Apache's Princess Bailee, a horse story

I have written about Bailee a few times, but today's post is very difficult. We purchased Bailee from a lady my daughter took her first lessons from. My daughter met Bailee when she was just a foal and fell in love with her. One day we went to an auction and there was Bailee, that was the day we became horse people. At 18 months, when she came to live with us she was only 600lbs. and extremely wormy. After a lot of care we fattened her up, got rid of her worms, broke and trained her and had the farrier out. The previous owner did not deworm nor did she think a farrier necessary. We didn't know much about horses and hindsight is always 20/20. Today we had a horse chiropractor out who told us that our daughter should never ride Bailee because of her extreme weakness, it seems as though the worms caused spinal deterioration. My daughter is devastated and as parents we feel terrible, we love the horse dearly, she is a registered Tennessee Walking Horse. My daughter is still going to work with her and teach her tricks! It's been a very sad day.

On top of it all, the 4H county fair season is upon us, riding your horse in fair competition is the highlight of the summer for these young girls. We have exactly 4 weeks to find a horse and make sure testing and paperwork is completed so she can ride in the fair. Can we do it? I'm hoping to find a light at the end of this tunnel.

My highlight of the day is the phone call I'm going to receive very shortly from Author Debbie Macomber! Woohoo, and interview...won't be posted until next week though!