Squeezing clothespins is a great activity to strengthen fingers and develop coordination between the index and middle fingers and thumb. Pulling the pins off the mane is a fun way to engage in squeezing pins and it doesn't hurt the horse! Notice all the postural control my almost six year old client is demosntrating as he reaches for the pins.

Lots of arena designing this week at DivinityFarm as I attached my home made (knit out of trash bags) basket for tossing activities. I have a bag of weirdly textured balls (i.e. koosh, squishy etc) all ready to use.

I made this stop sign out of a red manilla folder. I figure the octagon red shape with the word STOP is pretty basic in terms of learning to read, learn about danger and follow directions to pull/reins and stop. It will be interesting to see if our work during hippotherapy helps one of my clients learn to recognize and respond to the word STOP.