Cody- Riding on Angels Wings- Day One

The organization that my group went to was just outside a tiny town called Felton, MN. The organization is called Riding on Angels Wings, and they use horse therapy as a means to help developmentally disabled kids. The kids that they help have a wide variety of issues from cerebral palsy to ADHD. Horse riding helps the kids with their physical strength and flexibility, and also about listening to directions and being responsible. The first day that we were able to volunteer there was no scheduled class. The classes were cancelled for the winter, because in Minnesota it is much too cold in the winter to have kids go outdoors and ride horses. So our group was responsible for mucking the horses stalls, which is a basically shoveling out the dirty hay and waste that has been left by the horses. This was a long and difficult process, but it is a necessary one. These horses do great things to help out kids in need, so I think that it was good for our group to see all aspects of the organization, and horse care is one of them. After we cleaned out all of the stalls and replaced the old hay with new hay, we were able to groom the horses. This was a really fun process, because it allowed us to get to know each of the horse. It was really fun for me personally, because I have not really spent that much time around horses. We were responsible for combing the manes and tails for each of the horses, combing off the shed hair, and cleaning the bottom of their feet. These horses are so well trained so it was cool to see how calm they were. Each of us on the trip spent quality time with all of the horses and were able to decide our favorites. Mine favorite horse was the beautiful black mare named Blue. It was very frigid when we first got out to the farm, but the more we worked the more it warmed up. The whole process of the barn work was not the most fun, but it is a very important part of the Riding on Angels Wings organization. Our first day was pretty much over after we were done with barn work.