So I thought I'd start my blog by giving y'all a brief (lol ok yeah a very long) summary of how I got so addicted to this crazy sport. It all started when I was in the womb and my mom was just as horse-crazy as I am now. My parents moved to the farm that I grew up on about two weeks before I was born. It was nothing fancy, but it was the best place in the world to grow up. I got my first pony, Bam Bam, when I was about 3 years old. He was old, blind, deaf, had cushings, and was free from our vet. The perfect first pony!
After Bam Bam passed away, I started taking lessons at a few different places until we settled down at West Neck Creek with Lisa Doczi as my trainer. I got my next pony Silver Skies or "Scooter" when I was six years old. She is the pony that really got me into showing. She was a flea-bitten small pony who had done the regular division but had pulled her suspensory. We were only able to afford her because she was still rehabbing and wasn't ready to start doing anything substantial yet. Once she was ready to go she really got me into showing. She carried me from Walk Trot through Short Stirrup, earning year-end Virginia Beach Horse Show Association champion or reserve every year. She really got me hooked.
When I was eight we were presented with the opportunity to lease a top small pony for a very affordable price. That pony was Benlea Neptune. He had been champion everywhere in the small ponies, including Devon and Pony Finals, but he was quite a little bugger. He had been leased out several times to top pony kids, but was continually returned because he was too naughty. When he was returned the last time, his owners Susie and Kirkland Brown decided that he needed to stay in Virginia Beach and whoever rode him next had to ride with their trainer, Dabney Napolitano of Cedar Cover Farm. I'm not sure how we heard about him, but we did and I was a pretty good riding little kid but more importantly I was tough. We decided to take the leap and lease him and I started riding with Dabney as well as Lisa and my sister took over the reins on Scooter. It took almost two years for him to finally give it up. There were moments of brilliance, but there was also a lot of stopping and falling off in those two years. Once I learned his ride, we were unstoppable. He really introduced me to the A-circuit. We were champion or reserve at just about every show and he qualified me for my first Devon and indoors at age 11. We had a relatively successful Harrisburg, earning a 3rd and an 8th. Washington, however, was a different story. He was SO bad and tried so hard to get me off but I wasn't giving up at that point. I finally got him around the last trip and just missed the jog, but that was a victory in my mind. The National Horse Show was located in New York City on a pier when I went, mind you this was 2003. That was my best show. We earned 2nd and 4th the first day, got a 6th the second day, and just missed reserve by a point. I'll never forget the judge telling me in the conformation class that if I wasn't so tall on him I would've won both classes the first day. We didn't end up doing Devon because I was much too tall and had already moved on to my large pony by that time.
That pony taught me every single thing I know about riding. If I didn't ride him correctly he would dump me so fast it would make my head spin. He taught me to listen to the cues horses give us, no matter how big or small. That is something that has translated in one way or another to every single horse I have ever ridden. He was my first horse (or pony lol) of a lifetime.
That pony taught me every single thing I know about riding. If I didn't ride him correctly he would dump me so fast it would make my head spin. He taught me to listen to the cues horses give us, no matter how big or small. That is something that has translated in one way or another to every single horse I have ever ridden. He was my first horse (or pony lol) of a lifetime.
My next adventure was my large pony, Salvandi Mo-Jo or "Mo-Jo." When we got him in the fall of 2003 he was four years old and was jumping crossrails at the most. We knew he had all the potential to be a great pony, he moved a 10 and jumped great as well. He had a lot of blood but, like I said before, I was a tough kid and he was nothing compared to getting dumped off all the time. Mo-Jo was tough though, so we started taking more lessons with Chris Wynne of Breckenridge Manor. I had ridden with him a little bit before that on Neppie, but I started riding with him full time when I got Mo-Jo. We did the childrens ponies with him during 2004 and I really got to know him and he really got to know me. I was only 12 at the time so having a pony that was as green as he was challenged me, but it also made me love developing the young ones. We did the Large Green Ponies in 2005 and had a great year. He didn't get much easier to ride, but I knew him really well by then and we were champion or reserve just about every time out and ended up 5th USEF Large Green Pony of the Year. We stepped him up to both divisions about half way through the year that year in hopes that gaining points towards Devon the following year would help us sell him. We tried so hard to sell him, we even spent the money to send him to WEF, but he was just too hard to ride for any normal kid. After several months we finally sold him for about what we we had paid for him as a four year old to a wonderful family. The girl was older, so she was big enough to muscle him when he needed it. I still keep in touch with her today even though he has moved on to keep track of him. She just recently messaged me and let me know that he will be going to live on her farm in Warrenton while his owner has a baby. I am hoping to be able to go visit him as I haven't seen him in years!
By 2006 I was ready for my first horse. We went down to WEF to go horse shopping and I fell in love with a horse named On The Spot, or "Spot." We were planning to vet him and buy him but got a phone call before he was vetted saying he got caught in the fence and wouldn't pass the vet. Who knows what actually happened, but we were naive enough to go back to the same lady to find another match. Thats when we met Arion or "Finn." He was just off the plane, tall, leggy, and gorgeous. We were the only ones to try him and bought him on the spot. To this day he is the fanciest horse I have ever had. He was hard for me to ride though, as I was only 13 when we got him and he was very very green and still in European mode. We did the childrens a few times before we stepped up to the Younger Large Juniors (there was no 3'3 option back then). We had moments of brilliance, but they were few and far between. He just wasn't the right fit for me. He needed to live in a trainer's barn and have a real program, not live at home with a 13 year old girl. I still wish I had stuck it out with him, but it ended up being the right decision to sell him. I told my trainer on a Wednesday that I wanted to sell him and he was basically sold the next day to Lynn Ellen Rice. We took him to her farm for a trial and stayed in her home before the official decision was made. I couldn't have asked for a better situation for him, they loved and cherished him. They had a lot of success with him, but then he colicked and had to have the surgery. Unfortunately he passed away a few months after that due to a bursted cecum. They have a beautiful memorial for him on their farm that I have had the pleasure of seeing pictures of. I only have a few photos of him to share, but I will look for more at my parent's house next time I go. Those were the dark ages before everyone had access to a camera 24/7!
After we sold him, we went straight back to the lady who sold Finn to us in the first place. This time, however, we had a much larger budget and were looking for more experienced horses. I tried a bunch in Kentucky and fell in love with one named Gemini or "Skippy." Once he was vetted and arrived home, he was a completely different animal. He was stopping really bad and my mom was horrified because we had just spent all this money on this horse and he wouldn't even jump around! We somehow got a hold of his blood results and realized he had a huge dose of Banamine in his system at the time of the vetting and told the agent that we had a serious law suit in the works. This was a fabrication, as every lawyer we asked pretty much told us we had nothing lol, but we pretended we did and ended up getting most of our money back and sending him back. We tracked him for a little while and he showed in the adults after he was returned but eventually lost track of where he went.
So we sold Finn in August of 2007, its now January of 2008 and I still didn't have a horse! As a horse-crazed 14-year-old that was basically hell. We had been trying horses, but none of them were the perfect fit. We thought we had found a great one in Canada at one point, but he got sold before we could get passports and make it up there. There was a mare up there that we hadn't seen a video of for us to see as well, but decided that probably wasn't worth the trip. So in January we headed down to WEF to start trying horses. I rode a few in the morning that I liked, but still knew I hadn't found the one. That's when my mom and I drove into Looking Back Farm's driveway. We rounded the corner into the barn and both stopped in our tracks. The most beautiful, huge, dark bay horse stood in the cross ties all tacked up. We looked at each other, both thinking there's no way a horse that beautiful would be in our budget. But she was, and to cap it off she was actually the mare we were supposed to see in Canada just a few months before. I watched her float around, still waiting for the true moment that told me she was it, but as soon as I got on I knew. Even just her walk was so impressive to ride and her strides were so long and slow-motion. I started trotting and it was the most comfortable trot I had ever been on, and her canter was the same. I started jumping around and didn't miss a single jump, like not even a little tight or a little long. I just remember her trainer, Erynn Ballard, joking that I should just stay down for WEF if we bought her!
So we sold Finn in August of 2007, its now January of 2008 and I still didn't have a horse! As a horse-crazed 14-year-old that was basically hell. We had been trying horses, but none of them were the perfect fit. We thought we had found a great one in Canada at one point, but he got sold before we could get passports and make it up there. There was a mare up there that we hadn't seen a video of for us to see as well, but decided that probably wasn't worth the trip. So in January we headed down to WEF to start trying horses. I rode a few in the morning that I liked, but still knew I hadn't found the one. That's when my mom and I drove into Looking Back Farm's driveway. We rounded the corner into the barn and both stopped in our tracks. The most beautiful, huge, dark bay horse stood in the cross ties all tacked up. We looked at each other, both thinking there's no way a horse that beautiful would be in our budget. But she was, and to cap it off she was actually the mare we were supposed to see in Canada just a few months before. I watched her float around, still waiting for the true moment that told me she was it, but as soon as I got on I knew. Even just her walk was so impressive to ride and her strides were so long and slow-motion. I started trotting and it was the most comfortable trot I had ever been on, and her canter was the same. I started jumping around and didn't miss a single jump, like not even a little tight or a little long. I just remember her trainer, Erynn Ballard, joking that I should just stay down for WEF if we bought her!
Needless to say, I rode her again the next morning and we bought her just after that. She had an eventing background, but was new to hunters so she was still green but she was so willing and giving that she would do anything asked of her. She was the easiest young horse in the world. We did three shows in the childrens, even earning a 90 at our first show, before stepping up to the Younger Large Juniors. She also did the First Years that year with Chris. At the end of the year she had qualified for indoors in the First Years as well as the Childrens Classic. For some reason, we thought it would be too much to do both or we couldn't do both or something (I don't really remember) but ultimately we decided she would do Harrisburg and Washington in the First Years. She was a very willing horse, but she was still green and did not behave that year. She was better at Harrisburg, but was not good at Washington. The next year I qualified for Devon and indoors. At Devon she was scared and didn't like it there at all, so needless to say we didn't do too well. By the time indoors came around, we thought she would be good at Harrisburg but knew Washington would be a challenge. So we headed to Harrisburg ready to have a great time and hopefully get a ribbon or two out of it. Well, we got there and she got scared. She tried her best to be brave, but it was just a big venue for her so we went home with just a 5th in the hack. Now we were determined to have a good Washington. The year before, the main thing she was worried about were the shiny trophies on the far side of the ring. So, like the rednecks we are, we covered the entire ring in tinfoil. I'm talking the jumps, the fence, the standards, literally everything! Well, it worked because we went to Washington with zero expectations and came back with a blue ribbon in the first class. Now the other two trips went more how I expected the show to go. She was good in the handy but knocked the trot jump so that pushed us right out, but the stake class was awful. I think we even added down one line! Just another example of how horses keep us humble... All we needed for reserve was a 5th in the hack, but we got reserve instead and missed it by a half a point because Tiziano and Jessica Springsteen were reserve with a 1st and a 6th.
The next year we qualified for Devon and indoors again. Devon went about the same as the year before, no ribbons but got better and braver each trip. I headed to James Madison University that fall and thought that I wanted a break from riding and showing so I could focus on being a normal college student for a little while. Boy was I wrong! I think I lasted a week or two and that was only because I was too busy and overwhelmed to make it happen. I joined the Equestrian Club but decided to wait until after indoors to start riding with them because Moxie came to live at The Barracks in Charlottesville so I could keep riding her during the time leading up to indoors. Since the barn was about an hour away, I was too busy to fit in riding anywhere else. We headed to Harrisburg just hoping to improve on last year, which I think we did. I think we got a jog or something, but no ribbons as she was still very nervous and a little star-struck in that ring. The following week, we headed back to our lucky show and earned a jog, a 6th, and a 7th with great trips, but she was landing crossed up so that knocked us down a bit.
The next year we qualified for Devon and indoors again. Devon went about the same as the year before, no ribbons but got better and braver each trip. I headed to James Madison University that fall and thought that I wanted a break from riding and showing so I could focus on being a normal college student for a little while. Boy was I wrong! I think I lasted a week or two and that was only because I was too busy and overwhelmed to make it happen. I joined the Equestrian Club but decided to wait until after indoors to start riding with them because Moxie came to live at The Barracks in Charlottesville so I could keep riding her during the time leading up to indoors. Since the barn was about an hour away, I was too busy to fit in riding anywhere else. We headed to Harrisburg just hoping to improve on last year, which I think we did. I think we got a jog or something, but no ribbons as she was still very nervous and a little star-struck in that ring. The following week, we headed back to our lucky show and earned a jog, a 6th, and a 7th with great trips, but she was landing crossed up so that knocked us down a bit.
We decided after that something must be going on with her stifles and figured out that she had some damage to her left patella. She had surgery to clear it out and they found some arthritis in that stifle as well so they were able to repair it while they had her open. She took a full year to recover and my mom did most of the rehabbing since I was away at school. When I got back to school after indoors I started riding where the JMU girls were riding at the time. I decided that the barn wasn't a great fit for me so I didn't return there during my spring semester. I was lucky enough to get to keep showing at the time with Katie Meagher's Keep The Faith or "Larry" as well as a young horse I bought in March named Falcon. I'll start with Larry because I have such a special place in my heart for that horse. He was another challenging horse that had developed a bit of a reputation over the years, both good and bad. Larry had won everything, I'm talking everything with his previous people, but he had developed a bit of a bad habit of stopping from time to time and being naughty and very spooky. Luckily for me, he rode EXACTLY the same as Neppie did. I rode him around our first trip together and I'm not going to say it was good, because it was definitely not, but I learned so much about him from that one trip. After that, it was smooth sailing. He never let me down, not once. He was such an awesome refresher for my riding, as it had been eight years since my time with Neppie ended. We were champion at almost every show and that summer he even took me to Champion, Grand Adult, winner of the Woodslane Adult Classic with a score of 90, and Best Adult Rider at Upperville. He really gave me a good boost of confidence again and the same feeling I had with Neppie.
So, back to Falcon. We bought him in February of 2011 as an investment horse and owned him for about five or six months before he was ready to be sold. We did a few horse shows, but he just wasn't really my ride and had a very hard lead change at the time. We got some good ribbons in the adults, but we just weren't a very consistent team. I was still away at school and I think if I had been able to ride him more and get to know him better we could've improved a lot, but that was never the plan for him as he was always a temporary horse for us. We knew he was a very quality horse so we knew we would have no problem selling him, so when the time came he was snapped up pretty quickly. However, when he was vetting something came up. The vet said that he passed everything, but his lymph nodes were enlarged and so they do some tests on them. Turns out, he had Lymphoma. They said that he could fall dead from it tomorrow or he could live a full life with no effects at all, but that they couldn't pass him because of it. Anyways, he was at The Barracks because that's where the lady who was going to buy him rode so we decided to donate him to their riding program. They went on to do such an amazing job with him which was so much fun to watch, he even won the First Year Green Handy Hunter at Harrisburg in 2012 and participated in the Pro Challenge at Capital Challenge in 2017 and 2018 and won best horse! They still have him in their program now, mostly showing in the adults with great success.
After we sold Falcon, I transferred to East Carolina University where I started showing on the IHSA team with the coach Laura Underhill Norment. At first I was a little unsure about the whole thing, just because it was so different from anything I had ever done and I didn't really know what to expect. I have to say though, IHSA helped my riding so much. I got to ride so many different types of horses, some that I clicked with and some that were challenging, but they all taught me something. During the first semester, I was still showing Larry so we did a few shows and he carried me to a 9th place finish in the NAL Adult Finals at Harrisburg. In the spring, Moxie was ready to show again! We did our first show at Rosemount Farm in April and she was perfect. She was champion that weekend and it was so much fun to have her back! Back at school, a few of us decided that we wanted to do ANRC that was to be held at Centenary College in NJ. It is basically a show for college kids that has four phases: a written test, a flat test, a derby phase, and a medal course. I tried to find a horse to use, but couldn't come up with a good match so I ended up having to lease one from the school that was hosting the show. The policy is that if you lease a horse at the show you have to do that Novice level instead of the National level, which means that I did the 2'6 version. The horse they gave me to use was so amazing. His name was Carter and we really got along well immediately. I studied pretty hard for the written phase because I knew that was the one phase that I could really control and ended up winning it! Next was the flat test, which I knew was going to be our weakest phase. I was pleasantly surprised with our test and we placed 4th. The derby phase was the most fun and we got a score of 80 to end up 4th. I was really ready for the medal phase because I knew that would be our strength. We had a great trip and earned an 87, which was 2nd place. We ended up placing second overall which was so exciting!
That summer I showed Moxie as Larry got leased out to one of my friends! She was a star as usual and as long as I stayed out of her way we showed to great results including Champion and Grand Adult at Upperville. When I went back to school in the fall Moxie stayed home so I met her at shows with my mom and I did the IHSA team again. We qualified for Zone 3 Finals and indoors in the adult classic that year. We decided not to take her to Harrisburg as she really hated it there and opted to do Zone 3 Finals and WIHS. During the zone finals she wasn't herself. She stopped in one class and I barely got her around the other one. I was worried going into WIHS because I didn't know if she was just rusty or if something was wrong again. Needless to say, WIHS didn't go as planned. She jumped the first jump huge and I knew she was going to be scared going around. She stopped once, but I was able to get her around and give her a good ride the rest of the way. Even though she ended up being fine in there, I knew something wasn't right. She didn't take a single lame step, but I knew something had to be bothering her for her to act that way. We decided to give her a month off after while I finished my semester at school and just see how she was when I got home. When we pulled her back out she definitely wasn't right behind, but this time it was the other stifle. We got the vet to come look at her and he confirmed that it was her stifle. When she had surgery on the other one they were able to clean up some arthritis in it, but now her other one had arthritis too. He told us that we could keep her going with some maintenance but the longer she went the more it would deteriorate. We decided that she didn't owe us anything and could retire sound and comfortable rather than try to doctor her up to keep going. At the time she lived at Cedar Cove Farm (Dabney's farm that has a perfect little barn and huge pastures), which was the perfect place to retire. We decided that we would try to breed her in the spring and see if we could get some babies from her.
I decided to transfer back to the JMU and did so in the spring semester of 2013. They had really changed their riding program and were now riding out of Jason Berry Stables and the coach was his wife, Alisa. This was a much better fit for me and I started riding on the IHSA team with them right away. I was also lucky enough to get to ride and show a few horses for Jason that semester including Resilient, Prime Time, Dominus, and a jumper named Lord Lux. He even let me tag along when they went to Aiken for two weeks in March. One of the weeks was over my spring break so I just skipped my classes the week before and headed down there! I learned so much those two weeks, especially about the jumpers since I had never done them before that show. Prime Time and I were Champion both weeks and ended up Circuit Champion in the Adults! That summer I was lucky enough to get to show Larry at Upperville where we were Champion and I was Best Adult Rider again. After that though, I didn't show at another A show until April of 2016. During my break from A shows I focused on IHSA, did a few House Mountain shows with Alisa and Jason, tried to breed Moxie, and volunteered to go to shows to help out both with Alisa and Jason as well as with Chris and the Breckenridge group. I didn't have a horse of my own to show and as much as I begged my parents, it just didn't make sense to get one while I was still in school. I decided that the only way to get to the horse show was to just go and help out and soak up as much knowledge as I could in the meantime from Alisa, Jason, and Chris. I also really enjoyed having a normal social life and being a college kid.
So after Moxie retired we had hoped to breed her in the spring of 2013 but she didn't catch. We decided to wait until 2014 to try again as it had gotten late in the season. Once spring of 2014 came around again we sent her up to Dr. Bill Ley in northern Virginia as he is well known for his skill with mares that are difficult to get pregnant. Unfortunately, he didn't have the success we had hoped for in the spring. My mom decided that she didn't want to put any more money into it and was planning to go pick her up and bring her home. Luckily for us, they fell in love with her and asked if they could keep her through the fall if they covered her expenses and tried everything possible to get her pregnant but got to keep the baby. My mom agreed and she finally caught in the fall of 2014. In July of 2015 she had her first baby, Hallelujah or "Halle." We rushed up to meet her baby girl and she was just as gorgeous as we had expected. Her sire is a stallion that they own who is by Chin Chin. We bred her right back to another stallion they own who is Quidam de Revel/Cassini II but didn't have a career due to an injury when he was young. This time we got to keep the baby who was due in August of 2016!!
After I graduated college in the spring of 2015 I was getting to ride a good amount over at Breckenridge. I still didn't have my own, but one of the girls at the barn was super busy with work and school so she needed consistent help keeping her horse in work. I was lucky enough to get to step in and hack her awesome horse for her a few day a week for a while. Unfortunately for me that opportunity ended and since its not really my style or in my personality to go around and ask to ride people's horses and I wasn't around the barn for people to think of when they needed their horse hacked anymore I didn't have anything to ride. I was going crazy without having something to ride!! Six months later I finally convinced my parents that I had to have a horse. I asked Chris if there was anything I could hack a few times before going down there so I went to the barn to ride a little horse named Nilsson once before we headed to Ocala since I hadn't ridden at all in six months. Riding 11 horses in one day was quite the intro back into it. I literally thought my legs were going to fall off by the end of the day! I was so drained but I'm so glad I stuck it out until the last barn which was Hunter Holloway's Equi-Venture Farm. They had a few really nice horses lined up for me to try. I rode two before I got on a beautiful dapple grey named Snowbound or "Coco" as they called him. When I got on I knew he was special. The one I rode right before him was probably a better natural match, but I just fell in love with him. It was kind of hard to judge which horse was going to be the best match because not only was I was so out of riding shape, but I also hadn't jumped since the previous April when my IHSA lessons ended. That's 10 months since the last time I had jumped!
The next morning we went back to try to a few of the ones I liked from the day before. I rode one at another barn before heading back to Equi-Venture to try Coco and the one I rode right before him. I rode the other one first and rode him well, but still had my heart set on Coco. I got on and jumped him around again and knew that I just had to have him. We vetted him and he arrived home on March 5th. My parents were away for spring break so I got him to myself for the whole week until my mom got back. We decided that we wanted to change his barn name and settled on Jordy, after our favorite Green Bay football player Jordy Nelson. Our first show was Rosemount in April where we were Champion in the Adults. We moved up to the 3'3 A/O's at our next show in Lexington where we were Reserve and continued in the 3'3's through the summer. At the end of July we had some pretty bad luck. He had walked in from the field very short on his front feet and after a few wrong diagnoses, we discovered that he had foundered. Read about the whole story in my blog! While this was obviously tragic to me, I learned so much from it.
On August 10th, our baby Quiver was born! Moxie gave birth in the middle of the afternoon with no warning so we weren't able to get there until the next day, but we got plenty of pictures in the meantime! He was just the sweetest, cutest, most curious little fella. Obviously, I was totally in love. We got up to visit him every few weeks because we didn't want to miss too much since he wasn't at home and was growing so fast! Honestly, we don't know much about babies but Dr. Ley told us that he thought he was the finest grandson of Quidam that he's ever seen so we were very excited. He grew so fast that he had to be weaned a little early because he was getting too much nutrition from Moxie's milk. After he was weaned he went to live with my mom's old friend Lisa Kline of Foxlore Farm, also in northern Virginia. He lived there for a few months before he was gelded. He was starting to grow a club foot so our vet recommended that he have a very minor surgery to cut his Check Ligament which would correct it so his foot would grow correctly. We agreed and after he was gelded he was sent to the clinic for the procedure before he was to head home to us for a short recovery. The mistake that was made during this very minor procedure was one that had never been recorded before, that's how rare it is. Read all about Quiver's story in my blog! Again, while this was horrible it truly taught me so much.
So now that you're all caught up follow along as I chronicle my thoughts and observations as well as my experience in the horse world!