December 24, 2009

WILD RIDE. . .


We sure have been blessed by our association with Don Whittaker, aka Grandpa Don. We have known him for the past seven years, but it seems like he has always been in our lives! Because of him, we our living some of our dreams of having horses in our lives. It all started out with Natalee wanting to ride, our selling bread on the corner when Grandpa Don drove by, and the rest is history! Four years ago Don had a stroke and heart attack and nearly died. We took over the care of his horses and leading the trail rides he loved to do. Two years ago he gave Natalee her favorite horse, Silverado, for her 16th birthday. That summer he sold all the horses except Silver and Zorro to Ken Anderson. We continued our care of the horses and doing rides for one more year, then Ken moved the horses and stopped riding them, only breeding them. It made us sad, but things have worked out. Natalee and I were still able to ride a lot.
Since then, Sheldon Wittwer (who has 4 horses)has let us have his four horses down at our corrals so we can keep his horses worked and trained, in exchange for his providing hay for all six horses. At first Sheldon didn't think he was getting such a good bargain. . .that is until he rode his horses last summer. He was very surprised at how good they were. That's what happens when you keep horses trained. I think it works well for both of us!

So, here are some of our pics from the last few days...

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