Friday, July 16, 2010
Grace
Today I was feeling frustrated and distant. I was not confident in my appearance and extremely self-conscious. I took a moment to pray aloud while walking across campus, asking God to help me.. to lift my spirits and help me to deal gracefully with others. I arrived at my destination with a smile on my face. Before the end of the day, I helped a girl with an assignment we'd been working on and my day was made. Never have I felt such joy from helping another.. I don't know exactly what made this special, but it made my day. And thinking about it even now brings a smile to my face. Thank you Lord, for answering my prayer. Good night.
Thursday, July 1, 2010
Training Goals for 7/2/2010
Keiko and I should be going out to train tomorrow, weather permitting. I've been reflecting on our adventure last weekend and now have some concrete goals for training tomorrow:
1. I consider this one to be the most important right now, since Keiko has really picked up the idea of driving and is kind of blowing me off when I want her to get to head (at least she did on Saturday). I need to reinforce the 'get around' command in the round pen, sending Keiko to head and then changing the directions. Initially, I will not use a directional command. Later I *may* work on directions.
2. Continue reinforcing the grip command. No, I don't want Keiko turning into a gripping machine but in instances where she needs to reinforce herself with a grip, I want her to hit when told. So far I've just been using a "sssskitum, HIT onnnne." I drop my voice when I say the word "one".. this was working when I was trying to help build her confidence back up after the good kick she got. I may not actually need to practice this though, as Keiko showed initiative to grip again when it was necessary last weekend.
3. Continue working on a down/sit/stay while on stock. In fact, I may have her hold the stock off of the gate, starting for about 30 seconds and then sending her to head to re-pen them. This would be arena/pasture work.
4. I also need to start working on pushing her wide as she has been cutting corners lately. It is nice that we have a lighter group of calves now so she doesn't have to move in as close to lift them.
I'd like to take another adventure through the 10 acre pasture but will save that for the next time we work. I'm thinking I'll let the calves loose, allow them to settle, then go out with her to find them and re-pen them. This would also give me the opportunity to work on her actively searching for the stock when they are not in sight. It would be great if we could do this on horseback :) But we haven't talked about that yet so I'm not banking on it.
1. I consider this one to be the most important right now, since Keiko has really picked up the idea of driving and is kind of blowing me off when I want her to get to head (at least she did on Saturday). I need to reinforce the 'get around' command in the round pen, sending Keiko to head and then changing the directions. Initially, I will not use a directional command. Later I *may* work on directions.
2. Continue reinforcing the grip command. No, I don't want Keiko turning into a gripping machine but in instances where she needs to reinforce herself with a grip, I want her to hit when told. So far I've just been using a "sssskitum, HIT onnnne." I drop my voice when I say the word "one".. this was working when I was trying to help build her confidence back up after the good kick she got. I may not actually need to practice this though, as Keiko showed initiative to grip again when it was necessary last weekend.
3. Continue working on a down/sit/stay while on stock. In fact, I may have her hold the stock off of the gate, starting for about 30 seconds and then sending her to head to re-pen them. This would be arena/pasture work.
4. I also need to start working on pushing her wide as she has been cutting corners lately. It is nice that we have a lighter group of calves now so she doesn't have to move in as close to lift them.
I'd like to take another adventure through the 10 acre pasture but will save that for the next time we work. I'm thinking I'll let the calves loose, allow them to settle, then go out with her to find them and re-pen them. This would also give me the opportunity to work on her actively searching for the stock when they are not in sight. It would be great if we could do this on horseback :) But we haven't talked about that yet so I'm not banking on it.
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