-*-Every Little Girls Dream-*-

I'm already (somewhat) bilingual, but my 5 year-old has had a consistent interest in learning Russian. I don't know if it is great or terrible that one of his favorite movies is The Hunt for Red October and two of his favorite songs are by The Red Army Choir.

Being in the middle of the desert Southwest of the USA Russian lessons for a 5 year-old aren't conveniently available so I ask you, dear Question Club:

What is the best language learning software, books, CDs, DVDs or combination thereof for a young child?

I am happy to add a third language along with him and I'm aware at this age he'll probably pick it up faster than I do, but I also hear that the second language is the hardest and it gets easier after that.

Also any other considerations when teaching/learning a language with a kid this young?

DK/DC: What language(s) do you speak?

Well hello everyone! Sorry I have not been on here in forever! I really need to get this group up and running again! I miss everyone! How are all of you? I hope all of your horses and horse friends are doing well! I will be working on this page soon, hopefully I can get it back to the awesome group it use to be!

Lake Erie College is looking for donations of horse bits to help our Competition horses [the ones that go to shows] get much needed medical care. This includes Chiropractor, Massage, and other necessary therapy to ensure our horses stay sound. These horses are all very old [the youngest is 12] and most have had very intense younger [show or competition] lives that have left them with physical problems. Lake Erie College students take care of these horses and try to fix their problems, be they mental or physical. Any donation would be a HUGE step in the right direction for these horses, as the school cannot regularly afford to give the school horses adjustments and other therapy, but the Competition horses need it more regularly. With the money we can raise from selling tack these horses could recieve this therapy [which in the past has been donated to us, but with the economy it just doesn't work out anymore].

Other horse tack, as long as it is competition worthy [new or gently used bridles, stirrups, saddles] would also be welcome!

If you are a chiropractor or equine massause living in the Painesville, OH area and would like to donate your services or give them at a reduced rate, please reply to this message or Private Message me so we can talk!

Thank you!!!

I don't know if any of you are interested, but I'm totally hooked on this game.  And I'm sure some of you are hooked as well.  It starts out kind of slow, but it picks up pretty quickly.  Click on the link below to join!

http://www.howrse.com/?parrain=Rav…t 

x-posted  

Hi everyone! After years of taking lessons being my only means of riding, I am starting a lease on a horse! Needless to say I am very excited. She is gorgeous, willing and relaxed--her name is Libby. Libby is a Tennessee Walker, who is a trail/pleasure horse.

I've been riding her in an English saddle; she wears some sort of jointed curb type bit with shanks (I'm not so great with naming various bits, plus I've only ridden her twice so far).

She has a lovely rocking chair canter, and her gait (running walk i think) was so smooth & surprising-- this is my first gaited horse experience. I've ridden hunter/jumper type horses the last 15 years. And since Libby goes out on trails all the time (there's no arena at her farm) both that & the gaited thing are new to me--but I am loving it so far.

Now I was wondering if anyone had any bits of advice for riding gaited horses. Libby can be a bit impatient (and this is something her mom is working on too with her) especially when out with normal-gaited horses, since even at a walk she's quite a bit faster. When I try to do a normal half-halt, she tucks her nose down in alot (which i guess is kind of normal for the breed?) Not to be bad, or get away from the but, she just flexes her neck & poll kind of like they would in the show ring. Sooooo I end up having to bring my hands up a bit higher than I am used to, and I shorten the reins to take out the resulting slack-- is that the right way? Her owner was trying to explain it to me, but she wasn't out on the ride. We do plan on working together to work on the (very minor) issues Libby has, but I wanted to see what ideas other people had. Also if you know anything about their special gaits--I just sort of sit there, am I supposed to do anything else (Lol obviously not post!!)

Also she's not really responsive to leg pressure. Her mom was saying that's also common in gaited breeds? I mean, if you squeeze she moves, it's more trying to get her to leg yield/bend. (lol not run my leg into a tree as she avoids mud)


And for anyone who's never ridden a gaited horse--- Go try one!!!

...for our horses. Today we had a temperature of 15* with a wind chill of about 7. It was snowing hard, and only going to get worse. Even so, I headed out to the barn. First, I piled on every scrap of clothing I own. Well, almost. By they end I had five layers on top, and a pair of tights under my breeches. If I had put on any more clothes I wouldn't have been able to walk, let alone ride. So I waddled my way out through the snow drift to my little car. Fortunately it has a good heater. :) And off I went on the slippery roads, carefully avoiding the spot where my Dad put his car in the ditch just last night. After much steering-wheel-gripping and anti-lock-brake-thanking, I made it to the stable. On my way in I passed Lori on her way out. She had gotten a horse tacked up and lounged, then decided that she was too cold to ride.

I talked to Teri about my options. I could ride Touche, Sterling, or Esquire (the horse Lori almost rode). I didn't really want to ride Touche, because she is very sensitive to the cold, and in this kind of weather she would be particularly difficult. Esquire has been having some issues. Teri's been using him in the school lately, and he doesn't like it when people don't release him (can you really blame the poor horse?). Teri hasn't been able to ride him lately because of a broken rib, so he's become very aggressive in demonstrating his displeasure. So I decided to ride Sterling. Only one problem. He's in a paddock with a very large, pushy thoroughbred/lipizzan cross gelding. When it gets near coming-in time (which it was, of course) he gets very pushy and will charge out the gate with no regard whatsoever for whichever pathetic human he tramples (that's how Teri broke her rib). And no one was available to help me with him. I've been riding Touche a lot lately, and really wanted a change, so I decided to risk Esquire.

I had some excitement tacking him up, because the horse in the stall to his right wouldn't leave him alone. So I moved back to the second set of crossties. That was right next to Titan's stall, and he wouldn't leave poor Esquire alone either. So finally one of the boarders noticed my plight and held him for me up just past crossties. I lounged Esquire, and then when Teri came in she helped me get on him. Esquire's something of a funny fellow. He's very sensitive, but has no scruples whatsoever about leaning on the martingale or jigging. He wears a running martingale because if his rider is not completely adept at keeping him round and on the bit at all times he throws his head back so far that he could actually clunk heads with his rider. I haven't ridden him since last summer, so it took a while to get re-acquainted to him. However, once I did, I had a wonderful ride.

There have been sadly few times that I have felt myself truly integrated into the horse's motion, but they were all on this horse. Today was one of those days. I discovered that if I kept my legs softly draped on him and sat deep in the saddle, I could feel when he was about to jig and prevent it with a well timed half-halt and by keeping my seat firmly in the walk motion. It was quite lovely. Once we had established this, we went on to the trot. Teri warned me ahead of time that he would stick his nose in the air, straighten out like a board, and try to rush off. To the surprise of both of us, he didn't. He raised his head a little, but quickly dropped it again and resumed moving laterally from my legs. Teri said it was his way of thanking me for not hanging on his mouth. :) We did that in both directions, then walked some more. Then we changed to his good direction for a little canter. Esquire has a lovely canter. I was not able to help him find it today though. He mostly just rushed around without bending properly. Teri said it was probably because he was feeling good and hadn't cantered in a while. But while it wasn't as nice as I would have liked, it didn't scare me like it would have a few months ago. So overall, I had a splendid ride. It was definately worth bundling up for.

The other day I actually managed to ride Titan. For those of you who may have forgotten (I know it's been a long time), Titan has taken to rearing in crossties. He'll rear up, sit down, and as soon as we get the crossties off, wander away. After such an incident he's so wound up and sore from crashing around on the cement floor that it's hard to do anything more than lounge him. He even did it when someone just held him with a lead rope under his chin, so it's not the crossties.

So I haven't ridden him in several months. Well, the other day I got brave. I lounged him, then put him in crossties while I groomed him, lavished him with treats, and praised him enthusiastically for being normal for once. Basically anything I could do to keep his attention focused on me. Then I had the barn manager, Michele, take the crossties off and hold him with a lead rope while I put the saddle and bridle on. He was surprisingly good. I did all this with my helmet on, just in case. I was going to lounge him again, but Teri was giving a lesson on the lounge line, and I didn't want to go back and get mine, so I just hopped on. He was very stiff, but not lame. I made sure I warmed him up very carefully, with lots of circles and suppleing exercises. Then I moved on to the trot, and did basically the same thing. He was VERY stiff when we first started trotting, but he got better as we went along. I wanted very badly to canter him, because he has a lovely canter, and it was so nice to actually ride my horse again. But I decided to to the smart thing and forgo to for another time, as he was still pretty stiff and very out of shape. I suppose round is a shape, but not in dressage... :)

So I was extremely pleased with that. Then on Friday I did basically the same thing, only I didn't have time to ride him, so I just lounged him, groomed him, and put him back in his stall. Hopefully he learned from those two experiences that good things can happen in crossties.

Hello everyone! I apologize for dropping off the face of the Earth for a while there. We got a filter that blocked Livejournal. Now at long last the one on my brother's computer is broken, so I can post again, at least for the time being. Mom's trying out a filter that will let her decide what it should block. So if that works out I'll be able to post more regularly again.

So, a little news. We still haven't sold Titan. We are now looking into rescue/rehabilitation places. Know of any good ones in the Michigan/Ohio area?

Also, I've gotten to where I can keep Touche round at the walk and trot 90% of the time (except for during my last lesson), which is a big improvement over last summer. The canter still eludes us, but it's slowly getting better. One of my favorite lesson horses is back. Sterling spent all of last year fighting against allergies. They finally figured out what he's allergic to (basically everything), and the treatment seems to be working.

I rode Josie and Nakota in the snow for the first time a month or so back. That was fun. I can't do it now though, because we had two days of 40* weather, and then it froze again. So now there's ice under all the snow. Grr.

So that's basically what's new with me. Hopefully I'll be able to post regularly again now.

I have permission from publisher Sunstone Press to distribute an excerpt from an unusual crossover novel by Texas surgeon Barbara Bergin. "Endings" mixes Bergin's own worlds of medicine, horses, and motherhood with a strong romantic core.

It's the story of Leslie Cohen, a 40-year-old doctor who perpetually takes temporary "locum tenens" assignments to stay on the move. While filling in for an orthopedist in Abilene, Texas, she meets a man who might make her quit running.

"Endings" is laced with loving descriptions of ranch and horse life, packed with fascinating accounts of medical procedures, and loaded with mystery surrounding Leslie's hidden history.

The excerpt is entitled "Reining" and is a detailed scene at a horse event that Leslie and her date attend. It shows off the author's background as a nationally ranked horsewoman.

You can read the excerpt at the following URL:

http://www.authorviews.com/authors…