Simply Put...

I'm a lazy butt. Yeah, it happens, even to busy-freaks such as myself.

I've had a post sitting for over a week that depicts Ernie's weight loss/gain/muscle change journey in pictures, but I still cannot for the life of me get my dinosaur-aged camera to download pictures onto my laptop, so I have all of the older pictures set up, but nothing recent (within the last couple weeks, and believe me, there's been a lot of changes). For whatever reason, my laptop doesn't recognize the USB card in my camera. Hmmm...problem solving has commenced, it's just not going very well.

Both horses, I'm happy to report, are doing very well. Stella is enjoying her return to ground-driving; I've decided that until my hectic schedule calms down after the sport's season, I won't be getting on her. It's just not fair to her; I come to the barn in some state of stress, which is a big no-no for a green weenie mare with a perfectionist complex. She wants to do everything I ask so badly, but sometimes she gets a little ahead of herself. This is moreso the case under saddle, so until I can reliably have the peace of mind to deal with her baby antics, I don't want to ruin her. I've been allowing her, instead, to build up her butt. Since the weather has been (GASP) nice, for the most part, I've been working both horses in the hay field or a pasture as much as possible. They'll have all winter to do arena work, and I think it's refreshing and better for them mentally to be outdoors. It's also giving me the opportunity to work on distraction training (i.e.: no, you will not check out that horse walking by/spook at the tractor/watch a car coming down the driveway/whinny to that horse freaking out while you're with me!)

As for Ernie, Project E-Hab (I feel a little deja vu coming, didn't I do this, oh, 10 times already?) is going swimmingly. His hindquarters are much more rounded and developed, he's building up in his shoulder, his neck is coming back, and he's picked up a little endurance. Not much, but enough for an old man. We've been going out on lots of hacks around the racetrack, through the hay fields, down the dirt road, anywhere I can expose him to. When I don't have time to ride, I lunge him in the hay field; it's perfect. The ground is firm and the terrain is level enough that it's safe, but varied enough so that it presents a little challenge for him. It's like combining hill work with ring work; I get the best of both worlds and he gets a better workout in less time. Everyone wins!

More later this week. I'm going to get those conformation shots on here if it kills me.