Marengo the Spirit Horse

01/22/2025

Winter wonderland!

(old photo, we are still waiting on that perfect snowfall this year...)

Photo by Photography@fivemegawatts

12/31/2024

Yes that’s what it’s like and yes that’s what they’re like.

12/31/2024

JUST LET ME SQUISH YOUR FACE.

12/30/2024

This is why we can't have nice things.

12/21/2024

3 steps to a gift any horse girl will love!

1) Download and print the Riding Lesson Log Book (for free)
2) Pick out a super cute three ring binder in her favorite color
3) Wrap it and put it under the tree!

12/19/2024

The equestrian version of "a good powder day".

It's not like we can afford to ski anyway.

We have horses to feed.

Photo by 5MW Photography
(her crop was better but FB didn't like it)

12/19/2024

This is definitely not a photo of my horse deciding he was done photoshoot-ing and exiting with flair.

He would never do that.

Especially not multiple times.

Photo by 5MW Photography

12/16/2024

Fortunately, this is becoming a less controversial opinion!

5MW Photographyhotography

12/12/2024

Don't give up on your horse girl dreams!

Photo by Photography

12/05/2024

It started with bridles and show rings.

Place this hoof here and that one there.

More energy, but not in that way. Look here, step higher, more please!

Come up to my standards as I ride to theirs - because I don’t know what my own should be.

And when the marks on the test sheet are high enough, we will send in our entry for the next level.

One day, perhaps, we’ll both be good enough.

There’s nothing wrong with tests, dressage courts, and high expectations.

Except when what you’re competing against is your own striving.

How is your horse enough for you, when you’re never enough for yourself?

What is left when I come to the end of my own endeavoring?

When everything is stripped away and it is revealed that the reins were only holding onto my own desire for control?

And the reins were never necessary to stop the thundering hoofbeats - only trust and a whispered prayer.

Who am I but who He created me to be?

Who is my horse but a perfect gift designed to reveal everything He desires for me?

Left photo: Blesk Photography
Right photo: 5MW Photography

12/03/2024

11/12/2024

Just don’t ask questions.

11/07/2024

Still true. Now it’s been 3.5 years in a camper!

11/01/2024

If it scares you, rise above it.

10/14/2024

When you thought you would take a photo with all the pretty fall colors, but this is the only face your horse has on offer today.

10/11/2024

We are enveloped in His glorious presence 🙏

All creation cries holy…

09/29/2024

“It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
Mark 2:17

Good training and education requires kindness, patience, understanding and a willingness to restructure and explain ideas repeatedly in numerous different ways from a variety of viewpoints.

Adult, child, Human or Horse these rules apply.

If a horse misunderstands the cues for piaffe applying those cues with greater force will not achieve success. If a child cannot read the letters ABC increasing the anger and volatile nature of the teacher will not help the child learn faster.

A gap in a students knowledge cannot be bridged by the force or indignant frustration of a teachers exasperation in teaching the subject matter.

Only with patience, time and a willingness to explore each sticking point or misunderstood concept can a student achieve confidence and competence.

We all known this. We all agree upon this.

Many of us would proudly state this concept as a part of our integrity and something we fight for.

So why do I see so many people who believe they know better, kinder more ethical ways to educate people and horses attack, bully and harass those who require education to change?

Do you not see the trap???

What a toxic mindset to foster.

“All animals are equal but some are more equal than others”

All people should be kind but I can be foul to this person because they have lots of social media followers and I think I know a better way to achieve what they’re training…

WHAT?!

How can people preach love and tolerance than attack those they believe themselves better educated than?

If we, this odd little aspect of the horse world truly are blazing the trail of enlightened horsemanship on a journey to improve horse happiness and welfare we have to stop being so foul to people who haven’t had the same realisations yet.

The mindset of a person who believes to speak love then act out hate towards others because “they deserve it”

Can you not see how twisted that is? How when people act like that they are part of the problem and genuinely bring nothing closer to a solution. No change. Nothing. Just more hate and a wider gap between both camps.

The amounts of pages on Facebook and instagram I see join together not in celebration or enthusiasm but by collective hatred. It’s sickening.

How can we grow to be a better horseman, better people if we foster such evil concepts and allow them in our world.

I do not agree with everything I see in every aspect of the horse world. But I will fight to share the ways we can improve and I will not attack every person who has not found my personally perceived level of competence but share with them the aspects I think they are lacking.

I believe bullying animals is wrong

I believe bullying people is wrong

We must do better

Hate breeds hate not love

Photography credit to JShpicture