I have given away many things that were dear to me over the years.  I have tried to do the best I could for the people and the animals that I love.  I have also been the recipient of many wonderful gifts.  Gifts, I do not deserve.  Life has been abundant with opportunities for me to both give and receive.  I have been blessed in both areas.  And although sometimes my heart tumbles when I make a promise or statement that I am giving away something that I dearly love, I have found I have been paid back in spades for my paltry offerings to others.

One of the recent gift I gave was the gift of my rescued dachshund to my friends in Bartlesville.  We had taken in Sammi after the floods left her homeless in the Heights of Houston a couple of years ago.  Here is her story if you want to read it.  It was pretty remarkable.

Seriously, Cindy?

From the moment I picked up tiny Sammi from my friend Renee, I instantly fell in love with her. We got through the vet visit without issue and headed home so all our barn family could meet her. Sammi was always happiest when we held her. Jo Ann and Lainie were the most likely to be hauling the small pup around. 

I dearly wanted Sammi to go live with Jo Ann and her husband Tom. But Jo Ann while she loved the dog was traveling a lot and not able to take her. 

When my camper Kenna came from Oklahoma her parents instantly fell in love with Sam. They asked if they could have her and I jokingly said yes. I did want Sammi to have her own family but I was not quite ready to give her away. 

Later as Amanda and her husband Leon talked on their long drive back to Bartlesville. They called and asked if I was serious about letting them have Sammi. I said sure but actually had lots of regret.  

Sammi went home from camp with her new family. I miss her next to me at night.  I don’t miss her biting at the horses. 

But in the category of the doing the right thing, giving Sammi to this family was such the right thing to do. I have heard about how Sammi spends her evenings with Makenna and family. In the mornings Sammi’s “grandma” picks her up and they are off to see the town. 

I had told Jo Ann over and over to get Sammi a sling so she could be carried around hands free. Sammi’s grandma got her one and they go everywhere together. A dog could not be loved more. 

I am so incredibly blessed to have the benefactors in my life that make huge differences for me and my family. But I am also so happy that occasionally I have had the opportunity through Ginny or Sneaky or Theo or little Sammi to give something that brings some love and happiness to others. 

God bless the givers for their open hearts and unselfish ways. God bless the receivers for having an open and grateful heart to receive their gift. 

Thanks for riding along!!

For as long as Jordyn could vocalize the sentiment, she has wanted a dog of her own. My sometimes insecure and anxious granddaughter felt safer and braver when she came to Granny’s house and had one of Granny’s dog sleep with her in her room. Sometimes it would be the little lost Muffy dog that would sleep right up by her head. Always available for a midnight pet or a lick on the face. Sometime she would want Kena to sleep with her -the big Doberman who always insisted on sleeping under the covers. But the one thing that was always the same is she always wanted the dog to sleep with her. 

Every year the request has been the same and so has the answer -no puppies!  The answer has always been the same until now. I don’t really know what changed this year to make Ally and Luke decide that this Christmas Jordyn would get the puppy she always wanted, but I don’t care. I am just so thrilled that they chose to do something that I think it’s going to be so important for Jordyn’s confidence, self-esteem and her capacity for love.

My Denver daughter, Amber, recently got a new puppy too. They chose a wired hair German  pointer. A good dog for Colorado and for kids and a dog that Amber can run with. The puppy is adorable.

But over the years I have certainly sided the poodle way. Granted I had them on the ranch as a kid. But I never expected my house to have two poodles and one at my daughters. But that is the type of family we are now, in fact Lauren counts the days for other dogs to die so she can replace them with different colored poodles. I mean she means them no harm but would love to have the house hold a rainbow of poodles. 

Some of you may agree or disagree with our choice of dog. Just as I might disagree with yours. But for the highly allergic family we are, in the busy robust family activities we engage in, these are perfect dogs. There’s never a moment these dogs don’t want to be with you-playing,  fetching, running and jumping. Plus they fit in perfectly with the horses and even the horse show world.

I was in third grade when I got my first dog that was my own. Jordyn is in fourth. My first dog was with me all the way through my college years and the grief I felt of his passing was enormous.  He was my childhood.  Jordyn has no idea today as she takes on this new life all the memories they will share and all the times they will have. And also the open ears she’ll get from this little Man when she wants to talk about something private that no one else can know about. Poodles tell no secrets.

Today we picked up Jordyn and told her we were going Christmasj shopping. She had no idea where we were headed. Way out in woods past the Renaissance Festival we pulled into a tiny hidden driveway. 

This is how it went down. 

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So for today my heart is open and I am so glad that I can help them to have this wonderful dog that I hope has many, many, many years with them as a family.  As Jacqueline Suzanne once wrote in her book “Every Night Josephine”, no matter how much someone else in your world loves you, be it your parents or your boyfriend, girlfriend or whomever, no one will ever show as much joy when you come home in the evening dancing around jumping up-and-down ignited with love for you than a dog that you love.

Merry, Merry Christmas Jordyn, may Kai be the gift of a lifetime!

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The weekend before last, I got to the barn in the early hours to feed. It was a Saturday and I was looking forward to getting all 14 horses in their stalls and fed, then getting myself back to bed (my favorite weekend activity-sleeping in!).

It wasn’t going to happen. I flipped the switch on the barn lights to find our rescue pony Snowboy, cast along the side of his stall. Normally a white pony, he was covered with a layer of dirt, sawdust and blood. Immediately I knew he was colicking. Colic in horses affects their digestive tract. If they get a belly ache they cannot throw up like you or I. The blockage, bad food or whatever must pass through the gut and out the other end. (Great information to know!)

I got Snow out of his stall to the grass where he promptly laid down again. Dr. Criner arrived quickly and before dawn.   We got enough drugs on board to get him loaded in the trailer and off to Wharton Vet Hospital. Neither doctor gave much hope that Snow would live. In fact, both only gave him a few hours. We started IV fluids, pain killers and prayed.  At age 23, Snow was not a candidate for surgery.

The day wore on as tears many times filled our eyes. We would be okay for a few minutes then the tears poured down again. We have had this pony for most of Lauren’s life and certainly all of Jordyn’s.  And young Kendyll is just starting her love affair with the round white pony. I faltered as I began explaining first his absence from the barn and then his probable death to my four year-old granddaughter. This was not on my list of how to start a weekend.  I explained to Kendyll that Snowney was sick.  In fact, very sick.  I told her that God might need a really super pony in Heaven for all the kids there.  She seemed to accept that.  We cried a little more. We waited.

Dr. Poehler checked in several times on Saturday to tell me the pony was hanging on.  They had gotten a lot of fluids in him but he was not better.  He told me to keep the phone close by Saturday night in case it was time to put him down.  I was surprised Sunday morning to awaken and find no calls from the vet.  I didn’t have to wait long.  Shortly after 9 am, the doc called to tell me he had come into the clinic to find Snow on his feet, no worse for wear, demanding his breakfast. This was a miraculous turn of events. 

Once again, this little rescue pony that has defied the odds so many times, did it again.  He pulled off a supreme come back.  Except for several serious scrapes where he thrashed around his stall, he was good.  Even his feet held up okay.  Nothing but a miracle!  I guess God decided Kendyll needed to keep this white pony for a while longer.  With much graditude, Kendyll, Jordyn, Lauren and I trailered down to get him that afternoon.

Out of the clinic he came, whineying at all of us, ready to head home.  We are so grateful!   My friend said it best when she said “maybe Snow is getting an additional chance at life for every little girl who loved him”. There have been many. 

I don’t know why he was saved I am just so happy that he was.
As always, Thank you for riding along!

Some shots over the years with Snowboy and the family.

This Jordyn on Snowboy at almost a year of age.  My friend Linda superimposed a picture of my dad riding his big quarter horse Storm, into the picture with Jordyn.  Great-grandfather and great-grandchild were born almost 90 years apart but share the same love.

Lauren and Snow at an “A” show. Look at those knees!

Jordyn at her first horse show with snow.

Lauren at an “A” show with Snow and Jordyn (age 2) at her first horse show with Snow.

Ally pregnant with Jordyn on Snow with Luke. Love this photo.

Jordyn with toddler Kendyll grooming Snow and Kendyll hanging out with Snow.

And the pony gallops away!

I have been more than a little obsessed with Rich Fellers and the Irish Sporthorse Flexible since his big win at the FEI World Cup in 2012.  This horse has more heart and desire to win than any horse I know and has come back from three potentially career ending incidents- to compete again at the highest level of show jumping.

My bucket list included bringing up some babies, including having at least one born at my own farm.  I have had the tremendous opportunity to bring along Betty Sue (Special Occasion GES) who I snatched up the minute I saw her baby picture (who wouldn’t?).

Then we had the birth of our Flagmount horse, Sims (Flagmount’s Semper Fi) three months ago.  Another seemingly good plan as he is a big boy and should mature into a promising jumper.

Fargo (Silhouette’s momma) and baby Sims

My dream was to have a Flagmount/Flexible baby; uniting some of the best Irish blood there is.  We even talked to Olympian Bernie Traurig about it after he had coached Feather in a couple of clinics.  He knows Flexible well, too.  And he had worked with Feather closely. After hearing of our plan to breed Feather to Flexible,  his words to me were-“let me know the minute that baby hits the ground”.  Those words were pretty inspiring.  But we did not want to take Feather out of work for a year to have a baby.

SO–if I couldn’t have a Flag/Flexi baby then what?  How about a Fargo/Betty Sue and Flexible baby?  Say what-Betty Sue is a little young don’t you think?  Well, yes she is but what we chose to do is use Fargo’s daughter and Betty Sue’s mother, a pretty horse named Silhouette GES,  as the mother of our Flexible baby.

My friend Stephanie at Golden Edge Sporthorses( http://www.goldenedgesporthorses.com/ ) in Colorado graciously has offered to let us breed to her mare and to care for Silhouette during her pregnancy and in the baby’s early days, sending him/her on to Texas when weaned.

This will bring strong German lines to Irish ones hopefully adding a little height to the Flexible side. Many decades, perhaps a century, of strong jumping on both sides.

It is official.  We had a sonogram with a heart beat yesterday.  YIPPEE!!   Three’s definitely is a charm.  These three babies should keep me busy for the next ten years or so.

Flexible above showing how to fly.  Here with rider Rich Fellers in Spruce Meadows.

Some detail on the parents-

Daddy

Flexible is the small but mighty (15.3 hands) 1996 chestnut Irish Sporthorse stallion that I have admired for so long.  He is by the Irish stallion Cruising (16.2) and out of the Irish Sporthorse mare, Flex, by the thoroughbred stallion Safari. He has had an amazing career spanning now into his 20th year, which is quite a feat for a Grand Prix horse.

Noelle Floyd said in her recent article; Past, Present, Future: Flexible–“For eight years, Flexible has been winning at the five-star level of show jumping. Eight years. It goes without saying that the 20-year-old Irish Sport Horse (Cruising x Safari) and his rider Rich Fellers are no strangers to the international level of competition. The stallion’s partnership with Fellers stretches over 14 years in total, with countless wins and successes too numerous to list, with standout moments such as their 2012 FEI World Cup Championship and London Olympic Games appearance (as the highest placing US horse and rider).

Just this week, Flexible and Fellers finished 3rd in the $35,000 ATCO Energy Cup CSI5* at Spruce Meadows, proving that they are still going strong, competing at top venues and trumping the best in the world.”

Momma

Silhouette GES is a 2010 perlino RPSI mare by the imported 16.2 hand perlino Czech Warmblood stallion Sagar, out of the 16 hand palomino RPSI mare Blonder Reflection (my horse-Fargo).  Her sire Sagar is a remarkable young stallion who has inherited his incredible scope over fences, lovely gaits and fantastic conformation through successful competition bloodlines that includes the famous Holsteiner stallion, Landgraf I.  Her dam’s sire, Blonder Hans, is a 16.3h, palomino registered German ZfDP stallion.  Blonder Hans has three spectacular gaits with fantastic elasticity and impulsion. He also excels at jumping with beautiful form.  Silhouette is a lovely mover as well.

Here are a couple of other blogs I did on Flexible.

Rich Fellers-Irish Sport Horse Flexible

Don’t Forget-US Riders Go for Gold Tomorrow!

As always, thanks for riding along and watching dreams unfold.

****This post was written yesterday!!  Fargo’s baby has since been born!!

If you are lucky, and I feel I am, you, from time to time, you are able toassess where you are in your life.  Most of the time we just meander along without giving our life on a whole a lot of thought.

I certainly have tottered along.  No stranger to ups and downs.  Many things have changed over the years.  I had not given  a lot of quality thought around what is my life about-where am I in my goals for what I wanted from  life.

Takes me back to when I was little.  From the day I was born there were horses in my life.  Although I was born in Denver, even way back then, they had boarding barns and my dad owned a bay Quarter horse named Sugar Pop that he kept at the local stable.  My sister and I loved to go to the barn with my dad.  I loved horses from Day 1.  And dogs and cats.

It started to formulate what I wanted from life.  Summers we got to spend at the ranch, quintessentially holding everything that was dear in my life, my family, my dear friends and the animals.  The Rockies played a big part in that but in life you can’t have exactly what you wanted.

Education was a big part of the expectations for my sister and I.  There was never a question of if we would go to college or have job.  It was an assumption.

So, looking around the farm the other day it suddenly hit me that indeed, right here, landlocked in little city of Richmond was my farm, my ranch, if you will.

I started to think back to what I had wanted all those years ago.  And you know what?  I have all I could have ever wanted.

This farm with its horses, dogs loping around freely, cats sleepily hanging from the beams in barn, kids laughing and friends talking is what I would have conjured up as kid if I would have had the ability to see the future. 

I have a great job that the education my parents insisted upon helped build.  I would have never thought Texas would have been where I landed or this little parcel of land above river the place I call home, but it is.  I wish I had a partner in this life, a companion, but that is not how it worked out for me and my girls and their families are my truest blessing.

The very first day the horses arrived at the farm, beautiful Bruno and determined little Snow.

One day, maybe even today, I will cross another goal off my list, with the birth of a baby horse, right in my own backyard (or Fargo might just explode into outer space from being stretched so big).

Each of these moments, makes me realize I need to do a better job of living now.  If I have all I ever wanted then I should step up and enjoy it a little more graciously.

How special is this moment caught at the barn yesterday as Kendyll just hung out with Snowboy?

Life is now.  Life is here in grand proportions.  I just need to stop sometimes as I worry away, whittling down each problem in my head to minute dimensions.  I have been obsessed with worry lately and in the end all is well-or as well as it is supposed to be.

Stop and enjoy your life.  You might find it is all you ever wanted.

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Updates-

NO baby for Fargo yet—-just kidding!!

Baby Sims at 11 hands and 124 pounds was born this afternoon!

  
A baby for Nova to cure her ails?

And Feather is deemed A-OK by Texas A&M

Stay tuned and thanks for riding along.

Rain brings a renewal to the land and regrowth

It is the time of year for renewal. Easter, always one of my favorite holidays, is all about  new life, renewal and beginning again.  I have much to be grateful for from the rain that has brought pastures back to green, to longer days of sunshine, to plants and flowers in abundance  and to life in general, where breathing is easy again.

Much has been going on at the farm. For those of you keeping track from previous years or in Houston, it is time for Pin Oak,  largest charity horse show in Texas.  Lauren had a great show last year, winning her first Pin Oak ribbons and championship.  She will not attend this year.

We had hoped to have a horse to take Feather’s place as she recovered from a hoof injury but our plan to use/lease another fell apart. My saying of “Man plans, God laughs” was appropriate again.  I was so disappointed to not have a horse for Lauren.  We had wanted to lease one for the several months we anticipated that Feather would be out of action.

Funny thing how life works out but just yesterday, our favorite vet Lynn, completely cleared Feather to return 100% to work. We will miss Pin Oak but our wonderful mare, Feather, will be back in action soon.  Lauren is already riding her and you would never know she missed a day (in fact throughout this entire episode, Feather never took a single lame step on her “bad” foot).  So, all is right in our horse world,  we didn’t need another  horse  at all, we just needed to wait for Feather to heal.

I am enjoying riding my mare, Nova, and we are getting back to regular lessons. It has been a very long time since I could say that.  Nancy Lindsay is patient and kind to us and we are learning new things. There is a lot of activity at the farm once again as riders gear up for show season.

Lauren back on Feather with Allyson, Isabel and Amanda

My family has been great about helping out with new lights for the birthing stall (Fargo is due in June) and other updates. It is time for the winter blankets to go back in storage and summer flies to start being a nuisance.

Nothing exciting to report on my home front except everyone is as healthy and well as they can be. I have gone from having seven 9/11ths horses in barn but only one that is rideable to having everyone but young Betty Sue and super Momma Fargo on the non-ride list.

Summer is approaching as well. Typically we do a quasi-working student camp.  This means the girls hang out and work, ride, learn new things about horses  and often shop.  Sorry, parents, I can’t stop the shopping.  Mia is returning again this year from Malaysia.  I understand the Isabel is on-board for the duration.  I haven’t heard yet about Allyson, but hope she is planning to join us too.

This year we will have the bright, inquisitive Makenna coming from Bartlesville, Oklahoma for a week of camp as well. I think she will be an amazing addition to the team.  She loves everything about horses, and is eager to learn even more.  I am hoping we can persuade Fargo to wait to deliver her baby until Makenna arrives on the 19^th.   Either way, having a baby foal should make camp that much more fun.

We possibly have space for one more week long overnight camper, preferably in the age range of 12-14. Some riding experience, knowledge of horses is needed.  Anyone out there interested?  Campers will be assigned at least one horse to care for daily, have extensive riding time, instruction, field trips with vets, trips to top trainers, sessions taught by the farrier and general horse care education.  It will be fun and informative.

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TryDelta-an OTTB straight off the track above and ready to deliver now

Speaking of baby foal, Try Delta, our AP Indy granddaughter (related to our Bruno) that Lynn and I own together is due March 31^st.  Lynn told me TeeDee got down and rolled from one side to other, leaped to her feet and reared straight up in the air.  Lynn and I reflected that TeeDee was a tad bit (understatement) more agile than Lynn or I in our last two weeks of pregnancy.  TeeDee will deliver at Lynn’s-I hope to be there for tips and tricks to a successful birth but counting on a little Irish luck to bring us a wonderful foal.

Muffy, the spaniel mix, Lula, the mini dachshund and Kena, the Doberman,  all settled in to sleep away the rain (glad the remote is close by if they need it!).

My dogs have been waiting out the rain and missing me while I travel.  Still…pretty lucky dogs to have such comfy surroundings.  Did I mention that I am going to the airport to pick up a new dog that is flying in from Lexington, Kentucky?  Try to guess the breed—don’t say if you already know.  I bet this will be a surprise breed to all of you.  Hopefully, Lady will be a wonderful fit for my daughter in Denver who recently lost her cocker spaniel of so many years, Bailey.  But I am trying out the dog first to see how she does!

I hope when I speak with you next you will have had a happy Easter and I have new foal pictures to show. So excited to see how an Irish Flagmount’s Freedom and an all-American AP Indy baby turn-out (which I know I won’t know really for several years) but still this baby should be pretty top notch.

As always thanks for riding along.