Barbie Valentine has helped me through the years with my equine adventures. She gave me lessons, trained my horses, helped me find Hailee and Violet, and oversaw Renny's entrance into this world! I am lucky for her friendship on the equine side.
But I'm also lucky because she's just the nicest person and so caring and generous. She wants happiness for her friends. So, she helped me with the inspection by driving up from Kentucky to take us all to Michigan. And here's the fun sweet part. The part where you discover just how good a friend you have.
Barbie is always an elegant woman. She is turned out beautifully all the time, even when she is working hard with horses. She dresses impeccably and shows care in her grooming. She's lovely! So, imagine how hard I laughed in the moments before the inspection when we both went to dress in our handler's outfit. She stepped out of the trailer as elegant as ever, but dressed in stark white pants, a white long-sleeved shirt, a dark blue polo, and white shoes. She still carried herself like she was wearing Chanel, but she definitely was willing to wear a parking attendant's outfit out of friendship for me. I laughed at her willingness to go in for the adventure whole-hearted!
So, we went and got our horses in our matching handler's outfits. We were the most correctly dressed by far, everyone else was wearing jeans or khakis. Our horses were beautiful with their glossy coats, tight braids, lovely Quillin halters, Valentine Hall lead shanks, and their beautifully-dressed handlers. When the German judge saw us, she said, "Oh, very good. You are very clean!" And we all had a good laugh at the good-hearted newbies who brought their best to the inspection. That's what I like about Barbie, she brings her heart, she brings her best, and she's init2winit!