Ribbon

The story of how we ended up with Ribbon is kind of a long one but here goes. Our girls were into vaulting and we were leasing Moose a big old quarter horse gelding from a lady named Charlene at Bridlewood. In fact Moose was the reason we actually got into Friesians. Rhoda was 9 years old and this was her first year to vault at Springfield. Moose was stabled right next to a big beautiful Friesian gelding. Now we had seen Friesians before on the movie LadyHawk but never one in person. This big boy had his head stuck out of the stall and just wanted love from everyone. When we got ready to head to the hotel, Charlene asked, "are you going to lock Moose's stall?" then said "why someone could just come steal him." We all kind of chuckled at that and told her if someone was going to steal a horse it would be the Friesian next to Moose, not Moose.
Moose died a few years later. We really needed a vaulting horses but every horse we looked at was either WAY to expensive OR totally not suitable. Finally one day Rhoda was back to begging and I finally retorted, "Rhoda if you want a vaulting horse, just pray for a vaulting horse." We did and the next day, out of the blue, Amy Koch called to tell me Kelly Stuber had a Percheron Morgan mare she was wanting to sell. We drove to Tremont, looked at Patsy and brought her home for a trial. She was uneducated but had such a sweet disposition. Patsy was a carriage horse and well trained to drive but not trained to ride. That doesn't matter when one has a daughter like Rhoda. She spent hours with her and soon not only was Patsy our vaulting horse, she was Rhoda's combined training Pony Club horse. Below is Rhoda on Patsy the gray and Sarah on the pony Ranger.

But..all good things must come to an end, our vaulting team was hugely popular and became too big. Patsy was just too small to easily carry the triples. So 12 years ago we started praying again. I drove down to the draft sale in Arthur, IL and started looking. We knew we wanted something a bit bigger than Patsy and for sure a bit wider. Well after wandering the barns and looking at just about everything then heading for the bleachers to watch about the only place left to sit was way up at the top.This was pretty disappointing, every horse there going through the ring was WAY too expensive and I was beginning to feel I had wasted the day. I started praying, "Lord you know what we need, I don't need something trained, I just need something with a good attitude." The very next horse in the ring was a black Percheron mare brought in by an old man. The announcer announces, "This is a 4 year old mare who has never been made to work a day in her life but she has a good attitude." Funny the auctioneer started the bidding at $2000.00 but no one bid, he got all the way down to $500.00 when I raised my hand and started the bidding. A few others halfheartedly bid against me but we ended up with her for a price of $750.00. Karin, Mike, Diane and Rhoda were called. They were just arriving in Arthur and were excited to see what we bought. so I left the ring to go into the barns to find what we had just purchased, met them at the parking lot and together we started searching. When we finally came to the horse that had the right number on the rear end I kept saying, "No No that can't be what I bought." She was MUCH wider than I could tell from the top of the ring, she was MUCH taller than I could tell from the top of the ring. Mike looked at her and said, "she's huge, someone could ride her head, a few could ride her neck, you could put 4 or 5 up on her back."  Of course we had to throw Rhoda up on her back. Now remember Ribbon hadn't been made to work a day in her life, she kind of pinned her ears but nothing else. We loaded her up, very thankful for a big trailer, and brought her home. Thankfully we have a lot of fearless kids around and just started throwing them up on her. We are very thankful and feel she really is our gift from God.  Below are a few pictures of just some of her many many performances in the last 12 years.

 This mare is plenty big enough for triples.

Ribbon is not bred every year, and when we do breed her we have to figure out her performance schedule for the next year first. Her very first foal by Raven was Princess. Below are a couple pictures of Princess as a 2 year old. She was purchased as a weanling by a police man in Ohio who wanted her for his police mount.

Each foal Ribbon produces ends up looking like a Friesian on steroids. They all sell at or before weaning and they are all sweet, huge, gorgeous and of course black.

 The picture below was taken right after this filly's birth! That's how huge they are.

Because of her performance schedule, Ribbon is expecting a Valiant foal Sept 23rd this year.  

Karin repeats over and over that Ribbon is worth her weight in gold. Now I'm not sure about that but also know one doesn't just sell a gift from God.  Over these last 12 years Ribbon has taught hundreds if not thousands of children and adults how to canter, how to do basic vaulting moves, and how much fun it is to tower over all the rest of the riders.  Ribbon has quite a following, when people hear Ribbon is coming they make plans to drive hundreds of miles just to meet and greet her. We have people call to tell us they come each year to the IL Horse Fair just to spend time with Ribbon. We will be back in barn 14 this year so come on down to visit this very famous mare.