Cherokee is coming along beautifully. It's very obvious to tell she is a green horse still. We've started trotting in-hand but she gets a little excited and prances and shakes her head a little but considering how she could react to trotting in-hand I would rather have excitment and enjoyment than slamming on the breaks and being abbrasive. We also did our first (assisted) 90 degree pivot the other day. She was a little confused at first since when I would ask her to pivot she was want to move her butt as well as her front end. She is starting to get the idea and she squares up very nicely and almost perfectly. She backs like she was born doing it and overall I am very happy with her. She loves to work and please and is becoming a real in your pocket filly. She is still shy around new people so I am thinking for her first show I will enter her into as many halter classes as possible so that she will have a class or two to look around and calm down in (of course after some lunging before the show starts). I think I know how she is going to act at her first show so I am going to bold my prediction and then post how she actually does to see if I am close lol. We'll call it my futur reading session! Prediction: I believe she will be alert and have your typical girraffe head BUT I also think if I ask her to lower her head she will and I think she will get the job done but will be green, alert, and probably not stand still as much as I would like... I also know the arena and I think the mesh netting they hang for 'walls' will also potentially spooke her but I don't see it being a HUGE ground breaking spook. As far as placing I have no idea! lol
We skiped out on the January 8th show because her owners did not have the money to afford her classes and gas which is no big deal I don't think she would have done as well since she was BEARLY trotting in-hand then but being tied to the trailer would have done her a world of good lol. Her first show will (hopefully) be Feb 7th where she will be entered into:
Halter Mares & Fillies
Halter Color
Showmanship at Halter Novice Horse
(once again I don't expect her to do well in Halter because she isn't much of a halter horse, she could very possibly do decent at the local level but nothing HUGE)
