Elective: Equestrian Studies

Cherub 2's school plans for one of her electives

this year are a bit "horse-y".

She has been learning to ride for a year now,
but wants to take her "hobby" more seriously now,
as she is considering a career in the Equestrian world.

Her plans, assembled in a Charlotte Mason style,
include a combination of horse literature (fiction and non-fiction),

horse veterinary care and anatomy,

horse "care" manuals,
horse training methods and resources,

DVDs about various horse-topics

such as styles of training and riding,

perhaps some riding clinics and shows (and of course Horse 4H) ....

Some of the books we've planned are:

True Horsemanship Through Feel (Training - Leslie Desmond & Bill Dorrance)

Natural Horsemanship:  Six Keys To A Natural Horse-Human Relationship (Training - Pat Parelli)

Natural Horsemanship Explained:  From Heart To Hands (Training - Robert Miller)

The Seven Games of Parelli Natural Horsemanship (Training - video - Pat Parelli)

The Horse Owners Veterinary Handbook (Care and Keeping - Thomas Gore, DVM)

The Horse Lover's Bible:  The Complete Practical Guide To Horse Care and Management (Tamsin Pickeral)

True Horse Story (Literature - various titles from this series by Judy Andrekson & David Parkins)

Black Beauty (Literature - Anna Sewell)

My Friend Flicka (Literature - Mary O'Hara - we'll also watch movie 1 and 2)

National Velvet (Literature - Enid Bagnold)

The Black Stallion (Literature - this title and other's in the series - Walter Farley)

Marguerite Henry's Misty of Chincoteague, King of the Wind, Justin Morgan (and other stories).

Draw 50 Horses (Art - Lee Ames)

All of these are tied together in a neat balanced package,

and are topped with weekly Horsemanship Training and

weekly Horseback Riding Lessons.

Today our trainer/teacher came ....

Ms. "R" worked with Sunny first (our yearling),

and then the whole party went off on

their first trail "adventure" next door.

It promised to be a wonderful adventure !!

 Sunny was busy checking everything out  ...

and other than a few small spooks,

she did really really well for her first

time on a trail "walk" !

Sunny loves and trusts Ms. R ....

plus she seems to gather a lot of her

"horse" confidence from Cinnamon .... 

As you can imagine then, 

having Cinnamon AND Ms. R with her on the trail

worked really well.

Her spooks were limited (and short lived) ...

and without much spookiness,

Sunny is curious and continues to be willing to "try" new things.

By the end of the trail, Sunny was "old hat" at trail walking.

She appeared to be quite pleased with herself.

HA !

Cinnamon acted as though she had ridden this trail

a gazillion times before, even though it was her first time ... 

she and Cherubs 2 had a fantastic time together, I believe.

Above:  And look at that view ... WOW !!

What a blessing it is to live here,

and to see this every single day.

Here's the adventurous party heading back toward the barn ....

And here, Cherub 2 and Cinnamon are waiting for

Sunny and Ms. R to catch up ....

we also suspect that Cinny was

checking to be sure we

didn't want her to maybe go 

into the barn first ....

maybe a snack from the Feed Room, Cinny thought ???

Ahhhhh ... back in the pasture again ...

safe and sound ...

and s-o-f-t.

All of the adventurers, human and equine alike,

were pleased ... it was a grand adventure, indeed.