I am now 53 years old and I have realized I am not going to the Olympics - at least not as a rider! If fact, I am not sure I will even go watch - I did that in 1984, and while it was exciting and I learned a lot, I am not sure I want to invest the money it would take to go again.



And that is part of why I have surrendered the dream of competing at the international level. Money. It takes a Lot of it, and I do not have that kind of money, nor the access to the backing that it would… Continue

Back in February, I started training a 5 yr old paint mare.  She is owned by Very old friends of mine - who used to live locally, then they moved to Virginia, but we stayed in touch.  Then they came west again, to Arizona.  Last year they wanted to send Two horses to me, but their barn was struck with Strangles, so no one could go anywhere, then the roof on their home got damaged and all money went to that - so fianlly, Reggie and Rainey came to me in February.  Reggie was a 6 yr old morgan…

Continue

It's foaling season at Sweetwater Ranch.  One of my clients bought a lovely dressage mare by Olympic Ferro already bred to Grannius II - and I covered two of my own mares with Louie.  So, this year I will get to see what he produces, and we already have one foal on the ground.   He has been named Sweetwater's Alliance - barn name Lance - and he is lovely with good straight legs, up on his pasterns and nice feet all around.  And BIG.  In fact, Dr Marteney said he is the biggest foal he has…

Continue

Yesterday, I gave Bella Benedict another riding lesson on Gunny. This wouldn't be so significant, after all I teach horseback riding lessons for a living. But Belle is just 6 yrs old and she has to clean corrals to EARN her own lessons. Her family is Very tight financially, so I offered Belle a chance to join the 'work to ride' program. She works Hard to earn enough credits to get to ride.



So, this was her 3rd lesson, and we worked on developing a SMOOTH whoa - a nice easy slow pull…

Continue

Well, I feel I left a story untold.  So, I will quickly tell you all that Belle and I happily completed our first endurance ride last May- we actually placed 13th in a field of 30 - so I was pretty happy.  And maybe a bit over confident as we sent in entries to go all the way up to Mendocino to a ride in the redwoods.  SEEMED like a wonderful idea - camping, company, and a ride.  But the haul up was a basic nightmare - instead of an easy 9 hours, we were in the truck for 12, I was so tired…

Continue