Daisy and Dancer Read Online Free PDF Page B

my wrists started to hurt. “I’m really sorry,” I said, after about the fifteenth try, “but I don’t think it’s going to work, and in the manège I won’t even have the wall and it’s much harder to balance on the woodchips.”
    I started to feel a bit upset again, but Rosie said, “Don’t worry about it, honestly, it is really hard when you’re not used to it,” and then Isabel came up with a fab idea of how to adaptthe routine. So now we’re going to all dismount at the end and walk forward away from our ponies, and then I’ll jump into a star shape and they’ll do their handstands up against me, so I’m holding their legs. Rosie thinks it will look even better than our original ending because they can stay up far longer with me holding them and I can count to five so they come down at exactly the same time, which will look SO cool!

    By the time we’d finished, I felt so much better. I couldn’t stop smiling, and I told Dancer all about it while I was getting her tacked up for the lesson. When the ponies were ready, us girls went over to the manège and did a fitnesswarm-up with Sally again, which was really fun. Even when I got stuck halfway over Isabel’s back in the leapfrog and we both fell down, I just collapsed in giggles. And the same thing happened to Millie when she was trying to leapfrog over Stephanie, so it’s not like I was the only one.

    Then we had to do the trust exercise of falling backwards and catching each other, which Kate showed us on Tuesday. I didn’t think I’d dare, but I do trust Rosie, so I just let myself fall backwards (shrieking out loud as I went, but still!). And I made sure I stood really strong and solid when Isabel had to fall on to me, too, so that I didn’t let her down.
    Then it was time to get the ponies and mount up for our lesson. I was feeling so much more positive and confident, I hoped it wouldrub off on Dancer too! I gave her a big pat before I got on and told her how well we were going to do today. She walked into the manège really calmly and nicely and did the warm-up without any problems. And she even stayed on the circle we were trotting when Sally clanged the gate of the other manège. It was working!

    I really believed everything was going to be fine, but despite all my positive thinking, when the ribbons came out Dancer just spooked again, as badly as last time. She didn’t even want them near her and kept trying to go sideways to get away.
    “OK, don’t worry, Daisy,” Jody called, seeing me get a bit flustered. “You’re focusing on the ribbons a lot, which means Dancer will as well. Just pretend the ribbon stick is a crop in your hand and ride normally, as if nothing’s different.”
    I nodded and gathered all my courage – I really was determined to crack it!
    Jody called out instructions and we all followed, doing turns and circles and changes of pace just holding the ribbon sticks like crops (Sasha and Libby joined in with this as well, but without the ribbons). It was tricky at first, but Jody kept calling out new things and in the end I just had to concentrate on those and I really did forget I had the ribbons at all. Dancer seemed to as well and in the end she relaxed and was going really smoothly, and you wouldn’t have known she’d started off any more nervous than Amber or Monsoon.

    Gradually we started giving the ribbons a little swish, but still by the sides of us, not near the ponies’ heads or anything, and in the end we could do quite large circles without bothering them.We’re not going to ask for more than that, though, as we don’t want to push our luck! We’ve adapted our routine slightly too, so that instead of coming in swishing the ribbons straight away, first we’re going to walk the twenty-metre circle just holding them, and then we’re going to do it again, in rising trot, swishing them. There’s a kind of intro bit on the music we chose that’s quite slow, and then as the tempo picks up we’ll