Gia - session 404 - lunging and flatwork

 I started Gia out with just a little bit of lunging to curb her grumpiness, and hopefully get our ride started on a better note.  It seemed to do the trick.  I just did a little bit of trot and walk transitions each way on the line until she was visibly relaxed, licking and chewing with her head much lower.

Under saddle I started out working on some transitions between medium walk, free walk and halt.  She was happy to stretch down, and fairly good about her medium walk.  She was a bit resistant to the halt transition at first.  She wanted to back up a little, so each time she leaned back, I made her move on and we tried again a few steps later.  She was also against my hand (especially my right hand) during the down transition, so I had to work on softening her as well.  Eventually, she was making her transitions much more obediently.

Then we worked on walk trot transitions.  She was a bit more obedient about those, and she wasn't as grumpy today (I think the lunging helped).  She was a little bit crooked, so I did baby leg yields with her in each direction until she was straighter and more supple.

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