Idealee was named after her sire, Ideal, who was the model for the Breyer Oldenburg horse. I purchased her from my friend Janet Wallace in Utah, who bred warmbloods. She was more horse than I could ever afford, but Janet had way too many horses and gave me a screaming good deal on her. She was meant to be a 3-day-eventing horse, but the most I ever did was baby dressage. However, I trained her myself, and although she wasn't well-trained, in order to ride her at all, I had to learn to ride. I thought I knew how to ride before I got her. NOT. She was way too much horse for me, but she lifted me up to her level. She became "Molly" because she loved to paw all the water out of her water tub, hence she became Miss Mary Maytag after a famous cathedral in the Bay Area; that mutated to Molly. Molly was weaned the day I brought her home, and it was so hard on her. That's not how foals should be weaned. Another lesson she taught me. In 2008, she was bred to Denise Konetchy's Calypso, and produced Athena -- a gorgeous American Warmblood horse. I wasn't able to keep Athena, but wasn't able to sell her until she was 6. Molly was my pleasure horse all the years we lived in Moscow, and while I was able to take a few lessons, Molly did only "trail dressage". She had amazing big gaits and just ate up the trails, even at a walk. She loved it. When we first moved here, I tried to ride her out on the hills, but she was so nervous about leaving her buddies that she was dangerous and almost went over backward on me. She didn't, though, and with some practice, we were able to ride peaceably all over the 2000 acres surrounding our farm. She was very, very sensitive to aids -- that was inborn, in her Warmblood blood. It's too bad I never became a better rider because we could've done well in the dressage arena. Never eventing though -- she didn't particularly like to jump as her daughter did. In her later years, Molly developed DSLD. Oddly, it didn't seem to slow her down -- she thought she could still outrun the best of them. However, Dr. Ragle advised me not to ride her. Then I broke her to drive. We were just getting ready to put her into the carriage shafts when suddenly, she went lame, overnight it seems. I went out to trim her feet, and she couldn't stand on three legs to let me trim the hinds. That was the day I brought her to WSU and said goodbye to my sweet mare -- 24 years together.