In Which Midnight Wins the Beauty Contest Hands Down

So my dad surprised me this week by coming up to the farm to watch my lesson and take pictures! He knows how to make his horsey daughter happy.

It seems like every lesson with Midnight, I've actually been learning something new which is great. This time it was training myself to really open my shoulders and sit back, since that's the only way I get forward AND round without a fight...Midnight prefers one or the other obviously. Then we popped over some little baby jumps, which he had very little respect for and jumped quite weirdly...though at least by the end we were coming at it from an energetic, controlled "showjumping canter" rather than a bleh canter and then a HEY WE'RE JUMPING NOW WEEEEEEEEEEEEE rushing canter 3 strides out.

In the pictures, Midnight looked beautiful as always.

Me, not so much.

I sacrifice my dignity for this blog. FOR YOU.

Even when he took the WAY long spot from that rushy canter and jumped like a total goober, he still looks happy and yay and like he is trying so hard.

Meanwhile, I looked like....

Really? Really.

Hide your kids. Hide your wife.

Note to self: work on poker face for the show in July.

I am up at peaceful Lake Winnipesaukee for the week so no Midnight update until I get back...though I will be writing some more general stuff for Horse Nation. Stay tuned.