I'm getting the impression that, at least while Nibbs is here, I'm going to be doing more jumping.  Part of the reason being that Nibbs has lots of experience jumping, and can help me with my own jumping.  

So yes, I did ride Nibbs again.  I think he's looking a little better than when he first came here.  (In the lesson, my trainer mentioned that his weight fluctuates like crazy.  Only two days before I rode him, she was worried he looked too skinny, but now he's fine.) 

This was the first time that I got to ride him the outdoor arena.  There was no one else in my lesson, for one reason or another nobody else had showed up.  So, it was just my trainer on Twister and me on Nibbs.  

I was out in the arena before my trainer was.  So, for my warm up, I started with some halts from a good walk.  My plan was, after a few of these, to start working on getting him to give / go to the bit.  

I had my reins fairly short, and I didn't give excessively with them.  Before long, he was on the bit and 'meeting with my hands' if you will.  It was quite nice, better than even last week.  My trainer, who'd come out by this time, told me to give him a longer rein.  When I did, he stretched down quite nicely into it. 

The next exercise was trotting serpentines.  Of course, we were to have a good, fast trot going at all times, to encourage him to reach forward to the bit.  And secondly, going through the turns, if I felt him leaning to any one side (she mentioned he did it particularly bad to the right) then I was to place my body to that side to block him. 

Going around the first time, I felt a little like a rank beginner.  Several factors contributed to this, which I'll not list here.  But I just locked up a little.  

After on not-so-nice turn to the right, my trainer had me make a circle.  Nibbs was leaning out to the left, and she had me put my weight down on that side.  The difference was instantaneous, I could feel it.  Nibbs aligned himself, and I  think I could actually feel more of him come into my inside leg.  

On that note, my trainer had me stop trotting, and take a break.  Which honestly, is a little weird because we hadn't done much work yet?  But I took it anyway.  Maybe she somehow knew that I needed a little time to get unstuck.  

While taking that break, I watched my trainer work with Twister.  Basically, they were just going around in a one rein stop until Twister willingly stepped to the inside instead of being so bent on stepping to the other side.  With Twister, this can take awhile.  But when he did make the switch, it was subtle, and yet I could see it.  As soon as he did, my trainer released the rein to him.  

She said that there were some things she wanted to clear up with Twister this summer.  And that was part of the reason that Nibbs and Romeo are here.  They're going to take part of, if not all, of Twister's lesson load, so he can be free to work with my trainer.  Twister's going to boot camp XD

So, it was confirmed that Romeo is in fact going to be a lesson horse.  My guess is, that'll start once he's shed some more pounds.  He is starting to 'melt' as my trainer put it XD

Anyhow, after that we went back to trotting the serpentine.  I did much better this time.  Our turns were better.  My trainer had said that if I felt him anticipating going one direction or the other, to turn the opposite one if I needed to.  

We also kept up a fairly nice trot, I think.  At the end, my trainer started having us do a loop so that we were only turning to the left, because he was falling to the left.  I believe I may always struggle with turning to the left on whatever horse I ride.  

See, it's hard to maintain a proper bend in the turn, and when you start to turn, the horse tends to really cut into it.  Not sure what I'm doing to cause it, and of course I know some of that often has to do with the horse.  

Anyhow, after we got some nicer turns with a fast trot.  I just had to be really careful with where and how I used my body.  

We took a break, and then my trainer told me to canter him around in both directions to finish our warm up.  Nibbs canter was just as nice to ride as I remember it being.  I can tell he's not as fit as some of the other horses though, not yet at least XD 

We took another break, and my trainer explained what we were going to do next.  She wanted me to jump over the telephone poles for a warm up jump.  (A note:  somehow two standards and another tree log had been used to make the jump even taller.  The log was longer than the telephone poles, and the standards on either side held it up above the telephone logs.  Hope that makes sense.  It made the jump a couple inches taller than it otherwise would have been, I'd estimate it at more than a foot but not quite two foot.) 

She said that the jump was very wide, though not very tall.  Therefore, she wanted me to aim at the standard to the right.  She wouldn't even be upset if we missed the jump because of that.

The place to whom Nibbs belongs had told my trainer that Nibbs would jump pretty well with anything below 2'6".  But above that, if you didn't have a perfect distance to the jump, he would stop at it.  Plus, when jumping, he tended to through out his shoulder before jumping, and it'd just be a lot better for everyone if we could get him to stop doing that.

If all went well with that, we were going to do some kind of gymnastic exercise with cavaletti, I think.

We went over it trotting first, about two times I think.  By this time, Nibbs was actually 'off my leg' for the first time, and it kinda caught me off guard, so I got left behind when I asked him to go forward, but it was nice.

When I asked for canter, it didn't take long for him to get it.  But our jumps in canter weren't the best.  We were going a bit too fast half the time, and I was throwing myself forward onto his neck.  

I was afraid we'd miss the jump as well.  It was hard to leave him alone.  Furthermore, when I did make some correction, I wasn't used to him actually responding.  See, with Mariah, if you tried to correct her one way or the other, she resisted you.  So when I asked him to come a little more this way, it wasn't like I actually expected him to come a little more that way XD  

My trainer also picked up on the fact that I was in a hurry to get to the jump.  Yes, that's true.   Not to actually jump the jump, but to get having-to-get-to-the-jump-right part over with.  Plus, I was under the illusion that Nibbs was rushing to get to the jump.  (Hey, when you've ridden a speedy crooked black mare all the time, it does things to you XD  Come to think of it, Nibbs is about the opposite of Mariah.  He's a lazy straight white gelding XD)

So, we never did end up tackling that cavaletti exercise.  After a break, my trainer had us repeat the same exercise.  

This time, she told me to sit up, to not be in such a rush and have a good canter.  It was kinda a shock to my illusion that Nibbs actually slowed down and stayed slowed down when I asked him to.  I was better about staying up and off his neck, poor Nibbs, my haste and throwing myself into two point was making it harder for him to jump.

It was a lot for me to process.  It was fast and quick and everything.  But we did alright in the end and took another break. 

After that, my trainer asked me if I wanted to just leave all of this till next week, or try it again before ending the lesson.  I knew I hadn't done as well as I could have, and I wanted to do it again.  

This time, whereas before we'd been jumping coming from a turn off the right, we came from a turn off the left.  It was better this way because I knew what to do better.  

To help me not throw myself forward onto his neck and risk falling off because of it, my trainer told me to try to 'sit' in the saddle.  To not let my seat leave the saddle.  That way, I would hopefully creep forward into a two-point, instead of from a two point to laying on Nibbs's neck.

It helped.  I tried to stay taller and look up past the jump instead of at it.  The first jump, I came at in trot, and after we'd gone over it, I nearly forgot I was supposed to turn left and started to turn right XD  Such a creature of habit.

But those last few jumps were the best in the lesson, and so we ended there.  

So, basically, I learned that I'm still kinda riding like I'm on Mariah, or Lily, when it comes to jumping.  It's that habit thing.  But I need to adjust some things for Nibbs.  I think, since he's here, I might be doing a lot more jumping this summer, but we'll see.  

Actual lesson 7/12/2022