See No Evil

About a year and one half ago my Aunt, Stacey Miller, quite tragically and permanently lost her vision after suffering horrific side effects from a medical treatment gone terribly wrong. She was in the hospital for weeks and was very close to death on more than one occasion. Although Stacey, being the fighter that she always has been, pulled through, was told that she would never be able to regain her eye sight. Not only would she have to recover, she would have to learn to live this whole new lifestyle. I do not think I could ever had the courage and durability that she has had to get to where she is today. Recently I was shocked and so happy to see her able to do the dishes, boil tea, and even saddle up her daughter's horse! She has always been an intelligent, go getting woman, and clearly nothing has changed.

Immediately I began to think of something I could do to help Stacey and her family. I knew that the hospital bills would be never ending, she would need to go to school to learn how to regain her mobility and complete all of the other training she would need to be able to regain her confidence is world that she could no longer see. Being the barrel racer that I am, I immediately thought of a benefit barrel race. So right away I put everything together, had a presentation with Stacey and other family for what I had planned and everyone was quite excited for, what I had called, the SEE NO EVIL Benefit Barrel Race. There was one problem though, I had no idea how to actually host one of these races! I had no equipment, no computer software, no nothing and no knowledge. I asked around and got some responses but there was always a problem here or a problem there so I basically shelved the idea until the right time came along.

Recently at a local benefit called "Somebody Help The Boy" I was racing at I heard a loud speaker announcement after the race. Charmaine Newkirk with CM Productions basically said, if you know someone who needs help, and want to host a benefit, let me know! And "There's your sign"....I knew right away this was my opportunity to make this happen. Finally, the SEE NO EVIL race could possibly happen! After talking with Charmaine, she said let's give it ago. So I hit the road running, pulled out all of my prep work from so long ago and went to work.

My plans for this race where going to be a little different than I had planned. Recently I had been blessed to take Dreaming of Three's Rodeo Kid Dominique McAllister to his very first rodeo at the Stockyard's Championship Rodeo on March 9, 2013. Dominique, whom many of you know, is an 11 year old boy whom last year was diagnosed with Leukemia. He and his father live at the Ronald McDonald House in Fort Worth, Texas where he receives treatments 3 days a week. Dominique's father, Billy, travels from Abiline to Fort Worth frequently as his other two children live in Abiline, so he has been unable to find a job who is willing to accommodate his families needs of traveling. I had been, as well, trying to think of ways to help raise money for Dominique that could raise enough to actually make enough for his family. Nothing seemed to be big enough to help...until now! It was divine intervention that everything was coming together all at once in harmony to help both of these extremely deserving families who quite unfortunately have hit harder times than most of will ever have to go through.

So for about the past week I have endlessly been putting plans together to make this race a huge success. Salt Creek Arena is the chosen venue, as it is locally convenient for everyone and the date has been set for May 11, 2013. We have already received some MAJOR product sponsors for the silent auction including Absorbine, Heritage Brand, Mane 'n Tail, FORCO, Cowboy Magic and many many more. We have been blessed with our largest sponsor yet to be able to award the 1D Champion wit a HIDEZ Travel & Recovery Compression Body Suit, which retails at $600.

HIDEZ is an equine full body suits that helps rid the body of lactic acid build up so your horse does not get sore and increases blood flow to the heart, among many other great things it does. These are brand new to the US and I am thrilled that Matthew Spice, the owner and inventor of HIDEZ, is allowing me this opportunity to introduce this revolutionary product to the US and barrel racing industry.

We will also be awarding Trophy Leather Cuff Bracelets to the Division Champions, as well as a 10lb pail of FORCO, which is specifically designed to have your horses digestion track at optimum working condition. There will very likely be even more added to the Champion Division Awards.
There will also be awards to the Reserve Champions in the Division which will include a custom brush set from Craft & Crown, and more. We have where also able to have HORSNHAYES ART design a beautiful logo created just for this race. There will be a concession stand, hopefully catered by a local eatery. We are also having a HIDEZ body suit to be raffled off, among other raffle prizes as well. It's going to be a full on great event, and I'm hoping one of the best local benefits of the year. The books are planned to open at 11:00 AM, exhibitions to go from 11:30-1:30 and the race to start at 2:00 PM. We're keeping the entry low at only $25 and so far we have tallied up $300 in added money. I cannot wait to make this a huge success for Stacey and Dominique! I would never be able to do it with out all of the help from Dreaming of Three, Charmaine Newkirk and CM Productions and the extremely generous product Sponsors! Please check out the website for the race www.seenoevilrace.com for more info on the race and the amazing sponsors. If you would like to make a donation to help make this race a huge success for Dominique and Stacey please email me at carliehayes@yahoo.com for more information on how you can help.