WOW!! What a WEEK!

Yikes. Things that have happened since I brought home the devil in horse form.

1. She's NOT an appendix. She's an OTTB, and the woman who sold her to me lied. The woman, who's husband is a jockey, and brother a trainer, knew exactly what she had... That made me a little sad, since I know how OTTB can be and this is my FIRST HORSE! But, we'll make it, and I love her regardless.

2. The Jockey Club is of No Help when it comes to contacting her REAL previous owner. I was able to get her tattoo traced though, registered name--Storm City Slew. Really pretty right?

3 Hopewell Farms in KY is amazing! They got me Denali's trainers name at Emerald Downs. He was amazing and shocked that Denali (Storm City Slew) was sent to auction. She was suppose to be for the little girl of the woman who had her at the auction. I CAN NOT STRESS THIS ENOUGH!! MAKE SURE you know where your horse goes!! Have a contract in place that you have first refusal if the horse is going to be sold again. Denali could be on a meat wagon somewhere!

4. Denali (New Name- "The Great One") Is of Seattle Slew/Secretariat blood. She was, at one time, a very expensive horse.

5. New Blog! No point in having another blog about my "Appendix" since she's not!

I never thought it was possible to love something so much. I'm assuming this is what it would feel like if I had a kid. Denali is my kid, and regardless of her freak outs and running around like crazy, I love her more than anything!!

NEW NAME!

So Long Story!! Lillian is for a sweet, calm horse...you know, the kind of horse that I bought... I can't keep calling her Lillian. I've tossed around a lot of different names. Beet, Turnip, CRAZY, NUT BALL, well...not really the last two... I was going to name her McKinley, since it's a HUGE mountain in Alaska where my husband is, but my friend reminded me that the other name of the mountain is Denali. It just seems to fit her! She's so proud and SUPER LARGE. We keep trying to stick her to see how tall she is, but that freaks her out so bad that I can only gestimate. She's around 16 hands.

Lillian in a nutshell... (sometimes I think she's the nut!)

I said to myself, "Don't bring your wallet." Did I listen? Do I ever listen? My friends even said, don't bring your wallet...well, more on that later.

Guess what I did!! I bought a horse! I went to the auction in Enumclaw with some friends. I brought my wallet, and had no intentions on buying anything that day, much less a horse. I am deeply in love with Yukon, a 23 year old TB who stole my heart already, I couldn't imagine another horse I could love as much.

We walked around the little, dark, dirty pens and looked at the horses. Some were so beautiful, it broke my heart to see them so terrified. I questioned the organization skills of the people running the auction. Who would put a stallion next to a mare in heat? Crazy. I looked at all horses, 32, I counted as I went. Some I really liked, some could hardly stand on the three good legs they had left. It was super sad. I wanted to rescue the ones who had no life left in their eyes and give them an honorable end to their life.


That's when it happened, I turned the corner and from the dark corner of the last paddock she stood. Her head dropped down, with a sleepy look in her face. She was enormous and she was beautiful. There was just something about here that drew me to her. We talked to her "owner" (more on that later) and found out that she was a 3 year old Appendix. What a great horse! I was in love and there was no turning back. I had ridden when I was young, and had a lot of confidence in myself (at the time-it's amazing what a green horse does to your confidence.)It was the same feeling I got when I saw my husband for the first time. I just knew that she was my horse.


She stood there chewing on her lead rope, and every time her "owner" turned to look at her she would drop it quickly. It was really cute, at least at the time it was.


The next thing I knew she entered the arena and the bidding started. I didn't have a bidding number since I wasn't buying anything. I grabbed my friends (without asking-Sorry Cat) and proceeded to bid on her. At $675 I got my 3 year old Appendix! I was on cloud 9. I have never been so excited in my entire life! The fact that my husband and I had discussed getting a horse, and the fact that he didn't think we had enough money to take care of one went to the back of my head. I had Lillian, her new name, and I didn't care (at the time.)

My hubby is in Alaska for the whole summer, the only way to contact him is by writing letters. We'll see how that goes!!

We brought Lillian home. She hopped right into the trailer and if she could reach she probably would have tied her self up. She was so sweet!! What a perfect name for a perfect horse.

Things change a lot in the 50 or so miles that it took to bring her home.... I'm not sure what happened to my sweet Lillian I bought... out of the trailer came the Devil herself. You would have thought we brought home a wild Mustang Stallion from Nevada the way she was running and bucking and rearing in the arena. It was nuts!! No comfort to me was everyone looking asking me, "what are you going to do now?" Gulp.

I own a horse! What am I thinking...