“How many amateurs are living on ramen to make their equine dreams come true?” Valerie Wunder asked.

Wunder, a public relations and communications professional by trade and a hunter/jumper horse-nut by passion, is willing to bet there are more than a few amateurs out there who believe their horse’s new shoes are way more important than a new outfit.

Thanks to her mare, some twists and turns in life and a supportive mom, Wunder has started on some new adventures with those equine dreams. A hunter rider, she’s currently experimenting with the jumpers while she waits for her colt Danny to grow up.

Wunder’s mare, Zoey (a.k.a. A Little Romancze [Alla C’zar—Reina’s April Showers, Schoenfeld]) has always been her “heart horse,” she said. She bought the homebred, now 11, as a 2-year-old in Arizona from hunter breeder Crossroads Farm. After a several successful years in the hunters, Wunder bred a foal off the mare after winning a breeding from Dreamscape Farm in Canada.

Zoey had been injured, Wunder had been furloughed from her job at U.S. Airways and “it seemed like the time to do it,” she said.

Zoey and her foal, Danny. Photo by Buckikiddies Photography

Not long after breeding Zoey in 2012, Wunder moved Ohio for her new job in public relations. She originally planned to leave Zoey in Arizona until she had the foal. “I thought I could be the type of owner who could just get updates,” she said with a laugh. Instead, she says she was just going home after work, instead of to the barn (and eating and gaining weight, she joked). So she brought Zoey to Ohio.

In 2013, Zoey had the colt by Bon Balou and Wunder named him Danny, or Bonaducci. Wunder’s supportive mom, Dee Wunder, slept for weeks on Valerie’s sofa so she could be there for the Danny’s birth.

Dee sells her homemade canned goods and pepper jelly at craft fairs to help Valerie pay for her horses. Originally the money was going into the “Zoey fund,” but plans soon changed.

After weaning Danny, Zoey went back to being a successful show horse in 2014—one of her best show seasons ever in the adult amateur hunters.

Valerie Wunder showing Zoey.

Then Valerie noticed the mare was a little uncomfortable. She had her checked out and they found a bone chip in her left hind fetlock. It was the size of a pinkie nail, Valerie said, but it did enough damage that even after a trip to Rood & Riddle (Ky.) to have it removed, Zoey was telling her that her show career was over.

“She’s the type of mare who won’t ever stop, but she was uncomfortable,” Valerie said of her beloved Zoey. “I couldn’t empty my bank account to buy an adult amateur horse so I had bought her as a 2-year-old and brought her up. She was more than I ever imagined. So much work, time, money, and she was telling me she couldn’t do it.”

Knowing the mare enjoyed having a career, Valerie found a breeder in Canada who would take her on as a broodmare, and in June 2015 she sent her there. Valerie decided to take the summer to get back on her feet and rebuild her savings account while her colt Danny grew up. When she finally took a lesson, on a lesson horse, it was the first time in eight years she rode a horse that was not Zoey.

“I cried through my first lesson,” Valerie remembered.

But thanks to another breeder, Valerie got a show season after all this year.  She had met Elizabeth Houtsma of Hillside H Ranch in Missouri at a 90-day test back in Arizona, and they became friends on Facebook.  Elizabeth had a mare, Bellagia HH, that had just come back from a lease and was not yet bred. Bella was “just hanging out” and Elizabeth offered to let Valerie ride her for the winter. “For someone to be like ‘Here’s a horse to get you though until Danny is ready,’” Valerie mused. “Nobody does that.”

Valerie on Bella.

The only catch? Valerie’s heart is firmly in the hunter ring, and Bella is most definitely a jumper.

“My trainer is like, ‘You will be the only one who gets time faults,’” she laughs.

It’s not the height of the fences—Valerie has shown the three-foot hunters with Zoey and hopes Danny will be her 3’6” amateur-owner horse someday—“It’s more about the fact it’s against the clock,” she said. “I love the lopey idea of the hunter, loop the rein and two-point around.”

Valerie’s doing the low schooling jumpers, 2’6”, with Bella and it’s pushing her comfort zone, though not Bella’s as the mare has done the 1.20-meter classes.  “I never had any desire to do the jumpers,” Valerie said. “Everyone is saying ‘Welcome to the dark side.’”

Valerie is shooting for a rated show with Bella at the end of February, before she sends her back to Elizabeth to be bred. She’s trying to figure out how to balance her job with the show schedule, since her classes fall during the week.

And when Bella goes back, Valerie will shift her focus to Danny. Right now, he’s turned out. “He’s a total pigpen right now, like a yak,” she said. “You can see the stink lines coming off him, like a cartoon.”

In March, she’ll bring Danny, who will be 3 in May, to Hunters Court Farm in Johnstown, Ohio, where she trains with Nicole Parrill. The plan is to take him to horse shows and just let him hang out.

Danny learning the ropes.

Her ultimate dream is to someday show Danny at the Washington International Horse Show and have her mother be there to see it. Valerie, 37, is unmarried and doesn’t have kids, so Danny is “like her grandson.”

Dee and her “grandbaby,” Danny. 

And if Danny as a prospect isn’t enough, after Zoey has her foal in June, she will be re-bred and Valerie will get the next baby. “I didn’t really plan for all this to happen!” she said as she envisions paying board and training two horses. “Danny will be coming 6 when this baby is born.”

She said that sometimes she asks, “How am going to do this?” adding, “I can’t tell you the last time I got a haircut! I don’t live paycheck to paycheck, but I have to be smart.”

But she said, “People spend their money in different ways, and if I don’t have horses I would probably spend it on something else. I’d rather spend my money on them.”