This Thanksgiving we headed up to visit my in-laws in northern Virginia. Along with visiting family we had plans to visit our 2 year old gelding, Marq Your Bible aka "Marcus", who we own in partnership with my mother-in-law and 5 others. He is taking a short break, as he has grown so much that we decided it was in his best interest to give him a breather so he'd be all ready for a 3 year old campaign, with our first big goal of a first start in March and then head him to Colonial Downs this June and July, for the VA-bred races, hoping he will be stakes quality.
Our trainer, Diana McClure, is a wonderful woman and not only loves the horses she works with, but also loves children and helping them develop their love of horses. So, whenever we can make it out to her farm, she offers my two daughters a ride on her pony horse, Brownie, who is quite famous in his own right, for being the lead pony for Big Brown before his Preakness win, among other things.
So, on the day after Thanksgiving, we went to Diana's farm and both my girls got to ride Brownie and Diana also graciously gave pony rides to my two nephews, one of which had never been on a horse.
All the children really enjoyed their rides and my oldest even got to ride twice, because she loves Brownie so much that she talks about him all the time and even brought him some carrots this time. Diana is showing her how to get into a jockey position, which she also did in July, at our last visit, and a picture of that has gotten a lot of attention on Facebook and on Diana's website.
After our visit with Brownie, we headed over to a friend of Diana's farm to see Marcus. Diana thought her friend's farm would be a better place for a short break, than her own, because of a nice hill in the pasture and he could be left turned out a lot more, with a few buddies.
When Marcus came up to the fence and realized who was here to visit he was crazing our attention. I climbed the fence and groomed him a little bit. He is not what most people would think of when they think of a horse who has been in race training. He's so sweet, I groomed him while he was totally loose in his pasture, no halter, no lead rope, nothing, he just stood there relishing the attention that I bestowed upon him.
A few times, after I was done grooming, he wandered off, but always came right back for more attention. The picture above is of Marcus coming over to me and giving me a good sniff and kiss. He did this all on his own, I did not encourage him to put his nose to my face. I know he remembers me. I was there helping him come into this world, a difficult birth and he is lucky to be alive and healthy after such a hard time coming into this world. I guess he and I will always have a special connection because of that tricky situation.
After he sniffed me over really good he wandered off, but came right back and I was standing by the fence talking to Diana and he came up and put his head over my right shoulder and just stood there with his gorgeous head on my shoulder listening to me talk and letting me rub on him some more. He is so sweet and such a special boy, I can't wait for him to start racing.
After our visit we went back to my in-laws for a late lunch, tried to get our youngest daughter to take a nap, but she was just too excited, so later in the afternoon we headed out for a walk, as our oldest wanted to go see the stream, she had seen on a walk, the day before, with some other family members. It was my husband, my two daughters, and I alone, this time. I had my Seeing Eye Dog Dextra harnessed up and I was following behind my husband as we went down the very steep hill behind my in-law's house. Our oldest daughter led the way and my husband helped our youngest. After a little while, we realized it was getting dark very quickly, so we turned around to head back to the house, but our oldest daughter was getting a bit upset that she wasn't going to get to see the stream again. My husband got me to the bottom of the steep hill, where the path led through the thick woods up to my in-law's house and I took my youngest daughters hand and started back to the house as my husband took our oldest a shortcut to the stream. I couldn't see hardly anything through the thick woods, I just said, "Dextra, forward! Let's go back to the house." And Dextra slowly made her way up the steep incline guiding me and my 2 year old daughter around the thick underbrush, bush branches, etc staying on what felt like the correct path, the several hundered feet up to the clearing where the house stands. When she got us safely to the front sidewalk I dropped the harness and gave her a huge hug, petted her vigorously, and just told her how proud of her I was and what a super star Seeing Eye Dog she is!
These dogs are not trained to go hiking like that, but many guide dog users do go hiking, we just have to do it slowly and use the training they have to expand on it to train them about trails. So, she isn't in the first to do this, but it was her first time doing it and she was amazing!
Dextra and I have only been together since April and she is only 2 1/2 years old, but she is proving to be so awesome and I can not praise her enough or thank The Seeing Eye enough for partnering her with me. I look forward to a lot more adventures with this truly amazing young yellow Labrador from The Seeing Eye.
And, yes, my 2 year old was also adding her praises to Dextra, too. It was so dark by the time I made it back to the house that all I could see was the outline of the house against the fading light. I went inside and had my father-in-law turn on the flood lights, so that my husband and oldest daughter could find their way back to the house, which they did about 20 minutes later.
So, the day after Thanksgiving gave me a lot to be thankful for. I am thankful for my sweet family, my awesome Seeing Eye dog, my horses, and my wodnerful trainer, Diana McClure.
