I love him dearly, but Moose, bless his little heart, was not the most attractive foal. In fact, he garnered his barn name "Moose" because his breeder's son thought the hair growing out of his ears resembled moose antlers. It was better than his younger full brother's barn name, though--he was Mugly, short for "Much Ugly". Hey, I didn't name him!

This was his sale picture in the spring of his four-year-old year. Kinda sunburnt, hasn't grown into his head, still not all that attractive. But I loved him anyway.

Later that summer at Cal Poly's horse camp (I was an instructor.) This is still one of my favorite pictures of him. Oh, and he ate those splint boots the next day. Sigh.

Another one of my favorite pics of him--this was at his barn in Templeton in the fall of 2002.

Spring of 2003. This is one of the very few pics I have of me actually riding him. I need to not be behind the camera all the time!! :-p

The only pic I have of me showing Moose. I was showing in reining at an AQHA show in Paso in the spring of 2003, and the whole show ended up being kind of a disaster from start to finish. Just the one I wanted immortalized on film. How much of a disaster? Let's just put it this way--we placed higher in our English flat classes than we did our reining classes (and he's a reined cow horse, so that's basically what he was trained to do.) Oh well--it makes me smile now. :-)

Early spring 2003. Much lighter than the previous year, no? Crazy.

Moose as a wrangler's horse (and me as a wrangler) at the LEdV women's ride in the spring of 2004.

This one was taken yesterday morning. I swear this is the same horse. There's a white star hiding somewhere on that forehead!! :-)

Ready to ride. (Not bad for a cameraphone shot!) :-)