A life-long horse lover embraces "It's Now or Never." O sole mio.
In July of 2025 our 11 year old daughter, Josie, had just finished a therapeutic riding camp at Hearts and Horses. It changed her life. Fine motor skills, empathy, compassion, personal space? Equine time was a dream. I began to pursue the idea of adopting a horse for our family, as I knew that we would be able to support therapeutic relationships for all of us with a horse who we could access daily. It became my mission. A week after that camp ended for Josie, my uncle Greg died from complications of late-stage Huntington's Disease. The need to follow "ridiculous dreams" while we could enjoy them fully became crystal clear.
To kick off our grief-filled, hopeful journey, I took all three kids to visit horses with Dr. Ruth Altman at Cito's Rescue in Loveland, CO. Although there wasn't a right-fit horse for our family or for her horses, I knew we wanted to support rescue and continue searching for a therapeutic horse for our kids (and for me!).
Red enters our lives. Then leaves.
As I was on a flight from Colorado to Pennsylvania for my uncle's service in August, I reached out to a man who had posted his older gelding, Red, on Colorado Horse Rescue's courtesy listings. His photo is probably still up there! While I was driving with my twin sister to my uncle's celebration of life, Red's owner called me in response to my late-night airport email. He wanted to *give* us this horse. Disbelief is too mild a word.
Josie and I traveled to Arvada, CO to visit with Red and his owner. Amazing! Wonderful! I had resigned from my teaching position and was determined to work overnights to give me days to support increasing family needs and horse ownership. The reality of full-time special education teaching was no longer compatible with our family life, and the stress had exacerbated other pre-existing health issues for me, so I knew I had to make another career change to survive.
We had our precious Red for less than a day before he catastrophically broke his leg while running in the pasture. We had to have him put down. I won't go into detail about that day here, just yet.
Giving up on the horse rescue dream was not an option. Our daughter was beside herself with grief over a horse she barely knew. Our youngest met him once, and my husband and eldest son hadn't even met him at all.
Windsor is with us.
In my grief, I returned to the Colorado Horse Rescue courtesy listings, optimistic, and almost frantic to fill this intolerable hole in our lives. I reached out to Windsor's owner detailing our story and our hopes. I received a rapid response, and we quickly moved forward to meeting Windsor and his owner in Ken Caryl, CO. Josie and I both had the opportunity to ride, lead, and engage in some groundwork with him under the guidance of his owner and trainer. We were ecstatic. Windsor was very intelligent, highly trained, and had the work experience that made me feel safe(r) with him. We decided to move forward with adoption and as we discussed specifics, Windsor's previous owner also wanted to GIFT him to us. I couldn't believe it.
I reached out to my friend, E, and we agreed to board Windsor at her home with her sweet old Haflinger mare. E wouldn't accept money for this arrangement. So, I found myself with a free horse and free board. I knew there would be another shoe to drop after getting a vet and farrier care, but we were somehow doing the thing- again!
Windsor came to us at E's little ranch on September 4, 2025. His previous owner brought an absolute ton of old tack, buckets, blankets, supplements, and forage. His SUV was filled to the brim with all things horse.
Reality (sort of) sets in.
As we were preparing a midday wet mash for Windsor, his previous owner talked through his specific formula and measurements for each ingredient. He even pulled out a scale to gift us. In the midst of his demonstration, he also unloaded four days' worth of pre-mixed dry mash in buckets from his vehicle (for convenience, he said)! I was extremely grateful, but I started to wonder what Windsor was really capable of eating when I saw him dropping mash, slurping, and licking the bottom of his bucket for every spare morsel. He quidded almost all of the hay we'd provided and also quidded grass. We'd be learning very quickly that we would need to make some adjustments to many things in the near future...
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