Play Day - 4 years with Juliano

We've had a brilliant play day, it was great fun mixed with learning. Few of our "classical" friends joined us with their horses and we ended up with 6 humans and 7 horses in our play field at one point.

Exactly 4 years ago from today I've bought Juliano. Buying him was the best decision I've ever made and I couldn't have wished for a better horse. Today he was going around the field, exploring all the balls, tarps and other scary things and it was amazing to observe how much he has changed over these years. He was very confident and in fact he was trying to show other horses what to do with the toys. I also brought a thick foam for horses to stand on. Juliano was very curious. He immediately wanted to stand on it but when he did the foam flattened underneath his hoof. He was surprised but few seconds later he was standing on the foam with both feet. It was so cool. He was at liberty most of our play day.

Here are some photos, you can see more on my Flickr photostream

Juliano with the Green Ball

Eparol with the Green Ball

Juliano exploring foam

Juliano destroying the tarp

Hula Dum

Drezyna with foam

Lama

Dum and Impet

Happy J

J bringing Justyna to her knees

Justyna riding Zawieja bitless

Play Day Saturday

This Saturday worked out just great. I wanted to ride, but Juliano was in a playful mood and Magda wasn't in a mood to ride, so two words "Play Day" and we were running around gathering our big balls, tarps and other scary gizmos. Our little Play Day had an unexpected big turnout as Justyna joined us with her two mares, Kamila took Eparol and Impet and Marta brought Drezyna.

Juliano and Dum decided to test our Liberty. There were a lot of toys in the paddock so at one point of our finger Juliano and Dum would go to the tarp or one of the balls. At one point they started fighting over the tarp and than started ripping it to shred. The green ball was also very popular. Most of our horses feared the ball so much they would not approach it, they would keep at least 20-50 meter distance depending on the horse. Not today, today all our horses loved the green ball. Juliano is getting better and better at playing "hoofball" with it. He kicks it, then follows, then kicks it again.

At the end Juliano made all of us cry. We also have a jumping ball for kids with two horns on it. Juliano grabbed the ball by one of it's horns and started tossing it around while still holding it. Than he started putting it on Lama's back just like I put the green ball on his. In the end Juliano wanted to hit Dum Dum with the ball but he lost grip and let go. The ball flew up in the air couple of meters and landed on Juliano's rump. Julino was shocked, jumped and then blamed Dum for the whole thing. It was so funny I couldn't hold the camcorder still.