Is Horse Riding the Secret to Raising BRAVE Kids? - Farmer Mary Field Notes (Week 2, 2026)

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Originally written October 20, 2025

So, our kids don’t do a lot of traditional team sports. Back when we lived in Lakewood, Ez tried soccer for a season, and it was fine. Not his favorite, but fine, and I can’t say we loved the freezing cold mornings of standing on the sidelines. Plus, we were spending a lot of time traveling back and forth to the farm, so our weekend time was pretty booked. Once we moved to the farm, I figured we’d have more time for organized sports…and then we started building a farm from scratch and got livestock, and had day jobs, and time was still crunched. I still wanted the kids to have an activity that would be a physical outlet and teach them resilience and persistence, and emotional regulation, and all those good traits. And so, we introduced horses into the mix. That was back in 2021, and we haven’t looked back since. 

The kids take a weekly lesson with a fantastic trainer who has amazing horses, and all of those traits I wanted them to develop? Oh boy, are they ever. There is nothing quite like perching on top of a thousand pound prey animal with its own opinions to teach you how to manage your emotions and control your body so that you can help said animal manage its emotions and control its body. Then, as that partnership develops over time, it can be so rewarding. The kids also have to pitch in to care for the horses as part of the lesson program–they fill haynets, muck stalls, scrub and fill water buckets, give baths, groom their horses, clean tack, and the list goes on. It’s never just hop on and ride and then leave. They also get the chance to interact with the professionals that care for the horses. They’ve observed vet visits, dental appointments, hoof trims and shoeing with the farrier, and bodywork and chiro appointments that keep the horses feeling their best. There is an entire world that supports this sport.

And it is a sport, make no mistake. As the kids have gotten older, they’ve had the chance to try their skills in several horse shows of various types, and it has all of the excitement and preparation that you’d find for a football team practicing their plays before a big game, or a dancer preparing for a recital. The kids learn routines that they will perform with their horses, travel to show locations to practice on-site, they groom and prep their horses and gear so they look stunning, and battle the nerves and anticipation that creep up on any athlete or performer. 

Last weekend was a whirlwind of all of those things. Both kids were signed up for a local jumper show, where they would memorize one or two different courses of 6-8 jumps, and attempt to navigate the course without knocking down any rails and get the closest they could to an optimum time without having any access to a clock. It requires precision, timing, communication with their horse, and a heck of a lot of bravery to go in that ring by themselves and rely on their memory and their trust in their mount. Our daughter went in on a very tall retired racehorse to compete in a ground pole class, which means the jump rails were all on the ground. This was perfect for her–riding is like a rollercoaster sometimes, and she has been rebuilding her confidence in her skills, so just being out there by herself, without her trainer, and memorizing the whole course and convincing the horse to go where she wanted was an excellent challenge. I couldn’t be prouder. She got to do a practice round, and then go for real. The improvement between rounds was excellent, especially when you consider that earlier in the week we had her practicing the wrong order of jumps, and she had to memorize the new course in the truck on the way to the competition. Pretty good for a nine-year-old. Plus, they looked SO cute. She had picked out a new saddle pad to match her outfit and show off the horse’s color, and they were adorable. Tiny girl, giant horse just trotting along. So good.

Then it was her brother’s turn. He has been working with this sweet and spicy pony on and off for years now. One of the perks of their lesson program is that their trainer will move them between horses depending on which skills they need to develop, and he has come back to this mare several times, and they just click really nicely. He’s developed a solid seat and legs, and quiet hands, and won’t put up with any nonsense from her, and so she doesn’t give him a hard time and they can just fly over the jumps. He memorized two courses for this show, and showed solid improvement between rounds. This was the first course he pretty much cantered all the way through, and that additional speed meant he and the pony had to pay close attention to their timing and their angles of approach to the jumps. He had two refusals, but brought her right around and got them the second time, and even with those penalties, was pretty close to the optimum time. I was just proud that he didn’t get flustered by the refusals and that he kept right on going. 

They both ended up with ribbons at the end of the day, but that’s just a bonus as far as I’m concerned. I was really proud of them for being relaxed under pressure, and really stepping up their game beyond where they were in practice and lessons. Competitions and shows like this often feel like a lot. The kids have been doing double lessons for weeks to get ready, plus the extra expense of hauling the horses and coaching and entry fees and extra outfits and all the odds and ends that go with it. Ultimately, I’m glad they went. Sometimes we need that extra push to really see what we’re capable of, and I cannot wait to see how they continue to grow and learn in this sport. 

This post (video, whatever) is really all about the kids, and I don’t particularly want to make it about me, but I can’t help but reflect a bit. I had the opportunity to be in the same show with my own horse, and I opted out. After a fall back in July, I’m still rebuilding my own confidence, and my sweet quarter horse loves trails but is just learning what jumps are. We could’ve pushed ourselves and done the competition. I still can’t decide if I skipped it because I didn’t want to complicate things further and be too distracted by my own prep and rides to really focus on the kids, or if I just chickened out. We did go for an excellent ride at a hunter pace the next day, and Banjo would likely have been blown up by doing both, so I think I made the right choice, but sometimes you just question, you know? Have you ever found yourself in that kind of situation–where you have to choose to go for the stretch goal or skip it? How do you decide when it’s worth it and when to say no? Tell me your stories in the comments, or reach out, I’d love to hear about it. (Also, if you get the chance, say yes to riding the horse. It might just change your life in ways you never expected.) Oh! No recipe this week, but I did include some pictures of the cute kids from their excellent weekend.

 Thanks for sticking with me, see you next time!