Horse Stuff

One of the tasks I like to undertake at least once a year is to inventory all of my horse stuff. This only includes items that are kept outside of my home, though I do have a miniature horse western saddle in my living room as I don't want the leather to get moldy. There has not been a "full size" horse living at our farm in about 3 years, but I still have plenty of big horse items. Who knows, maybe someday I will get a saddle horse and might need one these items, though if I get a saddle horse, it may be a color that doesn't go with any of the items I have saved.  For example, I don't like the way a chestnut horse looks in a red halter, so the red horse size halter in my tack truck isn't going to work. You can read more about this on my blog from February 2010 "Clothes Horse" My endurance saddle won't work on a horse with narrow withers. Fortunately my 2 Wintec all purpose saddles have easy change gullet systems. so they might work. Probably the number one item on my inventory list is "Horse Clothing". God gave horses a nice coat of hair which gets nice and warm in the winter, so why anyone needs all of this clothing--of yes, if I get a Thoroughbred it might not get a nice warm coat in the winter; or what if I decide to show during the winter and my horse has to be kept clipped? According to my inventory list, I have 30 items of horse clothing. Coolers, rain sheets, stable blankets, fly sheets, and turnout blankets in different levels of warmth. These range in size from 42 to 81. I'm not sure who wore the size 81. It might have been a blanket someone gave me just in case I decided to try dressage and had to purchase a Friesian. Brands of clothing include Tough-1, D-Tech, Kensington, Baker, Cottage Craft, Schneiders, Mark Todd, Saxon, Weatherbeeta, Gatsby, and McAllister. As you can see I like to give my money equally to all of the different manufacturers of horse clothing. Some of the above mentioned items are new. or still in the package from the cleaners. I've tried to sell them, but everyone must have horses that don't match the colors I am selling, or maybe they just want to buy new stuff to go with the new horse, and thus began their own hoarding problem.. My list of horse footwear is just a daunting. After all, one must have shoes to match the outfit. Some of these are therapeutic so they never did match any outfit. I have Easy boot "Original, Trail, Rx, and Soaker; Davis boots, hoof socks, Therapy boots (I think I paid over $300 for these beauties) and of course one needs to buy the "Special" inserts to go in all of the above mentioned boots. Like the clothes, some of these are brand new, or look brand new.  I've tried to sell the boots but no one is interested. Guess they would rather spend the $300 for new instead of the $95 which is my listed price. Does anyone need blanket leg straps? I have at least a dozen pairs, and "no" they do not go with the above mentioned blankets. Stirrups? I have Peacock, Swivel, comfort and plain, stirrup pads, and new rubbers for the peacocks. I will not bore my reader with a continuation of all of my inventoried items but suffice it to say "there it way too much", or maybe I have a hoarding problem. In defense of my hoarding I do want to add that last month my son did ask me to take one of his thoroughbred polo horses for a couple of months as she needed some rest and relaxation. Good, I thought, a thin coated horse;  I can make use of some of these articles of clothing Of course on  the first cold rainy day I realized the size she wore didn't go with her color. After all, you can't have a chestnut horse wear red. At least not in my barn !!

Horse Loving Mother's Wish
I have always loved and owned horses, so I had assumed my 3  children would share my love for this incredible animal. There were always horses in their young lives. My 2 oldest  children did ride, took lessons, attended horse camp, and even did some showing. When they were old enough to say "NO MORE" and  conveniently decided to participate in time consuming school sports and activities, I thought my "horse loving children" days were over. My youngest son who was 6 years younger than his siblings, and also never showed much interest in horses, other than riding them while pretending to be a knight in armor. When he was in high school we attended an open house at the University of CT. There was a polo match, which we thought would be fun to watch. Actually it was the horse loving mother that wanted to watch the match. My son watched the game for about 15 minutes and announced that he wanted to play polo. I said "But you can't ride, never mind ride like a polo player. What about joining your high school's cross-country team?" Well he was determined to play polo, so started taking riding lessons and we even signed him up for polo lessons at UCONN. He learned to ride, and play polo well enough to be asked to join the UCONN high school polo team. He played on that team for 2 years, and when it was time to apply to college, he was only interested in colleges  that had polo teams. He was accepted to UCONN, and played on their team for 4 years, even going  to the national collegiate polo game in KY. Once the polo "bug" bit him there was no turning back. Now a  30 year old adult, after many years of struggling to be successful in polo, he owns and operates one of the largest equestrian facilities in MA. I like to brag and say that my son not only plays polo, but teaches polo, learned to shoe horses,, has a polo club, a huge equestrian facility, and best of all, I finally have a child that loves horses.