Little Red continued to bless our lives and become the pony of the family for my 4 nieces and 3 nephews as they were outgrowing him I received a call from someone with a large piece of property that is looking for a pasture mate. So I thought for a moment what would be best for this little guy. I of course would be sad with him leaving but it brought a smile to my face to think of him running and playing on big piece of property and having a pasture mate to hand out with. So I agreed they could have this amazing pony but I get him back whenever they need or want.
About 5 years later I received a call back from them, that they were needing to rehome Red. At this point InStride’s full facility was complete and we could easily take him! Yeah I get Red back J They delivered Little Red in good shape and they shared with me many stories about how he blessed their lives and how funny he was.
One story stood out the most to me as the guy was sharing with me his experience putting up an additional fence to his property. The fences was to divide an already fenced in 10 acres. He had a line pulled tight of where he wants the new fence to go as Red roams free in the pasture, he was strategically placing stakes every 8 feet where they will put the fence posts. He says it is going well and about to put the last few in and turn to look down his path to find Red pulling up each stake one by one.
Red settled into his new home at InStride in all a of 10 second, he is an overly confident laid back pony and he immediately became the favorite for many of the volunteers, students and staff. One day I was putting out Charlie. Charlie is the cowardly lion who is a rather large horse. Charlie has his own story but bottom line he was extremely abused in his life and lacked confidence in all areas of his life. When Charlie would go out he mostly just hung out around the gate and would slowly wonder around but never did I see him actually explore or play. As I was turning Charlie out someone was hand grazing Little Red and I said put him out with Charlie lets see what happens.
I could never really explain how hysterical this was and how they were together. We have this little chubby pony with a chestnut coat and blond mane and tail with this 16.3 hand, super fit warmblood with similar chestnut coat and blond mane and tail. They started off by greeting each other for just a moment and then Red was like lets PLAY he takes off running and exploring the entire field. Charlie followed his lead literally he followed every step that Red took. This was the first time I have seen Charlie play at all. Now think about it this little pony and this big horse cantering Red was full out and Charlie had to canter all collected and very much up more then forward or he would run over Red. They entertained us for a good 20 minutes as Red came up to us huffing and puffing feeling good, Charlie right behind him barely breathing hard but with this look of pure joy and happiness. They had become good friends from that moment on and it was this moment that inspired me to write the book we used for InStride’s Reading with Little Red literacy program.
Goes to show what can happen when you surround yourself with the right friends how life can be so much more fun and you can achieve more together.
Thanks again for the memories Little Red. RIP my friend.
Donna Blem