Gette the Wonder Pony

By Patty Wilber

I am proud of my grown kids.  They have pursued their dreams and have lovely families, BUT THEY LIVE TOO FAR AWAY!

(Of course, I come from a family of wanderers, so what can I expect?  My parents moved from Missouri to California.  I moved from California to Texas for school, then Delaware, and finally New Mexico…Our kids are in Hawaii and Tennessee.)

But this past week, Maegan, Rick, and the three grand girls were here!  The first day was one of the wet ones, but the next set of wet waited until they flew home to Oahu. While they were here, we snuck in just two days of riding.

Cometa is a pretty good kid’s horse, but he’s still working on his lamintis recovery. (He is making progress!)

Last time I tried Penny, it did not go all that well.  Leilani wanted to lope, but I didn’t trust Penny. I had Leilei get off, and I lunged P. in the round pen.  Penny picked up a beautiful, slow, and cadenced lope.  I put Leilani back up and asked for THAT lope. Penny said, “sorry. not.” and promptly humped up and dumped Leilani. Grrr.  So, this time, Penny was not high on the list.

LT is a bit high-strung, and while I’ve seen her show a no-go side when a beginner was on her, I didn’t think she was a good option.

So that left Gette. Gette is very level-headed, but has been on the show road, and had never been ridden by youngsters…

She was amazing.

Brushing. Leilani and Violet.

Gette says, “this is quite relaxing!”

Hoof cleaning.by Amara (in red) and Leilani.  Gette says, “time to nap.”

zzzzzzz

More hoof cleaning. Violet, Amara, and mom Maegan). Good thing there are four feet, so everyone can try!

Gette says, “four people for one hoof. cool. zzzzz.” (4th person is holding the hoof up.)

Maegan and Violet. Violet did not want to get off!

Leilani. Gette just went along, no biggie.

Gette: “look! i even let them ride double!”

Leilani rode again two days later in the round pen, which had dried out.  I used a saddle that fit her better, and she even loped! (I had to encourage Gette to go).  I got what I thought was a great video of her trotting, too. But turns out it was a 50 second video of my shirt buttons. Sigh.

The exciting thing was that Gette was not at all excited.  She just went around, cool as a cucumber, even when L. got a little out of rhythm at the lope and was bouncing around up there!

Cocoa (who is just two) is also a solid citizen.  He gave a pony ride to Violet from the arena to the barn.  He got some flowers as a reward.

“my flowers are the best!”, he says.

Now, if they only lived here, I could drag them all to lots of horse shows and trail rides!

We got more rain after the grands flew home to Hawaii.  That resulted in a stream in our little canyon! That will not seem like a big deal to anyone in a wetter climate, but running water is not a thing around here! It will stop flowing in a day or so, but boy, it is fun to have a live stream, if only temporarily!

Zuri loves water!

Cocoa took to crossing readily, even though he didn’t get flowers for his efforts!