It's a cold and it's a broken hallelujah

(The sadness of the title is not indicative of the content of this post.)

Freddie came to Fresno because he is firmly in the resale horse camp and so the more miles he can get with me, the better it will be when I go to sell him.

Let's recap his training so far so that these photos will adequately impress you. Freddie is five, has mostly been trail ridden, and at this point has about 90 days of dressage training on him, 60 of which occurred before I bought him. I've jumped him at least once probably most days I've ridden him, but he has only about 4 official "schools" on him, where we tried low courses or grids.

All of this to say: I might not be selling him.

Just kidding. But the above photo is as we approached the first fence of the day, his first cross country jump ever.

And it pretty much sums up his entire day. "Oh, we're doing a thing now," and he just rolled with it. Ears up, good attitude.

His form improved tremendously as the day went on, as did his confidence.

My favorite part of the day was how many of these photos I'm smiling in, especially after the nightmare with Kat.

His canter continues to need a lot of work, but as the day went on and he relaxed a bit I started to find the best quality I've had from him so far.

He's just so easy going and willing to please that it makes me feel like a genius.

He didn't think the water was a big deal at all, although he did threaten to JUMP in at one point.

And neither going up nor coming down were cause for any concern at all.

And even when I brought him to a ditch with ZERO real preparation, he popped right over it, no questions asked.

These aren't even all of my favorite photos! I have to save SOMETHING for y'all in this rain when I write about books or other boring things.

Anyhow - I love my baby horse and I'm really glad he came along. It made the drive home much more sweet and significantly less bitter.