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HI Spy: What’s on your holiday wish list?

You probably haven’t even picked out your Halloween pumpkin yet, but there are subtle hints that the holiday season is just around the corner. The days are getting longer and our horses’ coats are growing fuzzier by the minute. And, just in case you haven’t noticed, many retailers have slyly positioned red and green hued items on prominent shelves, subliminal hints that it’s time to start compiling your annual wish list.



As horse lovers, the holidays are usually our one big chance to get those special items we need to indulge our passion for riding. For example, Mandy McKellar of Portland, Oregon is hoping that her parents will underwrite her newfound interest in dressage. “I just started college, money is tight, and I can’t afford to ride more often. It’d be great just to get a gift certificate in a card saying, ‘Here. We pre-paid for some dressage lessons for you’.”



Marie Jones of Anaheim, California, takes a more direct approach. She bends back the pages of catalogs offering horsey home décor, riding apparel and specialty horse tack. Then she circles the stuff of her dreams with a magic marker. “I know it sounds a little mercenary, but my husband is completely non-horsey. He gets confused easily and he’s always afraid he’ll order the wrong thing.”
 
What are you hoping for? Have you been browsing through catalogs, surfing online horse sites or wandering the aisles of your local tack store? Does your horse really, truly need something that only “Santa” can deliver? If so, we want to hear about it! Consult with your horse and then share what’s on the top of your holiday wish list by clicking on “comments” below.  Just like previous installments of HI Spy, some of your responses may be featured in an upcoming issue of Horse Illustrated magazine.

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Cindy Hale

Cindy Hale’s life with horses has been filled with variety. As a child she rode western and learned to barrel race. Then she worked as a groom for a show barn, and was taught to harness and drive Welsh ponies. But once she’d taken her first lessons aboard American Saddlebreds she was hooked on English riding. Hunters and hunt seat equitation came next, and she spent decades competing in those divisions on the West Coast. Always seeking to improve her horsemanship, she rode in clinics conducted by world-class riders like George Morris, Kathy Kusner and Anne Kursinski. During that time, her family began raising Thoroughbred and warmblood sport horses, and Cindy experienced the thrills and challenges of training and showing the homebred greenies. Now retired from active competition, she’s a popular judge at local and county-rated open and hunter/jumper shows. She rides recreationally both English and western. Her Paint gelding, Wally, lives at home with her and her non-horsey husband, Ron.

View Comments

  • I started my wish list last summer! At the top is a set of electric horse clippers so I don't have to pay my trainer's groom to clip my horse before a show. I can do it myself and save money. But I need the clippers first!

  • A Foal! yeah I know it sounds funny, but I really want to train a foal from start to finnish(but your never done training:) But I probably won't get it for Christmas, my friend is breeding her horse next summer and I might buy her foal:)

  • A new show saddle for my horse. That would be an awesome gift. But I would be really happy with a pair of horse earrings.

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