THAT IS SOOOOO EXCITING!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'm THRILLED for you! :)

I know it must be disapointing having your dad not agree. I'm sure you know he just wants what's best for you, and not being a horse person, he doesn't realize having a horse CAN be what's best for you, even if it can be a little hard to make it work out ;)

Jessi

Argh, the forum just ate my post!  I will paraphrase:

 I totally identify with your dilemma, I struggled with much the same thing.  I knew I couldn't have a horse in college and right after, I was bouncing from VA to TX to TN to NC for work, plus was doing the grad school thing (LIFE EATER!) so didn't have the time or money.  But once I came to NC, I knew I was here to stay.  And literally one day, the line just snapped:  "enough is enough!"  And I went horse shopping.

Yes, I could have chosen a job where I make more money (I have a teeny salary working for state wildlife agency) but I believe that conservation is the most important thing out there and I literally couldn't sleep at night if I wasn't out there doing my part to make it happen.  So I go to work every day doing what I believe in and I go to the barn and see Solo stick his head out and greet me and it's worth every single spaghetti dinner and every single day of nonexistent funds!!  Solo doesn't want for anything and I save a lot of money on therapy!   

I appreciate the encouragement guys!  We'll have to see what happens.

 Just an update.  Apparently my trainer thinks that of all the babies born so far this year, Rizzie's is the nicest, prettiest, most trainable, etc etc.  And Rizzie has turned into a pretty good mom.  So that means she's probably going to breed her again next year. :(  On one hand, I'm really glad Rizzie threw such a nice baby.  On the other, this means that I will have another 6 months of not working with Rizzie next year, which will put us farther behind in training. 

I really can't complain because my trainer was nice enough to offer to sell her to me even though she has to wait almost 2 years to get the money from me.  She could have just sold her to the highest bidder right away... but I'm secretly complaining anyway. lol.