Monday, May 26, 2008

Memorial Day

Memorial Day is traditionally a day for me to take barn pictures. I had some very nice ones until my compact flash card decided to crash and I lost them all. But, luckily I have a spare card or two. But Sammy ended up being my only model today (is anyone surprised?). I thought I'd throw him in the riding ring and get some pictures. He's entering a bit of a gangly growthy phase. His head all of a sudden seems much more mature than the rest of his body. He'll grow into it, right????? right?????Just like everything else, it's all about the angles you choose. This is a flattering pose for the big headed one.
And look, when he's got those muscles flexed, his head doesn't seem too big for his body, right??? It also helps that his white blaze gives a bit of an optical illusion because it tries to make his head look a bit dishy, like his mother's.
This is Sammy's favorite pose. The big head doesn't look so big removed from his neck this way.
Or look, his head without the body looks very nice and mature. I'm sure eventually his neck will be able to carry it, right???? Why is the head the first thing to look so grown up?
I've been researching and learned that one of the steps to happily backing your young horse is to get them used to you being above them, on a fence or step ladder or mounting block. So I thought, no time like the present to try that trick and see what he does. We've got over a year to perfect this move. As you can see he was traumatized. He was so torn between trying to convince me he needed to go eat his dinner, or seeing if butt scratches were better if I was taller.
The butt scratches won out........It wasn't easy to get this one handed while scratching his butt with my right hand.
I think we can scratch, make sure they don't have a problem with you being above them, off our being prepared list......Now I have to figure out a way to keep him from insisting on being scratched while I'm standing on the mounting block. We have over a year to work on that.

Happy Memorial Day All.

1 comment:

Lara said...

ok, that Woody is to die for gorgeous but Sammy, we still love that cutie! Thanks for posting all the pics! Lara