Starting Back Up

So I gave Nine a couple days to just sit in the round pen and let his legs recover from 15 solid hours in the horse trailer. This morning after he ate I haltered him and tried a trick I saw in Fort Worth; Mark Lyon, who ended up winning the whole deal, was working with a horse in the practice arena. He put a rope around the horse's belly to encourage the horse to move forward. I thought this was so obviously brilliant, and I felt so stupid for not thinking of it! Then yesterday I saw the same idea in an article somewhere. Anyways, I tried that with Nine, but not much surprise - he barely even noticed it was there! I think I might have sacked him out too well in that area... But no worries, he will be a kids horse anyways, most likely, and kids horses have to be cool with that sort of thing.

So after giving up on that I got the mounting block next to Nine and worked on leaning on his back. He was doing super good, and my daughter was busying herself chasing goats, so I decided to put a leg over Nine's back. First I rubbed his side with my knee, then got my thigh up on his back, and before I knew it, my whole leg was on the other side! I still a toe on the mounting block, but Nine had most of my weight and was doing fine with me hopping a bit and moving my leg all over the place. I did a little work from his other side (leaned over his back but didn't put a leg over) then gave him a break for the day. Tomorrow Mom ought to be here so I think I will go ahead and get on him, perhaps bareback to start.