Sue Robisch
2019 was a busy year for Little Hooves & Big Hearts, and SaddleBrooke volunteers and residents played a big part in our success. Thank you! Here is a partial summary of what we accomplished.
* We hired a third equine-assistance facilitator.
Peggy Holt is a licensed professional counselor who has more than 25 years of clinical experience helping children and adults deal with substance abuse, trauma, and other mental health disorders. The breadth of Peggy’s clinical experience and her equally impressive skill set will make it possible for us to offer a wider range of therapeutic services to our clients.
* Expansion of our main office building in Oracle.
This project has allowed us to move our client sessions indoors – complete with minis – when the weather is not cooperating. It also gives us a separate space for parent counseling. Over the years we’ve learned that an important part of what we do is helping the parents deal with the particular challenges of raising a child with special needs.
* We deepened our relationship with the Children’s Clinics of Tucson.
The Children’s Clinics of Tucson is a world-class medical center that provides comprehensive care in a family-friendly environment to children and teens. Our minis and facilitators visited the clinics six times in 2019, interacting with more than 300 children and parents. The minis offer a calming, therapeutic presence and a number of parents, seeing first-hand the special bond that can develop between a child and a horse, are now bringing their kids to our Oracle facility for private sessions.
* Little Hooves continued to support other non-profits.
We again participated in the Tucson-area Night to Shine sponsored by the Tim Tebow Foundation that celebrates kids with special needs.
For the fifth year our minis participated in Tucson’s Autism Walk and Resource Fair, interacting with approximately 1,500 children and parents. This event is particularly important to us as many of the children and teens we work with fall somewhere on the autism spectrum.
* In addition to the above events Little Hooves touched nearly 700 lives in 2019.
Virtually all of these individuals are in a better place today thanks to our gifted facilitators and their trusty equine partners.
A special shout-out to all of you who helped make our Tucson Hoofprints benefit last May such a big success. It was the best-attended event we have had.
For more information on Little Hooves & Big Hearts go to www.littlehooves.org or call 520-896-2820.