Horse Story from La Grande, Oregon

My mom's new husband Fred is from La Grande, Oregon and he has a really nice property with 10 acres and a river running through it. It's beautiful there. They have four wheelers, a boat... and most importantly, HORSES! Ella somehow found this new infactuation with horses ever since Papa (Fred) told her at Christmas time that she could come to his house and ride his horses. She mentioned this every time she was on the phone to either Nana or Papa.

So, was it to any of our suprise, that the first thing she wanted to do when we arrived in La Grande was to ride the horses? No. It was dark so she could only pet them and sit on them for a while, and then it was time for bed.

The next morning Ella awoke at sunrise, as she does on vacation, so I put on some cartoons for her and went back to bed since it was 6am on vacation. Then we get this knock on the door from the neighbor saying that our horses were out and the gate was open. My mom goes into Bonnie's room (Fred's daughter staying there while my mom and Fred are in Florida) and she says to get Scott up to help her round them up. Then my mom comes back into my room after getting Scott up to tell me that she's looked everywhere in the house and Ella is nowhere to be found!

I jump up and start running around the property in my nightgown, which doesn't get me very far. I go back inside and put my shoes on to meet Scott and Bonnie with tears streaming down my face. I say a prayer to myself since she was nowhere in sight and with the horses out and the river close by, who knows what could have happened to her.

Bonnie jumps on her four wheeler and Scott and I jump into the car to start looking for her. Bonnie finds her first at the very end of their lane and started driving her back to us. We get out and after some punishment... put her to her room for time out. Ten minutes later she was found sound asleep in the bed.

This girl of mine has done this before at Wal-mart and they had to call Code Red and shut the doors to find her on the other side of the store...

Boy, do I wish I had kids that were scared to get out of my sight!