Finishing my Favorite Chapter and starting anew
- 3 days ago
- 6 min read
6/6/2026
About a month and a half ago, I took my beloved mare, She's so Fine, affectionately known as Sophie, to her final destination at Chapel View Farm, for a long and hopefully very happy retirement. It took me a while to write and publish this because I have been quietly dealing with a lot of emotion around this decision, and having it in writing like this feels very final and official.
For those of you who have been following along closely with us, you will not be surprised to hear that this has been a decision I have been hemming and hawing over for nearly six months. After our few good runs at the beginning of last year, Sophie and I started this unfortunate saga of having amazing rides followed by terrible rides, sometimes at the same event, and very inconsistent. I talk about this in more detail in other blog posts, but ultimately this steep decline in performance I believe was Sophie's way of telling me she really wanted to be done.
Prior to me taking the reins, Sophie was a jumper. She toted around adult ammys at jumper shows in the 3' and under divisions. Not much is fully known about her history, but I know that she did a lot of lower level jumping and for a very long time. After taking over the ride, she was introduced to eventing. So she got a later start on her eventing career, and together we went from a quirky novice pair to a quirky 2* pair. She gave me, what feels like, the world.
Sophie is not known for her bravery. She is spooky as hell and only shows bold confidence in the show jump arena. Out on cross country, she understands the task at hand, but she needs a lot of support. Especially as we have moved up the levels, she has required a lot of hand holding, which I have been happy to do as we have learned alongside each other. However, as we continued our journey that was the 2025 eventing season, her demands for support became more than I was able to meet out on cross country. From taking a swim at GMHA, to being shellshocked by Sophie's lack of desire to take the down bank at Course Brook in front of a huge crowd, to me sitting on a friendly roll top at Morven, and even barely making it out of the start box at Hitching Post - I tried all the places and all the things to try to give Sophie the ability to feel brave and comfortable again, but something just was not clicking. After a winter of trying to make it work by giving her tons of time off and taking things really slow (really me just sitting in denial), I owed it to my horse to hear her, stop pushing, and give her a retirement that she more than deserves.
I bought Sophie knowing full well our time competing together was likely going to be limited. She has pretty severe osteoarthritis in her fetlocks, and it was only a matter of time before that would affect her ability and willingness to perform, which I think is ultimately why we are where we are now. But, as many horse owners know, sometimes you meet a horse and you just feel that different type of connection. I loved Sophie from the first time I sat on her, and after giving me the experience of my first training and then our first prelim together, I didn't care if our time or abilities would be limited - I wanted more than anything to be her voice and commit to doing right by her the rest of her life. So I feel very privileged and also very grateful that I can make the choice of when and where to retire her.
Through all the places we've been together, she was at her happiest during our time at Chapel View Farm in Virginia. She was in turnout with other horses on acres of green grass, and as much as I would love to keep close by, she deserves to have a retirement in comfort. Jacqui recently acquired 90+ additional acres to her property, including fields for retirement, and I just could not pass up that opportunity for my special horse.
I brought her down in April, and I had a good cry when I turned her out in her field at Chapel View with her new friends. Most of it was happy tears to see her romp around acres of green grass, but some of it was heartbreak knowing that she wasn't coming back with me in the trailer. It was so wonderful to spend a few days at Jacqui's visiting and watching Sophie start to settle into her new home. Over the last few weeks of her being there, I have been getting consistent updates from Jacqui and Miranda on Sophie's activities, most of which included being pissed about wearing the fly mask I sent down for her, and her enjoying the company of her new friends. Sophie is now barefoot, feral, and living her best retired life. I am so excited to see her in a few short weeks when I am down in that area again to help with Young Rider Champs!!
It's been challenging emotionally, especially explaining to non-horse people that no, she's not dead, but this is a huge shift in my life that will change a lot of things. I would literally not have any of what I have today with my riding career without this horse. I am forever grateful to those who brought her into my life and supported us as a team from the start, and I am looking forward to continue getting updates on retired Sophie from the amazing team at CVF.
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When I was down in Virginia, I had a plan to try lots of sales horses local to Leesburg with the hopes that I would find at least one solid lead. I told myself that if all of the stars aligned, it would be convenient and also quite nice to find a horse to bring home with me in the same weekend I dropped Sophie off. I did not think it would actually work out like that but....it did!
I had the privilege of sitting on tons of horses with a bunch of trainers in that area, and there were so many really lovely young prospects that I got to meet. I had a handful that I really liked, but as soon as I met Tangerineginger, I knew I had found the one.
I had a wonderful time meeting and working with Greer at Three Diamonds Farm and Tori at Paragon Eventing who had this lovely mare. Ginger is a recently turned 5 year old off the track TB mare, just barely pushing 15.3hh and a great head on her shoulders. They sourced her off the track last year, and she had a good let down period before being restarted over the holidays. Their working student spent a few months putting consistent work into her and I fell in love on first sight.
I met her on Saturday of that weekend, and with Jacqui's help, we were able to schedule a vetting with Piedmont for Monday afternoon, and she passed and walked right onto the trailer Monday night to head to Apple Knoll. Over the last month and a bit, I've been taking time getting to know her and work towards her maybe doing a few outings this summer. I am writing this post after our first official 'outing' at home today for the AKF recognized horse trials, where we played in the warm up rings and did a 'dressage test' but ended the day after that. She's been pretty brave so far and I am excited for what is to come.
A huge, huge thank you to Jacqui and Miranda for being such great friends & caretakers of my best girl as she eases into retirement. I am sooo excited to see Sophie in just a few short weeks. And in the meantime, I am having so much fun getting to know and play with Ginger! I feel very lucky to be able to do all of this.
As always, thank you to anyone reading and following along. Looking forward to what is next!
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