the pain

OMG.. the PAIN. I am so sore I can't even believe it. My stomach muscles, my legs, argh! You'd think I was hitting the gym with a hard core personal trainer but my activity was seemingly much more innocuous than that.

What? you may ask.. well I started taking horse back riding lessons with Hannah. I used to ride Western all the time but its been years and I started off riding English Hunt Seat yesterday which I have NEVER done. WOW it works muscles you never knew you had. I fully expected to have sore legs but my abs! my calves! my shoulders!! the burn.. the pain. On the bright side, it was FUN! and a bit scary. I rode Faith who is awesome but he is so BIG. Its hard to tell in this picture but his back is nearly as tall as me. I need to measure him when I go out again. I am not afraid of horses but the thought of losing my balance and tumbling off him sobered me a little. There isn't much to hold on to on an English saddle.

Kerry ( our trainer) said I did well for my first time out. I trotted! I posted! I stayed in the saddle! Yay.. I am excited to go back. Hannah is delighted to be doing this together and I feel like it might help get me in a bit of shape. Maybe then it will be worth the pain..

On to a subject of a different sort. You may recall me mentioning signing up for Deborah's Shabby Mandala class. We just got our third lesson but I figured I'd show you my first stage pieces. The top one is one that Hannah started but she lost interest and I finished it up. Its much further along and she wanted me to leave the lamb showing so you will see how I tackled that.

This was just the creative stimulation I needed to get me back to creating daily. I have applied the basic lessons here to some other things and I think they will turn out pretty cool. More soon!!