What has been going on

So following my post of yesterday, I forgot a lot of stuff that I did.

Since I was so sick for so long, I haven't had much riding done, but the last time, as you all know, I was working on Dandy's canter and circles. She has never turned a corner, much less a circle, while cantering before, I felt that she was too young to undertake such strain and... WHY would I need her to canter a circle???? So since she turned 4 last month, I have started working with the canter. Dandy has a naturally elevated canter, she should REALLY be under English tack, which is also one of my goals. She has a natural slow canter, huge movement... she gets that from her dad, who is AMAZING! I absolutely love riding her, she is easy to gauge, I don't need to hold her back once she is set in her speed and a simple kiss noise will get her moving up a notch. She is very good with the canter, but her trot is a bit harder to gauge, she tends to want to go faster and faster and not transition in a canter when asked... so I will be working on transitions also.

Unfortunately, I only did about two sessions of that with Dandy, then I went down with the illness, that nobody knows what it is! The first session went well, Dandy was super focused, the second, not so well, since my sister was riding Peg and Dandy kept wanting to be in competition and was always looking where they were at... I got her focusing on me and it wasn't so bad, but I had to be much more in her mouth, at least more than I like to be.

I tried going around poles with Dandy, but from the left it's a disaster, she cuts in as she turns, because she can't see that she is going around something... maybe I need to adapt just as much as she does, but I think I can forget my barrel racing dreams... :(

The last time I tacked Dandy up was on Friday (Good Friday) I think. As you know, the steers got loose and my father in-law only herded them back in the field, with the other cows... so I called my sister, tacked up Dandy and Peg (who aren't affraid of cattle at all) and started them towards the barn... there was 5 cows and 2 steer to move. We proceeded to get them in a pen close to the barn with the horses, shut a bunch of cows in with the steer, then I decided it might be better to finish the small work on foot, but we left the horses close by, in case we would need them, my horses aren't cow horses, they are just regular trail horses and pets, but they have been on cows before and pretty much know what to do. I trusted them to be able to do it, plus I just wasn't feeling well enough to walk a 40 acre pasture, chasing cows... and a very bold steer.

All went well, until the gosh darn steer stopped to face Dandy and I. He was pawing the dirt and getting it all over him... at that point, I was just standing there with Dandy, being patient, waiting for him to just get discouraged and go about moving again. I think he sized us up, he had already charged Dandy in the field, while he was out... poor Dandy would never hurt a fly and she always gets picked on for that. But, since I was sitting on Dandy, I think he thought we were a bit too big for him, so he stopped being silly and moved on after a bit of coaxing!

The part on foot was a bit less fun, since he knew we were small, so he tried charging my sister... that didn't work... I was standing at the complete other end of the pen, he eyed me and came thundering down my way... Although I was completely freaking out inside, I stood right there and started making myself look bigger, swinging away with my cane. He finaly got discouraged when he get 6 feet from me. There is no reason why he would've charged from so far, nobody cornered him, we were slowly pushing him towards the barn. Like I said... I DO NOT understand bulls and cows. I realized that leaving the horses wasn't such a great idea after all. But we finaly got them in the shelter, left the other cows out and got them in the barn... and that's where all hell broke loose. Of course I was nervous, because he had charged on us in the field and I knew that the barn was a confined space and that would just make them a bit more edgy. Fortunately for me, he decided to stop charging once I hit the post (hard!), if he had decided to pursue, I wouldn't be here today writing this.

All I know is, when it happened, I couldn't feel a thing, I hit the post and knew that I had serious damage on my back but there was no pain, I was completely focused on the bulls forehead! I don't know how much time I have hit him on the nose for him to back off I have no sense of that whatsoever... I think I went in survival mode for a minute. As soon as he backed off, I unstuck my back from the post (lol) and made my way half-way up the stairs to the hay loft. That's when the pain started... but the worst part was that the silly bull wasn't in his pen yet... I had to go back and put him in!!! I was shaking like a leaf, at that point, my SO had appeared, probably, when I was in total pain sitting in the stairs to help, so I just guided from afar so that they don't get into the same mess and I was happy to shut the gate!

By that time, my sister was completely paralyzed with fear. She has NO cow experience and I'm glad she wasn't the one being charged, she was already shaking as much as I was. So I took a pale of corn, went up the the mean bull, gave him his food and pet him on the head and neck. Please note that I would not do that if the bull was at liberty, but behind a big steel gate, what could go wrong??? I made my sister pet him too, since she was now deadly afraid of cows and never coming back to help! She did, against her own will, but at least she understood that I had pushed the bull a bit too far (He's WAY easy to push too far!). I hope I will not have to do that again... that bull weighs nearly 1 400 lbs and his little friend, who is sweet as pie weighs about 1 300 lbs, but he doesn't have a mean bone in his body!

As much as I hate to see them go, I can't wait to taste them! This is finaly our own meat, we know what it was fed, it is all natural and we know that it didn't spend a week in a grocery store fridge. It'll be top quality!