By Way of Introduction

I am a horse trainer and riding instructor in Northern California with more years of experience under my belt than my age would suggest, less formal instruction than I'd ever admit to, and a desire to become one of the best. What the 'best' means changes to me pretty regularly, but welcome to my adventure towards that nebulous goal.

I was mostly encouraged to start this blog by my enthusiastic following of Carly's incredible blog, Poor Woman Showing.  I adore her and Bobby's adventures, and when a new post title pops up on my Google Now (yeah, that happens pretty much first thing in the morning) I always look forward to reading it. So I'm hoping that I can learn to enjoy looking back on my own blog similarly, or that I can find some community of riders that would enjoy my adventures. 

I ride a lot of horses and kavetch about a lot of students with my friends, so I assume this blog will be similar. I'd also like to explore my discovery of new books and the application of principles within. 

Here we are. I bought a horse this weekend. 

His name is Tango. He doesn't believe in cantering calmly yet. He'd rather jet sideways, porpoise through the air, and then hand-gallop. We'll fix that, in time. His previous owners also said that he "doesn't like to jump", so after I reinstall brakes in this beastie I'll try to figure out what they mean by that. 

I have several horses I ride pretty regularly, and I'm sure I'll write about their progress too. 

By way of introduction: 

Jimmy, a horse I had in training and can't seem to help but continue riding for free, ridden by a student in the photo. When I started working with him, he wouldn't canter. I'm about to recognize a theme.

Danny, who is arguably the UGLIEST jumper in the world. He's a dressage-morgan that I jump occasionally because it's good for his hind-end and because I think it's a little funny.

Those are the main characters.

Looking forward to sharing the tale!
-Kate