EC Blog: A Miracle Filly Is Born
Foal photos by Bree Hokana Photography.
By Bree Hokana
This precious LEGACY continues on…
Filled with many emotions, this story is about overcoming tragedy and walking in FAITH, and believing for miracles….
On February 18th, 2025, my heart shattered into what felt like a million pieces.
IMA BLOND INVESTMENT aka “Blondie” ate her breakfast, and was acting normal and made a fast turn for the worst and we QUICKLY acted and got her to Chino Valley Equine. They rushed her into the surgery room and performed what seemed to be a successful surgery for an epiploic foramen entrapment. I watched the whole surgery. We had the best vet work on her. I watched as they transferred her over to the recovery room. We were told to go grab dinner and wait for her to wake up. We got a call at the restaurant and I answered, they told us her heart stopped.
Those words and that moment – I couldn’t even hardly comprehend the words… My only thoughts were – “It can’t be… I just saw her transferred over to the recovery room for her to wake up. I just saw her.” A thousand feelings of emotions swept over, and as devastating as it was, those words were very real, and our girl didn’t get to come home with us….
How do you sum up thousands of memories? You can’t… But Blondie’s story is meaningful.
My Mom saw Blondie when she was 2 years old, she was by her Res. World Champion stallion, Invested Dimension and out of the great World and Reserve World Champion mare, Too Tardy Dude that Charlie Cole showed, who was owned by Diana Arnold.
My mom tried for years to purchase Blondie, and when the opportunity became available to own her, we didn’t hesitate!! I never knew at the time all that we would do together. She was the greatest gift I have ever received. She took me through my Youth and some of my Amateur years of showing.
She made dreams become reality.
She was a “trail superstar”. I have yet to ride a horse with so much natural ability and have such great cadence, and have so much lift as she did. She was so talented – she great at Showmanship (but Showmanship was not for me) and she was great at Horsemanship (winning the NSBA World Show in Horsemanship with my sister, Brook Hokana) and L1 Reserve Champion with me in Horsemanship. Blondie was a GREAT pattern horse, really she could do ANY All-Around Event. But our event was the Trail, I never knew I could love the trail so much; but she made me fall in love with it. We won many circuit awards, too many to count. We were Reserve and Bronze NSBA World Champion multiple times. We were World Champions. She was Multiple World and Reserve World Champion at the Palomino World Show. Blondie amassed 329.5 points in her career. She was a GREAT show mare and she made every ride a great ride.
But…. She was so much more than a show horse, she was my best friend and a light through a lot of highs and lows in my life. She was constant. She was there, always. Even when I wanted to just go and sit in her stall – her kind, gentle eyes and funny personality always knew how to warm my heart. She was my best friend, my partner and she was there for me through sooo much of my life. I have spent almost every day with her or around her. She was a part of my life. She was my heart. She and I had a level of trust and a bond that was undeniable. She would always perk up her ears when I called her name, or when she was being lounged in the arena – she would stop and walk over to me. She loved me and I greatly loved her. We had a bond and a relationship that was UNDENIABLE!
She was so much more, so very much more than a horse in a stall, she was family.
Thank you for the ride of a lifetime, Blondie.
Going back to that moment on February 18th, I sat in the back of the truck with my mom… In an absolute state of shock, and a lot of tears.. We made the decision to take her ovaries out.
The ovaries sat in the front of the truck, packaged in the container, it was the last piece of Blondie we had left. We prayed over them and my Dad left at midnight and drove 7 hours to San Luis Obispo to Veterinary Reproduction Innovations to do ICSI.
They retrieved 5 oocytes that needed semen asap… We were told that we needed a young, very fertile stallion and we’d need to get the semen to them immediately. We went over stallions and made the decision on the great, Hay GoodLookN. So we called Hillary Timchak. She was so gracious, so kind, so understanding and so wonderful to work with. She did over and above to get us semen.
The others did not make it to maturity, but we received one embryo that was ready to transfer into a recip. Stacy Potter helped us find the wonderful Jan Martin with the best recip mare for our Blondie embryo.
Fast forward to January 21, 2026. Our little miracle, literally our miracle was born. They told us our prognosis of even recovering any oocytes and even getting them to maturity would be most likely very very low with the extensive surgery Blondie had and all the anesthesia. Blondie was twenty-one years old. TWENTY-ONE and not at the prime time of when a mare would be cycling…. But we PRAYED and we BELIEVED that we would get a very special horse…. AND WE DID!
I was believing God for a filly, a beautiful palomino filly….
That’s exactly what Blondie gave us.
A beautiful, perfect palomino filly.
Blondie gave all, and at the end, gave all that she had left to give.
What I would give to have her here! We would always take her babies over to meet her, it was always a funny encounter. I wish so badly that she could have met her.
Thank you so much Blondie for making my life better. For giving us this beautiful filly.
This is the last piece of our Blondie girl…
We laid Blondie to rest next to her dad, Invested Dimension.
Psalms 107:1
‘O give thanks to the Lord, for He is good;
For His compassion and loving kindness endure
forever!
Jeremiah 29:11
” For I know the plans and thoughts that I have for you,’ says the LorD, ‘plans for peace and wellbeing and not for disaster, to give you a future and a
nope.
We are still deciding on a barn and a show name for this filly, we want something great to signify this great journey of faith and of miracles.
2026 Palomino Filly
Hay GoodLookN x Ima Blond Investment (Multiple World and Reserve Champion, 3x NSBA Bronze Champion, NSBA Res Champion, NSBA World Champion • NSBA $1,679.97 • AQHA 239.5+ points • Palomino 90 points)
Additional photos credit: Shane Rux Photography, Jeff Kirkbride Photography, Larry Williams Photography.
Thank you to Bree and the entire Hokana family for allowing us to share this cherished post! If you have a special blog for consideration, email it to us: Delores.Kuhlwein@EquineChronicle.com.
