Its been a while since i have posted! Hope you enjoy the pictures!

Wow! I am so proud of Valero and Cord!I actually rode them! Valero could care less when I sat on him! He responded to my leg cues and bit pressure!! What I did to get him ready for me to actually ride him was I watched Kitty Lauman's Success Under Saddle. I also put fake legs on him(boat bumpers) to get him used to things hitting him in the sides. I was very impressed with how well he handled everything!

I also rode Cord today! He didn't respond to leg pressure(Which i was happy with because the last time I rode him once I put my feet on him he had a bucking fit) This was the one hole we had the last time we tried to train Cord to saddle. We didn't get him used to leg pressure. My mom just led me around while i was on him make sure he had no fits. We didn't get any pictures of this unfortunately.

Today we only had 3 hours to work with our horses due to how busy we were. Valero was responding better to leg cues and bit pressure.

We started off with my mom leading me around on Cord, then I told my mom," Take the halter off." She looked at me like i was CRAZY! haha! "The bird has to leave the nest sometime,mom. Cord needs to figure this out on his own and he can't do that if he is following you the whole time." is what I told her to get her to take off the lead. Cord was very confused at first as to why my mom was not leading him anymore and when I put leg pressure on him... nothing. So to get him to move I turned his head away from my mom . Once Cord got going he caught onto the idea of walking around.

Thats all for this post!! I was going to play with them today but out of NOWHERE stupid SNOW shows up on my SPRING break!!!! UGH!!! Stupid snow!!!

    Well it was that annual time of the year for the MM&BSC meeting! We arrived at 11 and there was already so many people there! Before the official meeting began we had time to catch up and eat!(Good food BTW!) Karen came up to me and asked me if I liked her shirt! I replied, "YES!" Later on in the meeting she said,"Since you like my shirt so much you can have it!" So she gave it to me! (SHE HAD ANOTHER SHIRT ON UNDERNEATH WHEN SHE TOOK IT OFF!)
    When the official meeting began they started handing out awards,old and new.
*Best Dressed Cowgirl: Angela(my mom)
*Best Dressed Cowboy: Glen
There were 3 new awards, the Dona Brown Living Legend Award,  the Mary Brieck Trail Riding Award,  and the Jimmie Demmitt Youth Award.
The DBLL's went to ...
*Kristi and Randy for their hardships with Elena and Izzy/Sky. They stood by their horses when they were going through some real bad health spots.
*Brenda and Jay for helping Levi(their mustang) regain his sight and have a new lease on life.
 The Mary Brieck Trail Riding Award  was made to honor Mary Brieck who promoted mustangs through trail riding. This award went to...
*None other then April!

The Jimmie Dimmitt Award went to ...
*Me!! The award says,"Presented to Jessi in recognition of excellence in promoting America's living legends in 2010."
*And Makinly!
The whole thing was very emotional! My mother typed up a biography on my whole life! I was speechless at first! Thank you everyone!

We all so very much enjoyed this meeting! Looking around while we were in that group picture I just thought how crazy it was that this group started with just Kristi and Randy and progressed into so much! AMAZING!
Pictures courtesy of Dona Brown.

The adoption was AMAZING! I am soooo sad its over! Ok so I am now known as the horse enabler! I got two people to adopt mustangs that weren't planning on it!There was the 7 yr. old girl who got the 3 yr. old Sorrel mare, and a girl about my age who got a 2 yr. old black gelding. The girl my age was soooo excited. She said all sorts of things were running through her head with what she was going to do with him! I gave her my email and the groups.  So hopefully she will join. I told her to email me or the group if she has questions. I got some pics for her since they weren't expecting to adopt and therefore had no cameras. I do believe she may name him Knight or something. Jay and Chris actually worked with him, They had him giving to pressure with a LEAD and almost ground driving!! I told her if Jay spent anymore time with that horse they'd be able to walk it onto the trailer!!
    I gave a demo with Valero several times, and I am guessing some people found it interesting... I hope they did!I showed everyone what i have taught him so far. Actually, a girl came up to me and she sounded quite interested in the Extreme Mustang Makeover. So hopefully we will see her in it someday!
    Shari also invited me to do a vaulting demo with her, Andrea, and Patience(Shari's Mustang). Let me tell you.... I have never vaulted on such a small horse!
     Jay also worked with Lero... I was told he was pushy... Yes i know... I need to get harder on him. Hehe! But it was amazing what Jay got Valero to do in such a short amount of time!! Thank you soooo much Jay! I will keep working with him!
     I was telling my parents that Kahlua, Valero and I will be famous someday! haha! Kahlua and I are going to be in the news, I was interviewed in the Columbia Tribune( here is the link...   http://www.columbiatribune.com/news/2011/feb/26/mustangs-burros-ready/    )
and Martha is going to put the picture of Kahlua kissing the little girl in a magazine!!! I think we got some good publicity for the mustangs!!

Well we have gotten 10 inches so far... its supposed to snow more tonight. Ugh!! Go away! I want Summer! Heres some more pics of the snowdays.

So you guys know that "newly horse crazy" next door neighbor i went sledding with today?? Well we decided to go visit her horse at the place she boards him at. I bundled up and brought my lunge whip, lunge line and hobbles(she wants to start teaching him how to lay down). We got there and the things i noticed right off was he gets in her space and LOVES to try her!!! She told me his major problems were backing, lunging on the line(pulls too much), just the basic things need touch ups... So i got the pulling while lunging thing under control(he was lunging with slack in his rope by the end of the night) and backed a few nice steps. After further investigation i noticed he loved to throw his head while trotting. I asked her if he always did this. She said," Not this bad" Come to find out when he throws his head she just gets off!!! That was the problem he was trying to get me off! Eventually he learned he wouldn't get me off and we moved onto the canter... She has never cantered on him nor will she ever until the "problem" is fixed. I wondered what problem this was... I found out a little too late! I have never been on a horse bucking SOOOO badly!! I felt like i was on one of those bucking broncos at a rodeo!! I was sooooooo mad at him i smacked him got off and lunged his little butt off!! He was sweating by the time we were done... i handed him to my friend and said i need a break and he needs to be walked out... So that was the end of my crazy night!!First not so easy training experience! But i do have to say I am proud of myself for the immense changes i did see in him that I CHANGED! 

I took some photo's of the horses in the snow!

Here are some pictures of me working with Valero the day BEFORE we were scheduled to leave for the Nebraska EMM!

Here is just something extra I saw on facebook! It is REALLY cool!

This morning being as cold as it is and with snow on the way the farrier came out to do all 4 of my horses. I think my horses knew some COLD weather was coming because they were FRISKY! Kahlua went while i worked with Valero.

    Valero has gotten kind of out of shape as winter has gone on but I expected that because i am so busy during winter. I started out our lesson with lunging. You could tell Lero was feeling good because when i asked him to trot he threw his head, but i snapped the lead and he came back to earth. We basically just did a big review so Lero doesn't forget what he learned last summer and we can continue this summer! (Can you believe i will be working on sitting on Lero this summer!)

    After Cordero went it was Valero's turn. I had butterflies in my stomach because the last farrier visit did not go well at all(Our farrier's hand got sliced open because Valero yanked his foot away)Valero was not bad but he wasn't good...(definately better than last time!)Valentine went then it was time for de-worming. Valero got his first big boy de-wormer today! Of course he tried to eat it but I got it in.

    On another note I have decided not to do the training job i was offered...I didn't get a chance to evaluate the horses, but i was told by our farrier,"Very nice people but their horses are crazy." He is a very honest person and had the chance to trim their horse's hooves. Turns out the Clydesdale broke his hand after the horse yanked his foot away and then kicked out at LeRoy. So that's the latest update.

Photos 2-4 courtesy of Beth Ridenour, www.artfulpath.com