Our day at Tractor Supply

Thank you, again, Fredericksburg Tractor Supply Company for hosting several local animal welfare groups for the day. We always enjoy talking to your staff and customers. "Everyone has a story." We were especially thrilled to meet so many people describing keeping elder horses at home as part of their families.

Thank you, too, TREES volunteers. The items you made to help raise funds were just beautiful. Your creativity grabbed the attention of store customers, though we did not sell as many goodies as we hoped we would. No worries, though. TSC plans another event in December. Think " 'Tis the Season." We're open to any and all new ideas.

We did distribute a good number of brochures and other literature and, since education is part of TREES' mission statement, we can consider the day a big success on that front alone.

We actually had more people stopping to read about the sanctuary (table facing left in the background) than to sample goodies. That's a good thing!



The end to the day. Thank goodness we were inside!

Thank you Piedmont Horse Expo staff, visitors and TREES volunteers!

Thank you to everyone who made yesterday's Piedmont Horse Expo, in Culpeper, Virginia, a terrific day.

Traveller's Rest, in particular, is more than a little excited to have met so many wonderful Expo visitors and fellow vendors. If you haven't been to this new annual event in the last two years, be sure to watch for the 2010 Expo and mark your calendar early.

There were speakers addressing everything from equine nutrition to training to animal identification. Vendors covered every imaginable aspect of horsedom as well: equine "spinology," boarding, feed dealers, vet clinics, leather care and repair, blanket cleaning, farriery, and of course, equine welfare.

At the risk of leaving someone out.....and please feel free to send me a nastygram if I do......I'd like to try and thank everyone who made our booth one of the busiest in our area of the barn.

We couldn't have pulled this off without:

Gene and Carol Craigo who helped haul every thing to the site, set up, staff the booth all day Saturday, then packed up and hauled everything home. The Craigo's also came to the farm Sunday to man the muck forks for two days worth of cleanup.

Deborah Caprio, candy artiste extraordinaire, got very creative with these horse lollipops. Very popular, we sold out by the end of the day. That buys seven 50-pound bags of senior feed. Deborah also took care of having many of our brochures printed in time for the Expo.

Valerie St Romain and her entire family derusted, primed and painted "Golden Horseshoes," also very popular!

Thank you , too, to Jill Deming of Integrated Animal Therapies for offering gift certificates to sell.

Karen Souder....hugemongous, delicioso chocolate chip cookies, home baked by Karen, appealed to those not quite up for solid chocolate horses. Karen, while manning her own real estate booth (anyone looking for a home in the Culpeper area? Please call Karen!) also sold animal puppets, donating a portion of the proceeds to TREES, and directed visitors to our information table.

Michaele and Jim Babcock, between the two of them, also helped staff the booth the entire day, provided hot coffee and pastries for volunteers and visitors and helped break down and pack up when it was all over.

Trish Hallier took over for Jim when he had to leave for the afternoon, greeting visitors and packing up at the end of the day. Trish has been helping out at TREES booths for a couple of years now and its always a great pleasure to see her again!

Amanda Blanton, DVM, of Rappahannock Equine Veterinary Clinic, wrote some of TREES' brochures, allowing us to pass along professional information on managing elder equine. You will also be able to see Dr. Blanton's articles on TREES' new web site, to launch soon.

To the Orange Madison Farmer's Cooperative, thank you for the bags of feed. Every mouthful is deeply and gratefully appreciated.

Thank you to Sherrie Minkes, the Expos' Vendor Coordinator organizing a smoothly run event for all involved.

And finally, a whopper Thank You to everyone who stopped by the Traveller's Rest table. Its always fun to talk with others who care for Equine Elders, and those who offer services that may help our residents remain healthy and happy. We hope to speak with you again in the very near future. We also look forward to talking more with those who are interested in volunteering with TREES, in having their clubs and 4H groups organize service projects, and in starting equine welfare organizations in other areas of Virginia. Please let us know how we can help.

Whew!

Readers that might like to help, but may not be able to participate in booth staffing or prep, can help enormously by letting us know of other events in the area where our information on Elders would be of interest. We'd love to get out and meet more VA Horse Lovers. (If you know of a potential event, please email Traveller's Rest as info@equineelders.org. Maybe we'll see you there!)