My first horse and first love, I was given Bailey when she was 5 1/2 months old when her mother was killed by another horse. My sister could not bear to keep her and could not bear to sell her, but knew that she would have a forever home with me.
Bailey showed me how little I knew about horses and led me to find Parelli. Luckily for both of us 2 Star (at the time) Instructor Fawn Anderson was boarding her horses just up the road from where we lived. I still remember the first time I saw Fawn ride. We had just come back from dropping off some of my neighbour’s cows at their summer pasture and fawn crawled through the fence and hopped up onto her little buckskin horse, Billy, bareback and bridleless. She proceeded to wak, trot and canter figure 8s and do simple changes, sideways and I can’t even remember what else… needless to say it blew my mind. Being a LBI when confronted with new information, I thought about this for days before asking my neighbour what it was she did. He told me about Parelli and I haven’t looked back.
Bailey is now 5 and is an unregistered purebred Quarter Horse with Jet of Honour bloodlines. She’s the softest horse I’ve ever touched and she’s light and responsive thanks to Parelli. I hope to start her under saddle myself this year – but only if I get her good and ready on the ground, first.
Update: Bailey was started under saddle in 2010 by Jason Hicks. She had a lot of bronc in her and still throws a few crowhops in when first saddled. I took her with me to ride in my first ever Buck Brannaman clinic in Dayton Washington July 2011 and now know better how to help her through that to where she is feeling comfortable and responsive enough to ride safely. I am looking forward to progressing with her as well as Maya.
