With all the talk about my new young horse, Pepper, it may seem like I’ve forgotten about my other three horses. Yes, a pretty young face always get the attention, but I have my other horses to keep going too.

Dually has once again been undergoing some diagnostic work and progressive (pronounced: ex-spen-sive) treatments to try and understand the source of his pain, which we’ve finally isolated to his right knee. At 18 years old and with an early start to his performance career as a cow horse, he’s showing his age (and one crooked leg doesn’t help). Although he’ll hold up to light riding for some time to come, I am definitely NOT a ‘light’ rider. I don’t weigh much, but I tend to ride hard. Hence, the reason for having a young horse. So Dually has been relegated to “semi-retirement,” meaning we’ll keep him in shape—fit and shiny—for photo shoots and videos, but not really train on him anymore. He deserves it!

Meanwhile, Annie, my little mare with a red-headed attitude is doing great and a blast to ride. My long-term efforts to try and train her to be a gelding seem to be paying off! Eddie, our handsome ranch gelding (son of Sixes Pick—world champion Ranch Horse), has become a fully-trained, solid and reliable bridle horse. Rich has been using him to shoot off of and more recently, has been saddling him English to get ready for our trip to Ireland. I might add that this stocky, typey ranch horse looks downright sexy in English tack (and Rich doesn’t look so bad either!).