having horses for their lifetime always has an ending… so we know there will be an end for each, our goal is make their time with us to not be stressful Rarely have we sold one, there were only two both real ponies that were outgrown.
We named the farm Sanctuary thinking more of being a place of protection for the kids. Little did we know what was to actually happen.
We have been blessed with some interesting stock that worked hand-in-hand with what we were trying to accomplish
We wanted to give our kids a strong foundation that could be used to teach them how life works. There have been many highs as well as heart breaking lows.
Our young daughter took on many of Mark’s goals, one was to win a national championship. She laid out the plan, worked hard, had her horse is the best of shape and lost the goal by a few points. The loss was made hard to accept as the winner showed multiple times before her mother as judge or a close family relative. Together we read all the rules or the organization but could find none that restricted such from happening.
Together we wrote a proposed rule change, went through all the correct channels to get the proposal before the national board. The rule change was passed as written and has since been known by the ones that know what happened as Aimee’s Rule (Her Horse, Prairie Hill Mulligan was National Champion, as Horse and Rider are judged separately)
All my friends thought I was nuts to be spending the money on the horses, the showing, the competitions and on and on… but our kids learned how to deal with failures and that life can be not fair (we had old style Morgans who some judges disliked), there horse could be prefect but be tied low… we just started keeping a log on the judges…some we would no show before.
