First Ride

Today, I was hopeful to get the first ride on my mustang filly, based on last nights success with her letting me hop up on top of her.   I round penned her for a little while to take the edge off of her and had her consistently turning in, which she is getting really good at.  After she faced up and let me catch her, I put the saddle pad on at least 50 times from each side until she was licking and chewing(this tells me that she is comfortable with it) and then I put the saddle on about 25 times from each side until I got the same signs.  At this point, I gave her some bit pressure until she yielded her hindquarter and then I asked for her to give to the bit and flex.  Both of these things she remembered from the night before, so she seems to be catching on to all the previous sessions.  At this point, I flexed her and stood up in the saddle and at first she moved her feet a little, so I stayed in the stirrup with my body on the left hand side until she stopped moving her feet, then I stepped down and repeated this several times.  This let me mount her several times with a postive outcome, instead of just swinging on and grabbing as much leather as I could, which is the way we used to do it when I was growing up.  I did this on both sides and we had equal success on each side.  Also toward the latter part, I would mount and sit in the saddle with my leg over and in the stirrup, and then dismount and do this again several times so she could see my leg on the off side.  This went really well and things were rolling along fairly smooth.
     Well there comes a time when you ask the horse for some forward motion, and initially she had some sticky feet, but I finally encouraged her to move forward and just give me a few steps before doing a one rein stop and then flexing a few times before we asked for forward motion again.  We repeated these steps and worked our way up to a jog and then also a lope.  So we had our first ride, and learded a lot of one-rein stops, and she is flexing and giving to the bit well.  It is always nice to have a successful first ride and at the end, I stepped off and rubbed her on the head, and she lowered her head, and moved it toward me.  Couldn't have asked for a better outcome.  Tonight I gave her a little grain on her hay for the first time.