Horses - 2008!
In 2008, MiKayla leased a 26 year old Buckskin Gelding named Jesse. While we were leasing Jesse, he stayed at his owners home in Adel. We were lucky to lease Jesse as he was owned by the aunt of another fellow 4Her that MiKayla had become good friends with. Jesse had quite the show experience under his belt, but had been used for trail riding the past few years. We were happy to have a horse lined up for MiKayla to show; but, by now Kirsten was also old enough to join 4H and show and she wanted to show a horse as well. We found it impossible to find an experienced show horse for Kirsten to lease as we wanted something with lots of experience to help her learn about horse showing and to focus on her form and her skills, rather than working on training a horse at the same time. In the end, we purchased a horse for Kirsten (just a couple of years earlier, I had sworn that we were NOT buying any horse), a 1994 Dun Tobiano Paint Mare, Tailored Moonlight.
In 2008, MiKayla had a great show season. We still did not have a trailer so we were able to pay others to trailer for us to get the kids to shows. Our favorite shows were the Flying Arrow Saddle Club shows held in Adel and the Quad County Saddle Club shows held in Madrid. Kirsten was too young to show at the State Fair but MiKayla showed for the first time at the State Fair level. She received a Purple in English Pleasure (highest ribbon ranking), plus a Blue, Red, and White in her other 3 events. MiKayla also showed Taylor (Kirsten's horse) at the Flying Arrow Saddle Club Cowgirl Queen Contest, and was runner up that year. Now, the Cowgirl competition is a completely different story when it comes to horse shows.
Kirsten spent most of 2008 getting used to Taylor and working on her riding skills. She didn't get to show Taylor until the middle of June, giving her about 1 month to get show experience on Taylor before the county fair. At the 2008 Polk County 4H Fair, Kirsten & Taylor went Reserve Junior (4Her) Pleasure Horse. Quite an accomplishment!