Horses

We have quite a few budding equestrians in our family.

Little Grace Bolden loves riding, says Tania. Tania now has a farm ranch with several horses and said she would love to get the barn fixed up to board horses for others.
Olivia, Lindsey, Grace and Jon have taken riding lessons and I believe, leased a horse for a while.
April used her own money, made doing a paper route for several years, to buy two quarter horses, Sugar and Melody. Now she does barn chores and feeds for half the board. She shows her horses at the county 4-H fair and other nearby small horse shows, nothing too fancy. She did go to the WI State Fair last year but the competition was fierce!!! People were spending thousands of dollars, probably even tens of thousands of dollars, on their horses and clothes. April just likes competing for the fun, not for the one-upmanship of whose horses or clothes are better.

Grace Bolden and the Weber kids get their love of horses from their moms, of course. But it must be genetic for April because Tammy is scared to death of horses, after getting bucked as a kid taking lessons out on Burdick Road. Actually, Tammy and Lisa got bucked riding double that time. Neither got hurt, really. Lisa got back on, but Tammy never did. Some of you may remember that Lisa went on to buy her own Arab horse, Ruby, which she sold to Tania when she grew older and was preparing to leave for college.
April was bucked, as you may remember, in April of 2005 and lacerated her liver, shattered her kidney, broke her arm and was med-flighted to UW Hospital. But she got back on. Now, I think it's important for every child to get bucked off before they buy their own horse. BTW (By the way) it is a goal in life for April to get Tammy back riding a horse and she did get her on the back of Melody, if even for a few seconds. I think Melody even took two or three steps until Tammy started hyperventilating so badly (seriously, this is not a joke) she had to get down. Dream on little girl...!

Dennison kids out there, did you ever ride? Did you have a horse or pony? Did you wish you did? I remember stories of Linda's pet cow (that ended up being supper, I think), did you ride it, and of the kids riding the Crans' ponies, is that right? Please share with us, the children and grandchildren, some of your memories of horse-back, or even cow-back riding!