time out!

No, we do not "do" time out for the kids. I don't think that is effective. The name of my quarter horse that is 1 year old is named Time Out. Being a stay at home wife and mom, she is MY time out. Get it?! People that know what it's like to loose themselves in the barn for hours at a time and love horses understand that best I guess. As Time Out gets older and I can saddle her up and go for a gallop in the fields I'll love my "time out" more! That was rambling I know, but hang on I'm getting there. We bought a fore cart this fall, we saved our money and bought one! A fore cart is like a sulky, you know for race horses, only more sturdy. So today a friend of ours who trains and races standard bred horses came over and helped us start training Time Out. Both Matthew and I were wondering how she would do, at times Time Out has a mind and will of her own and doesn't want to cooperate! Typical baby! Well today she did very well indeed. We took her away from Abby (her mother and buddy, Abby didn't care that she was taken away either), tied her in the barn, put a bit in her mouth for the first time, and put part of the driving harness on her! I laughed as she seemed to gag and roll her eyes and tongue around the bit. She was too busy chewing and trying to get the bit out of her mouth and didn't even flinch when we put the crouper, the piece that goes around her tail, or cinch up the girth! We took our time doing all this too, just slow and easy, and let her smell and eye all the equipment before we put it on her. We stood around in the barn for a while to see if she would do something stupid, because some horses do, but she continued to chew and gag on her bit, and just looked at us wondering what was coming next. Then we decided it was time to take her out and see what she would do, she was wonderful! She trotted abound Matthew still chewing on the bit, and then pranced around as he led her around the fields to get her used to the harness. She didn't once try to do anything wild and crazy either. Our friend was impressed and said that she was taking all of the new stuff we were doing very well. She also went on to tell us some horror stories about horses not taking it well, so I was thankful Time Out was being so good! We ended on a good note, petted and praised her well! All and all it was about half an hour, then we took the harness and bridle off and put her back out in the pasture with Abby. She shook her pretty head and cantered off to go see "mama." They greeted one another by smelling noses, then happily went on to eat grass. I know we still have a long way to go, but hopefully things will continue to go well! We are very pleased and excited about this process and pray it continues. We have many trails out here and hope to enjoy them in the fore cart together!