Welcome to my Pony Blog!

I've never been consistent when it comes to journals, online, paperbased, voice-recorded- you name it, I've started it and never kept up with it. But here I am, yet another attempt. This time I hope to be successful because I actually have a purpose now: to journal the progress of my horses.

Let us start with a little bit about me, and usual equine suspects you'll be reading about. I'm young (in my 20's) and have 2 horses: Faith and Frank. Faith is a 5 yr old OTTB (off track thoroughbred). We've been together for 2 years now. Frank is my 4 yr old breeding stock paint; we've known eachother for about 4 months.

I also share my life with 2 other equines: Dobie and Zanaella. Dobie is a 10 yr old pinto pony, trained by yours truly. He is owned by an 8 yr old girl. My horses live at his house. Zanaella is a 5 yr old ghost Appy, rescued from the Yakima feedlot through Columbia Basin Equine Rescue (CBER). I'm currently sponsoring her, which means I pay for her daily costs and get to train this beauty.

Back to me- I've been involved with horses ever since I could recognize one. I probably started on my parents at around age 3- with My Little Ponies. We lived in East Rutherford, NJ soon to move out to Sussex County. Of course I pitched a fit and did not want to move. My parents saw an opportunity and bribed me with horses. It went a little something like this: "Ally, if you move with us to Sussex [like i had a choice?!] we'll get you some horseback riding lessons." OH BOY! Sign me up!

They call it the "great mistake." For the next 20 years I rode horses, 1 time per week. Actually, there was a break in my teen years when I decided soccer was more important than riding lessons, since i was not allowed to have my own horse anyway. I got back into riding in college, in Boston of all places. There i met my now good friend/roomate/ horsefreak, and we found a barn at which to continue lessons. Lessons turned into serious training, grooming, showing. Then I graduated and moved out to Seattle (!!!) with my roommate.

My introduction to Seattle was interesting. I was affiliating myself with a riding facility, longing for my own horse. Since i didn't have a job yet, i could not own- I could not even ride for fear of getting injured and not having the health insurance to cover it. At last I scored my first full time job in Seattle (October 2003). It took all but 1 paycycle for me to purchase my first horse, Faith.

Faith was a mess when I got her. She is a Delineator baby, and had a rough time at the track. She ran just well enough for her owners/ trainer to think she stood a chance at placing, but never quite made it. She let them down one too many times, and was cast off- she wasn't being fed or kept after.

A lady who was looking for an Arab came to our barn with Faith's picture in tow. I fell in love with her, and 3 days later, we picked her up in Carnation and brought her home.

Since then we've had our ups and downs but we're still together and we'll always be. She has taught more about love, life, and leadership than any other horse or trainer.

So, for this, this blog is dedicated to my girl...myhorsefaith.

All the best, everyone!