Wednesday - So . . . Wednesday - the best day so far! Breakfast as usual and then we had the pleasure of going to Cowboy Church at he most beautiful church in the world. Richard played the guitar and we all sang from the programs Cheryl had given us. Then Richard gave a short sermon before we saddled up for the morning.
We went up to the gymkahna field, the difference being that I took Fame with us. I'd asked Richard if someone could pony him along and he said, "Well, why don't you do it?" So I did. Once we were at the field, we played focus games. We put posts around the perimeter and rode point-to-point, or to every other pole and then he asked us to see if we could circle the pole while keeping our hand on it the entire time. Fame, who had been tied to a fence to watch the goings on got loose, or almost loose multiple times, so I guess I flunked the knot tying session we had. Ooops! We went back for lunch and then after lunch I got another knot tying lesson followed by an independent seat lesson (where you ride with no reins) on Badger. Richard directed him from the ground while I tried to direct him with my body and I guess we were doing rollbacks - or so I'm told. Then, at break, Tom helped me with Fame. He was ground support while I did a passenger (well, ok tried to do a passenger lesson) on Fame. We walked, trotted and I loped on him for the first time! I got cleaned up for dinner and Karen B. and I decided to go to Boccalis for great Italian food, Chianti, and their famous strawberry shortcake. We also opted out of the evening ride for massages at the Chinese massage place where we had 30 minute back of body and 30 minute foot massages for crazy cheap. What a heavenly day!