milliepops
Wears headscarf aggressively
Where does the time go? 5 years ago to this day, I invited a funny pink welsh cob into my life. For the next 12 months I wondered what on earth I had done, but slowly but surely she turned from devil pony to complete angel and I feel incredibly lucky to have her. Thought I'd do a little post looking back at our journey so far 
Kira was supposed to be a little project while Millie was recovering from an injury. She came from a friend of a friend, who had a riding accident with Kira when she lived in France and it had basically just unravelled to the point where K was turned away until she was ready to part with her. This was the only photo I saw before going to get her
I thought from her owner's description that she probably just needed whipping into shape and then I'd sell her as a RC pony, finally releasing some funds to buy the WB I've always wanted...
Turned up at the yard with the lorry and it took 2 people to drag her down the field. I fell in love with her little curly ears but it was clear she wasn't just turned away, she was feral. We manhandled her onto the box and took her home, where she instantly fell in love with Millie (she'd been kept on her own for a few years so she was just thrilled to see another horse
)
So this was the starting point. I have never seen such a fat horse and i think she must have some kind of incredible luck to not be laminitic
I couldn't get a saddle on her because they just bobbled around like a pea on a trampoline, so I started out just doing some low key groundwork and getting to know her. Eventually it was time to get on, and she clearly remembered what all that was about because I just climbed straight on without any drama,but that didn't last long because I soon uncovered a major napping problem. She wouldn't go up the drive, she wouldn't go in the woods, she just reared and ran backwards... bogged off over the edge of cliffs... not the easy project I was hoping for. I haven't ever ridden anything like it. Increasing the pressure with tack or a helper with a lunge whip just escalated the problem. She didn't really care for other horses either - we could ride out with someone and if she decided she wasn't going any further, she would just nap and watch them walk out of sight
There were so many bad days, I don't even know how I got through them, other than a deep sense of responsibility knowing I was her last chance, there was no way I could pass this pony onto anyone else in good conscience - someone would end up getting badly hurt. On the ground she was a complete angel, she would follow me around when I was poo picking and drag me over for a cuddle and who could deny the cuteness of THIS:
Shortly after the first christmas I decided I needed to have one big push and then if she wasn't improving by easter, I would take her on a one-way trip to the hunt kennels. I found a local freelance lady who had her own brand of natural horsemanship that was not gimmicky but very horse-centric and she came to help me a couple of times a week. Together we figured out how to get her feet unstuck when she napped and sure enough before easter she started to turn the corner. Whether it was just luck, or whether I had relaxed *myself* by picking that date, i will never know but it's definitely something I would do again.
When she could start hacking, we could ride round to a nearby arena and start doing some proper work! And then we started going out to some little shows and outings. This was our first party,a local funride
In the August we started going to some shows - on a ticket first and then I affiliated her straight away just to give her a guaranteed kind of show. We had some highs and some lows - she would score in the 50s and in the 70s on the same day
Not many pics as I'm always on my own but here she is having a couple of Kira moments in a random novice, March 2016
It's interesting watching old videos because I can see the strengths & weaknesses that have developed since - e.g. the canter is inclined to bounce croup high and that used to push her out of balance, but the activity that caused that really helped her with the changed as soon as she learnt to keep her bum *down*
From that point on she has really blossomed
She's done area festivals and regionals at every level - not always done very well when we got there but just to qualify has felt like an achievement given where she started from.
2017 area festival at Mount Ballan, look at her stumpy legs amongst the big horses! This was the year we did Medium.
That same year we did our first advanced test and also got our photo in H&H A tremendously proud moment, but also bittersweet because I was supposed to do my first advanced on Millie but she had just retired at that point
Kira was supposed to be a little project while Millie was recovering from an injury. She came from a friend of a friend, who had a riding accident with Kira when she lived in France and it had basically just unravelled to the point where K was turned away until she was ready to part with her. This was the only photo I saw before going to get her
I thought from her owner's description that she probably just needed whipping into shape and then I'd sell her as a RC pony, finally releasing some funds to buy the WB I've always wanted...
Turned up at the yard with the lorry and it took 2 people to drag her down the field. I fell in love with her little curly ears but it was clear she wasn't just turned away, she was feral. We manhandled her onto the box and took her home, where she instantly fell in love with Millie (she'd been kept on her own for a few years so she was just thrilled to see another horse
)So this was the starting point. I have never seen such a fat horse and i think she must have some kind of incredible luck to not be laminitic
I couldn't get a saddle on her because they just bobbled around like a pea on a trampoline, so I started out just doing some low key groundwork and getting to know her. Eventually it was time to get on, and she clearly remembered what all that was about because I just climbed straight on without any drama,but that didn't last long because I soon uncovered a major napping problem. She wouldn't go up the drive, she wouldn't go in the woods, she just reared and ran backwards... bogged off over the edge of cliffs... not the easy project I was hoping for. I haven't ever ridden anything like it. Increasing the pressure with tack or a helper with a lunge whip just escalated the problem. She didn't really care for other horses either - we could ride out with someone and if she decided she wasn't going any further, she would just nap and watch them walk out of sight
There were so many bad days, I don't even know how I got through them, other than a deep sense of responsibility knowing I was her last chance, there was no way I could pass this pony onto anyone else in good conscience - someone would end up getting badly hurt. On the ground she was a complete angel, she would follow me around when I was poo picking and drag me over for a cuddle and who could deny the cuteness of THIS:
Shortly after the first christmas I decided I needed to have one big push and then if she wasn't improving by easter, I would take her on a one-way trip to the hunt kennels. I found a local freelance lady who had her own brand of natural horsemanship that was not gimmicky but very horse-centric and she came to help me a couple of times a week. Together we figured out how to get her feet unstuck when she napped and sure enough before easter she started to turn the corner. Whether it was just luck, or whether I had relaxed *myself* by picking that date, i will never know but it's definitely something I would do again.
When she could start hacking, we could ride round to a nearby arena and start doing some proper work! And then we started going out to some little shows and outings. This was our first party,a local funride
In the August we started going to some shows - on a ticket first and then I affiliated her straight away just to give her a guaranteed kind of show. We had some highs and some lows - she would score in the 50s and in the 70s on the same day
Not many pics as I'm always on my own but here she is having a couple of Kira moments in a random novice, March 2016
It's interesting watching old videos because I can see the strengths & weaknesses that have developed since - e.g. the canter is inclined to bounce croup high and that used to push her out of balance, but the activity that caused that really helped her with the changed as soon as she learnt to keep her bum *down*
From that point on she has really blossomed
She's done area festivals and regionals at every level - not always done very well when we got there but just to qualify has felt like an achievement given where she started from.
2017 area festival at Mount Ballan, look at her stumpy legs amongst the big horses! This was the year we did Medium.
That same year we did our first advanced test and also got our photo in H&H
A tremendously proud moment, but also bittersweet because I was supposed to do my first advanced on Millie but she had just retired at that point
