What sentimental things have you kept since losing a horse?

Fools Motto

Fools Motto

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Nearly 3 weeks ago I had to have my beloved mare PTS suddenly.
I've got loads of her things sitting around now. I don't have any other horses, and I don't intend to get any more. Mainly due to the lack of finances and time.
I have just started a horsey job again, and I love being around them. I know I have many friends with plenty of 'patting opportunities!'
I've covered up her saddle and bridle, looked at the pile of rugs once. I've donated some of my grooming kit to work. Some of her old bits I sold on Ebay over the last few months anyway as was doing a massive sort out. I've stacked up buckets and put mucking out kit in a pile. I've got the wheelbarrow in my garden.
Pointless keeping anything, but don't want to get rid of everything.
What items have you kept? Do you do anything with them?
 
Fools Motto said:
Nearly 3 weeks ago I had to have my beloved mare PTS suddenly.
I've got loads of her things sitting around now. I don't have any other horses, and I don't intend to get any more. Mainly due to the lack of finances and time.
I have just started a horsey job again, and I love being around them. I know I have many friends with plenty of 'patting opportunities!'
I've covered up her saddle and bridle, looked at the pile of rugs once. I've donated some of my grooming kit to work. Some of her old bits I sold on Ebay over the last few months anyway as was doing a massive sort out. I've stacked up buckets and put mucking out kit in a pile. I've got the wheelbarrow in my garden.
Pointless keeping anything, but don't want to get rid of everything.
What items have you kept? Do you do anything with them?
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I have a rocking horse in adult size which was bought for my fortieth birthday. He has a lock of black hair in his tail (the rest is white and he's a dapple grey) from a horse I lost at the time he was made. I love it.
 
I lost my mare 7 weeks ago and I've kept her grooming kit, feed bucket, bridal. I'm moving into my own horse soon and I've taken her bit off the bridal and I want to use it somewhere my my house, like to hang my tea towels on! I brought it indoors the other day and my parents laughed at me, as they thought I was joking, but I think they felt bad afterwards!

I also want to have a canvas of her made up to go on my living room wall

I have some of her tail hair, which I will be getting made into a bracelet.
 
Special rugs that just mean something to me for some reason.

Bridle. Saddle. Leather headcollar.

Everything is in the attics. The rugs, bar one, will be used for other horses. The bridle won't fit new horse. The saddle might fit D1's new horse.

I used Titch's foal rug as a blanket on my study chair as it's a good size and shape to snuggle up under.
 
I reuse as much as I can ... some things I just keep, tucked away. My best, most useful everyday body brush still has the punched out label on it (remember those machines?) saying 'Mustard'.

Foaled in the mid 1950's, he left us in his very late 20s, 32 years ago.

Gone, but still present in my life every time I pick up that brush :)
 
I've kept my TB's leather headcollar and her leadrope. I've pretty much sold the rest of her things now, but it took me ages to get to the place where I could do that. I still have a breastplate and polypad that belonged to my old anglo. The breastplate gets used still as it's very adjustable.
 
I lost my mare in April 2015. It was unexpected and absolutely devastating. I didn't even look at her stuff until end June 2015 when a new horse found his way into my life. I didn't have a lot of spare money so I had to re-purpose many of her rugs and her saddle (which thankfully did fit with some adjusment) However, there are some things I have kept by, her bridle with the special browband, her leather headcollar, a numnah with her name on it. We have some of her tail hair too and actually her ashes are still in the tack room.
 
I lost my best horse this summer.
Weirdly I don't feel overly attached to his kit and that in use with the other horses.

I do however have one of his shoes above my front door and I also commissioned a beautiful bracelet that I love.

 
ihatework said:
I lost my best horse this summer.
Weirdly I don't feel overly attached to his kit and that in use with the other horses.

I do however have one of his shoes above my front door and I also commissioned a beautiful bracelet that I love.

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That bracelet is lovely. I've got some tail hair I'd like to have made in to something. Where do you start in searching for people who make things out of hair?
 
Due to circumstances had to give up my four horses this year, even though I still visit three of them, I still find it hard, couldn't go up the yard for a long while and their bed is still down in the barn, the trailer went with the old TB as a thank you for taking him back, as did the old trashed rugs, my hay went with the trotter x and the electric fencing tape and posts will be delivered soon, I can't bear to part with his western saddle yet, or my sprenger stirrups, so still have a lot of horsey gear cluttering up the house, so for all I know the horses are all settled and happy, it still feels like a loss to me
 
It is nice to keep something. I've been able to use rugs and bridle for new pony, am going to sell her saddle (has taken a while to face this though). I've also kept her saddlecloth with her name - purely for sentimental reasons.
 
My lovely old boy was PTS just over a year ago. I tear up even thinking of him still. I have kept everything, his playing bridle still hangs on his hook, his saddle still sits in the tack room. I did put it on Facebook for sale and then had to take it down, it upset me too much ( ridiculous, I realise).

I have a handful of his tail which is tacked onto the back of the portrait I had done earlier this year. I don't think I'll ever stop missing him, he was one in a million, I feel massively privileged to have had him in his twilight years.

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I keep tail hair from all of mine, but my very favourite thing to remind me of the horses I have lost is a table. My lovely Dad took a load of horse shoes from my horses and welded them into a table top for a garden table. It is very attractive in itself and really personal.
 
I keep all tack etc. My grandson's pony had, until recently, a leather head collar belonging to my old pony.

I have some tail hair, tied with silver wire,with the idea that I would have something made, but I don't want anyone else to handle it, awkwardly!

Mariposa, I love the portrait - and I could have written your last sentence.
 
When we lost Oliver, almost 17 years ago, my mum had a beautiful wooden box made for me with his name engraved on a plaque on the lid. In it, I keep his last set of shoes, his head collar, a couple of brushes, a lock of his mane and the first rosette we ever won together. She also had a beautiful portrait of his head done in pastel for me.

I open it occasionally and just hold his things in my hands. My last pieces of my very special boy, who I still ache for now. I will never stop missing him.
 
My daughters have a lock of mane from Jimmy and Red as they belonged to them. Jim was pts and Red was found dead in the field, both in 2012.
My old pony Honey died in 1993, but her saddle is still in the loft.
 
I still have my old lad's last shoe. He was only shod in front and had managed to lose one of them a day or two before he went over the bridge. My lovely farrier came out specially the day he was PTS, and removed it with great care for me to keep. It now lives on my bookcase as a memento.
 
I lost my boy 2 months ago and had a major sort out of stuff. I kept his rugs, headcollarsed, grooming kit, bridle saddle, a lock of his mane (which I had turned into a bracelet) and his stable plaque which is now in a frame in my room. Like you OP I will also not be getting a new horse due to the lack of time and hetic work schedule. I am sorry for your loss x
 
I wanted to use as much as possible of my old horse's things with the new one. They are very different sizes though so that limits that to grooming kit etc. Had to sell a lot of his gear to pay for the new one, actually once I had taken a deep breath and told myself he didn't need it any more it gave me pleasure to think of other horses being cared for with the stuff I had chosen and looked after so carefully for my boy. I have some tail hair that I still can't quite steel myself to get made into anything, and for some reason I was never able to bring myself to sell the bridle and bit we used for flatwork. I also have a lovely pencil drawing my friends commissioned for my 40th when he was well and happy, and I haven't wanted to get that framed and displayed yet, but I will one day when it's time.
 
Eighteen months on from losing Chester i've only recently packed all his rugs away.Can't bring myself to get rid of anything,they're all part of him to me.His stable still has his name above it and his headcollar and all the rosettes we got still hang outside as a tribute to him.A piece of his mane lives on my bedside table.I still miss him every day.The only thing i've re used is his feed skip for my new lad but it's still Chesters bucket lol.
 
I lost my mare in July and I've still got everything that was 'hers'.

I have a small loft space above my utility room so I packed everything up and put it up there until I can face looking at them and deciding what to do with them.

Everything happened so quickly that I didn't have time to take any tail hair so I had this done instead and now she is part of me forever (apologies if pic is huge!):

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I have a lock of her mane, lost her a little over a year ago and I've only just gone through her bits and will be donating her rugs to a charity,
I've still got all her buckets and grooming kit as I have other horses too,
Her tack is still here too, it should be able to be adjusted to fit one of my others when the time is right,

I still can't go in the drawer that has her mane in though, she was my everything.
 
The three horses I have lost are all tattooed on me, although I did have one done a few years before I lost him. I have some mane from each and a bracelet engraved with their names. I have a tub with my first pony's fleece rug and headcollar in, but haven't kept any rugs for sentimental reasons from the other two. I still have a few of them from the last horse because they fit one of my others.
 
Carlo was PTS suddenly in July. I still have everything! Some I can re-use for the other beastie, some I shall have to sell as it is the wrong size. ATM I cant bring myself to sort it all out, I also have his shoes which I asked the vet to remove when he was gone and some mane & tail hair. The plan is to have a stock pin made. I have made a collage of favourite photos and will buy him a rose bush in his 'colour'. Best of all I 'kept' him as he is buried on the farm. Its all totally over the top but I figured if I started with everything possible I wouldn't have any regrets not keeping something!
 
D has retired, so I've already started the process of clearing things out. I need the money and the space really. He's still got all of his rugs and his leather headcollar and his grooming kit. We also have two stable name plates. I suspect it will be the name plates and headcollar that stay in the end, maybe his Thermatex which has his name on it; I might get a cushion made out of it.
 
I lost Gus last March and I still have everything! I also have some tail hair and the farrier, who was there when he was pts, took his front shoes off and polished them up for me.

I am just about at that point where I think I should donate some of the scruffier (but still very wearable) rugs to charity - Bransby is just down the road from me. The others I will sell. I will probably keep a couple of bits in case I do get a new horse, but the search is on going and I haven't seen anything suitable yet.

The saddle and bridle are in the corner of the kitchen.
 
The last horse I lost I'd only had 6 months. All his stuff was brand new, some unused so nothing really with any real sentimental value.
I got a little brass headcollar nameplate and put it on the gate post to my stables with his shoe round it. It's subtle but always there and makes me feel a bit better that he's not just gone.
 
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