2024 Christmas Letter

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

We want to thank everyone for being with us through 2024. It was a crazy year, but still had lots of fun times and great memories thanks to everyone. Looking forward to a more enjoyable 2025 with the goals of more rest and relaxation to promote more creative and fulfilling times ahead!

We have big news in our family here at the ranch - Ben and Maria were successful and adopted Rosie and Alexandra! Two more Anderson’s at the ranch and they love to ride and be outdoors. Currently Maria takes them riding on Fizzy the pony every day, and Alexandra turns 2 next week. We couldn’t be happier for them. Ben also became a fishing guide and was able to take guests out to fly fish upon the Missouri River, which is a pretty exciting addition for us to have access to!

The horse herd at the ranch has many new faces this year and some of our amazing horses have found fabulous new homes with guests who love them. We are so grateful to our guests who have our horses in their every day lives now to make space for the new kids who are learning the responsibilities of being a guest horse at the Rocking Z.

Our online booking system has undergone a huge change over the last year and currently is a few weeks from being fully integrated into the website, however any plans can always be confirmed and booked through Patty. Sorry about the the long road to the new online system. We look forward to having it up and running.

We also want to thank our amazing staff who put in long hours and were so flexible throughout the year to make everything successful. We couldn’t be where we are without you all. We hope to keep making changes to improve the ranch but the best improvements come from all of you who keep coming back year after year, taking rides and playing games. Thank you all.

We hope that this coming year finds all of you happy and healthy, and that it can be a year of deeper understanding and kindness in the world. Merry Christmas and Happy New Years!!!

~Zack, Patty, Maria, Ben, Anna and all the Horses of the Rocking Z

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2023 Christmas Letter

We missed you all for the 2023 Christmas greetings! Anna couldn’t find the moments available to get the letter done, but we were thinking of you all.

2022 Christmas Letter

We wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

We have been so grateful in 2022 to see the return of so many of our overseas friends and guests! We had missed our international crowd throughout the travel restrictions. It really felt like we were back to normal with our diverse mix at the ranch. We had a very successful year, though not without trial. We hope you are also looking back at 2022 with a smile.

The guest ranch was busy this summer with a long, full season of fabulous guests. The horse herd was amazing and we were very pleased with everyone’s performance throughout the season. We had awesome interns this year and have been so proud of all of our staff as well. It was hot and dry this summer but fortunately not too smoky. We’ve welcomed in a long cold winter with some wonderful snowpack so far. We hope that this will heal the lack of groundwater that was suffered last season. Three days prior to Christmas we got to enjoy some balmy Arctic weather, feeding hay and caring for the horses in -40 degrees. Christmas day is supposed to be almost 40 Fahrenheit, an 80 degree swap!

Zack was supercharged through 2022 on housebuilding. The home for Ben and Maria is coming along beautifully, and we hope they will be moving in by spring. He only took time off to stack hay and get involved in local politics. The home was bricked in throughout the summer and the fireplace all finished. Now they are finishing up the interior.

Patty was without rest as usual, managing the bookkeeping, bookings, kitchen, and watching grandkids. We have been encouraging her to get out and ride more, which was successful until our weather became very cold. She loved the clinics through the end of September, riding with Dave and Jody Ellis and Martin Black always inspires us all to keep improving. She has agreed to increase our staff here at the ranch for next year also, which we are all looking forward to.

Ben and Maria are doing well. Maria’s shoulder has healed and is getting back to it’s old strength. This year they were asked to be respite foster care for a little girl, Rosie, who will be 15 months old at Christmas time. It’s been a joy having her around, but we will not know for many months if Ben and Maria will be able to adopt her. Our prayers are that Rosie is able to be put in the place that is best for her, and we are grateful to have her here.

Tom and I have our hands full with Arthur and Sofia. They are both communicating more and more, and it’s so fun listening to their stories and interpretations of things. Arthur loves the sky and stars, and Minecraft. Sofia can’t get outside enough and is crazy about horses. Tom is doing well working at SoFi. Anna always wants to be out with the horses, and continues to improve at rehabilitating lameness.

Our friends and staff are doing good. Justi is in Mexico at Los Barriles teaching kite-surfing for the winter. Julia is taking care of lots of maintenance through the winter here. Kilian is keeping Zack supported on all his projects. Bridgid is hauling hay and feeding cows and horses and helping with the kids this winter. Maddie is caring for all the horses and going through the tackroom maintenance, stitching leather and building new headstalls this winter. It is looking like a long cold winter, but we are keeping busy and productive.

Merry Christmas to everyone and may you bring in 2023 with joy and good cheer!

~The Rocking Z Family and Crew

2021 Christmas Letter

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

We hope that this finds you healthy and happy as the year comes to an end. 2021 was a good year for us with some big changes in the mix. Thank you all so much for being a part of our life!

Zack and Patty are doing well, staying strong and continuing to work hard. Patty has had a feat keeping track of all the bookings and necessary adjustments due to Covid the last few years. However, in October and November she took advantage of some mild weather and free time to assist in starting and developing five young horses along with Justi, Bridgid, and Julia. Zack spent much of the year working on the normal building maintenance and farming tasks.  But he got the opportunity to start a new project as Ben and Maria finally decided to build a house up at the Beach place.  Zack has been assisting with the design, drawing, and building of this new home, just a few miles upstream from the main ranch site.

Ben has had a busy year managing pastures with the current and ongoing drought, while at the same time juggling horseshoeing and house building. The cattle are looking good and he welcomed a new foal out of his best rope horse mare, Lulu. He named the foal Beach to commemorate their new home up at the Beach place.

Maria was just as busy as usual all year, riding and training all day every day from March until September, until she sadly tore her supraspinatus muscle in her shoulder. This required shoulder surgery in October, followed by many months of recovery and physical therapy. She is healing well though and insists on cooking and taking care her niece and nephew while she is stuck inside.

Anna and Tom had a baby girl on February 18th and named her Sofia Patricia. She is simply amazing when she laughs and it brings so much joy into the room. Today she is working hard on walking, taking Grandma’s hands, and traveling all through the lodge. Arthur will be four come next February.  He is continuing to work on his talking and taking good care of his baby sister. He is always up to something and loves to build! Anna is managing the horse herd through its natural transitions and training when she can while acting as mom, wife and horse guru.

The ranch had a fun-packed year with our guests and staff. The 2021 guest season was possibly one of the busiest on record, even with all the great staff and interns.  Justi is back to Mexico for the winter, but she was able to work with three young horses (Cider, Chief, and Ocho) this fall which she is very excited about.

Julia is staying warm working through the so far mild winter we’ve had helping everyone with winter tasks and projects.  She has a three-year-old colt named Jack she is riding, as well transitioning her project horse Maggie to the guest string for 2022. Tilly continues to grow it seems, but recently reached that milestone age of 1 years old!

Bridgid continues to work with her colt projects (Wyatt and Lynx) with more time to spend with them. She has learned a lot and had to get creative as both were keen on some aerial acrobatics to start!

Maddie is restarting and progressing some older horses that have come to the ranch this year with the hopes that they will be ready to work come next season. She continues to handle much of the day-to-day care of the horses and really enjoys the time she spends with them.

As usual, much has changed and yet very little has changed on the ranch this year. We have many new faces in the horse herd and we’re excited to continue their transition into the guest string while offering our staff new and exciting training opportunities. We’re hopeful that 2022 offers more opportunities for our European friends to visit the ranch again.  Stay healthy and remember soon we will all get to be running free across the fields once again. 

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year from all of us at the Rocking Z!