc. Then it was time to unload. Zoe was a hot mess in that trailer. She had pooped and it was on the runny side so her backside was messy and of course she stomped in it so now her feet were messy and she was all sweaty. I guess all that grooming and extra TLC that morning was for nothing. Dang mare. Zoe unloaded fine but was very alert. She was good but had to be reminded a couple times that she can't push me around just to see what was around her.
We put her in her turnout behind the barn. She was being penned next to two geldings on one side and a big gelding on the other. She immediately set out to sniff the perimeter - not caring about the horses in the pen next to her. At this point the stud actually acknowledged that she was there only by looking her direction. He never called to her the entire time we were there - amazing!
We did some more small talk and it was time to go. As a side note, I really like her. I think she has the right methods for training. She's not a bully but has expectations of the horse. She expects them to behave and lets them know when they aren't (Zoe needs to be reminded of that). She knows what she wants and how to ask the horse for it, which is also very important. She said she will work with Zoe everyday and if she misses a day during the week she will make up for it on the weekend. She was going to let Zoe settle in for a couple days and start working on Monday. We've been having extreme heat (in the mid to upper 90's with high humidity) this week so I wonder what all she did. She was going to start on ground work and see what holes are there. She will move on to saddle work once she feels Zoe is ready for it. The pace is going to be set by Zoe so if Zoe decides she wants to learn it could go very quickly. If she decides to be difficult, it will take longer. That's another reason I like her. So I've been dying to text her to see how things are going but it's only been a few days so I don't want to seem over anxious...ya know? I will wait until next week...I guess.
Sorry about not taking any pictures. I was way too
Until next time!
Quote for the day:
"Smile, it's free therapy."
-Douglas Horton
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