Vail Equine, LLC

08/29/2026

It was "au-natural" bath time. 🛁

08/28/2026

Tally's first rider 😂. She's looking for a lawyer to represent her for this enduring this foolery.

08/26/2026

Riley just keeps growing up and out. Doesn't even look like a yearling out there with the broodmares 😅💙

08/19/2026

Ruby is getting thicc out here 😂

08/15/2026

I know this face. I was a horse-crazy teen with zero access to horses and no money and I thought I’d hit the jackpot when my mom got me lessons with a "professional" named Shirley. She was tough, take-charge, and everything I wanted to be as a bullied, out-of-place kid just looking for somewhere to belong. For years, I spent every moment I could at "The Ranch" with Shirley.

Did I have fun? Yes. Did it make me tough and resilient? Absolutely.

But it came with a heavy cost. Shirley’s archaic training methods taught me that a horse acting out was a personal insult requiring harsh physical "consequences." I was also the target of her verbal abuse at times. As a naive kid, it never felt right, but I absorbed the good with the bad. Fear does make a horse comply—until it doesn't.

When I finally got my own horse, Rascal, I brought those toxic habits with me. I was a tragic mix of naive and arrogant, blind to the unfairness of my own handling because I had seen heavy-handed training "work." It has taken me decades to unlearn, unravel, and heal from the things I witnessed and was put through as a teen just desperate to learn.

Like any abusive relationship, I’ve wrestled with the "good times," but you can't unsee the trauma. The horse world today has endless teachers willing to show us better, kinder ways to communicate—for free. All it takes is the willingness to listen.

At 69 years old, if she still hasn't figured out she's wrong, that's a choice, and with our choices in life, sometimes come the consequences 🤷‍♀️.

08/14/2026

Good horses aren't made in 90 days at the trainer. They have to be built over time with small but consistent lessons and then maintained.

Poppy is super sweet but her arguably "needy" personality also used to make her pretty insecure when separated from the others. This "buddy sourness" is super common in young horses, but if unaddressed, can create a horse that is hard to handle away from others and dangerous to itself when it gets worked up.

Over the last year, we've slowly worked on "alone time" with Poppy. This has included mixed tie time, trailering alone, visits to the house, stalling at shows, pasturing alone etc. Last night Poppy came to our house by herself so she could see the vet today. For the first time, she quietly walked into the pasture without a second thought about being alone. Calm, cool, collected, and showing she's getting ready for the real world. Good girl Poppy 💖

08/13/2026

Hanging with Poppy Potato 🥰. I've been hiding her but this girl is going to be so cool when she's going under saddle.

08/12/2026

08/12/2026

Maizy girl looking good ♥️🤍💙. Starting to get ready for show life!