Want a Horse? (Summer)

I alluded to it earlier, but Lilly is going up for sale. 

Carrie thought long and hard about it. Lilly is or most marketable horse by far. She has her quirks and can be a little persnickety, but she's a high-performing ball of energy. She's not a family horse. With a skilled rider, she is a performance horse, though. 

This has been a work in progress for a while. Lilly started taking dressage lessons from Hannah at Kim's barn in March. Carrie has enrolled Lilly in the Mid-Atlantic Dressage Festival in Lexington, VA later this month. Hannah will ride her and Carrie's hoping for a good performance. That way she can market Lilly as a successful hunt and dressage pony. 

She made this poster to hang on Lilly's stall at the festival. 

The MAD-Fest won't start until May 18th. Carrie's plan is to market Lilly beforehand and up the price a little if she performs really well at the festival. We've been paying for Lilly to board at Kim's barn for the training and also for the presentation when people come out to see her. Basically, we're a small shop. Kim has Olympic level facilities that will be much more impressive and hopefully put potential buyers in the right mindset pricewise. Lilly is "priced to sell," for what she's capable of, but if you're not part of the horse world you'd be surprised what that equates to. Carrie doesn't like the anxiety of not knowing what to expect, so she'd rather go a little low and make things happen quick than wait for the best price possible.

The money will include a commission to Hannah, recoup board, training, and festival fees, pay off some other barn related debts like the truck, and give Carrie a new project horse. Carrie loves to have a project! Buying a horse for cheaper, training it for fun, and then selling it later seems to be the most effective financial way to run a barn. Realistically, there'd be a much faster turn around, but we're not in it for the profit. Carrie likes to take her time and get to know and love her rides!

While the process of selling can be a little nerve racking, I love seeing Carrie pour her energy and creativity into something. She pulls out all the stops! There was the jump chute last month that was interesting. This week, Carrie and Jess went out to ride and take some photos. Jess even hopped on for some photo ops, too!

The majority of Carrie's energy is going into the sale, but she's also looking for that next project horse, as well. Time will tell what happens.

And because I have a few extra pictures: It's been really windy lately.

Abby misses Lilly, but she's taken really well to being a herd mother. 

She really wants a man, but that's not in the cards! Somehow, she entices every gelding we've put in with her into acting like a stallion! Indy will just have to keep roaming around as a yard pony until we put him back into the old men's field with Ernie and Eddie!