Throwback Thursday - Where It All Started

I went over to my parent's house for birthday cake yesterday and my mom presented me with an old photo album of mine that she had found. In it were pictures of me on the first horse I ever rode!

Way back in 1983, my brother and I went to a week-long, away from home, summer riding camp. I don't remember very much of it, except the horse's names (of course). My pony for the week was Dolly, who was adorable. My brother rode Danny, who was blind in one eye and had a best friend Vinnie who looked out for him by always standing next to him on his bad side.

Although we went back the next year (when I rode a palomino named Pharoah) my brother did not enjoy it. I don't know if he ever touched a horse again after camp. Being quite allergic to everything associated with horses probably didn't help!

This started my horse bug, which my parents finally gave in to in 1986, when I started with weekly lessons and was leasing a pony about 8 months later.

Current me is horrified at the length of the chin strap on my helmet.

I don't remember riding bareback. But I do remember that the next year we went out on a trailride bareback, and I had my first canter (unintentionally), and I fell off and sprained my wrist.

I'm sure that this camp instructor's name was Karen Briggs, and I've always wondered if she is the same Karen Briggs who has written tons of horse articles that have been in many magazines. Also, I would love to have a pony this colour - that flaxen mane is amazing!

My brother on Danny

Each pony had two kids assigned to it for the week. I'm on the left with Dolly, and my brother is on the right with Danny.

Throwback Thursday - Sunflower

I've had a whole bunch of 13-14 hours out of the house in a row types of days lately. And I feel like I'm this close to getting a cold (seems like everyone I work with is already sick). So when I get home at 10:30 at night I've been pretty well going straight to bed and not blogging about what's been happening with the ponies.

So enjoy these throwback pics.

Sunflower was my first pony, who I owned from 1987-1993. She was a QH/Appy/Arab who was born in November, 11 months after a stallion jumped a fence.

I was looking through an old photo album recently and found this one from about 1991.

Not too shabby right?

Also from that jumping session, I present to you:

Pretty sure I ended up with sand in places it shouldn't be.

Weird Horse Possessions

When you own horses for a long time, you sometimes accumulate things that, well, normal people probably don't have kicking around in their house.

I have one such thing that I keep forgetting about. I've had it for 30 years, sitting in a jar, sometimes in a drawer, sometimes on a bookcase. I was reminded of it while reading The Hunky Hanoverian's post about her horse Rio's surgery.

It's a splint bone.

Or rather, part of a splint bone. About a 2" part.

My first pony, Sunflower, had a bit of a bad year around 1989. We figured that she tried to kick another horse (being the cow that she was), missed the horse, and connected with a wood plank on a fence. Which resulted in a broken splint bone in her left hind leg. This was only the start of one of those "crappy things happen to horses" years.

The Sunflower pony.

So off to the local vet clinic she went. I was only 14 years old at the time, so I don't remember much of the true scenario. I imagine that she went under general anesthetic, but I don't know for sure. I know I was completely unaware of the risk that it would involve,  as I had only been riding for about 3 years. She stayed at the clinic for about a week and came home to be rewrapped daily by me (I remember using Cool Cast bandages). After a while, it became apparent that she was experiencing some pain where the bone had been, so the nerves were cryogenically frozen along that area, and she forever more had 4 hairless dots along the outside of that leg.

And the surgery cost $800.

I don't think I'd ever taken the bone out of the jar until I took these pictures.

At least, that is how I remember it all, from my child's perspective of 30 years ago.

My party favour when I picked Sunflower up at the vet was the chunk of bone in a jar of formaldehyde.

The writing on the masking tape on the jar says "Sunflower, Left lateral splint bone, April 11/89". I guess that was my birthday present that year - my birthday is April 8th (bad things tend to happen around my birthday, I tend to get really paranoid around that time).

Over time, the formaldehyde has either leaked out or dried up. I didn't realize the condition of the jar until I took these photos - not sure if all the cracks actually go all the way through the jar or not.

Whatever formaldehyde was left in the jar I dumped out when I took the bone out. Oops.

Do you think it would be weird if I were to take it to the vet with me on my next visit and see if they would top up the formaldehyde?

This bone cost $800. I'm not getting rid of it anytime soon.

What weird horse things do you have in your possession?

Throwback Thursday

Phantom, at about 3 years of age. Photo shamelessly stolen from her breeder's sale ad. (Probably around 2006)

Throwback Thursday

Me on my gelding Farly, probably around 1999.

He's been gone since 2006 but I still miss that horse every damn day.