Flossie had a riding lesson this afternoon with our trainer, Bjørn Roar Larsen.

Daisy, as observer and chief pooper-scooper, plonked herself down on an upturned bucket and made herself comfortable.  BeAnne took up her usual residence on Daisy’s knee.

Earlier, the Boyzenberries had been let out of their field and were now having a mosy around.

Lambie was feeling very chatty.

‘Bert was intrigued watching Flossie and Klængur.

Support and help was offered.

‘Ster wandered in and out of the shed according to how he felt and what he could find to eat or wear.

So while Flossie was riding Klængur,…..

…. the Lambie and ‘Ster watched – like Statler and Waldorf.

The riding lesson was going very well.

The others eventually got bored and left but Lambie stayed with Daisy.

First it was the bin’s turn.

And then he decided to go through the rubbish and find a potential food bag to fling about or up-end himself into.  The last time he did this, he vanished into it and gave himself a panic attack!  It took ages to calm him down.

At the end of the lesson, Klængur had his food and Lambie desperately wanted to join in.

Everyone achieved.  A good afternoon’s lesson.

Daisy and I have just come home from a lovely carol concert in town hosted by the Shetland Choral Society.

As well as beautifully sung carols, there was a constant supply of tea/coffee and cake!

In my opinion, this has to be the nicest way to listen to carols – eating homemade cake!  Shetland is the best place for home baking!

We did our bit and were very supportive.

So, every time a sheep was mentioned in a carol, being lowly or otherwise, Daisy and I would look at each other and smile, thinking to ourselves about our happy little flock.

The Boyzenberries are all on wonderful form.  For once, they are in a good routine and almost do as they are told.  If anyone wanted real sheep for a real Nativity play, these boys would be perfect for the part.

‘Ster has been working on his sincere face.

‘Bert has perfected his own Winning Smile.

Lambie is trying out a new meaningful face.

Blue Steel …..

or Magnum?  You decide.

He also has his usual nose-kissey face.

Darling sheepy boys.

I feel there may be a Nativity market here I could be tapping into with three very tame sheep.

It is probably just as well we do not all live on mainland UK.

Lambie also has a cynical face and so do I!

I popped by the indoor school to find Daisy training her horse, Kappi.

They were just coming to the end of their session.

I truly enjoy watching them and they worked very well together.

Let it be known that I try very hard not to be a “Dance Mom” and it is not easy for me, as a control freak, to let them get on with it by themselves.

But I keep telling myself that it is their relationship together.

Not mine.

Once they had finished, Flossie and her horse, Klængur, came into the school.

We try to colour coordinate!

Flossie and Klængur are working very hard on their teamwork and communication.

I am helping Flossie at the moment.

Klængur is a complicated little chap.

One minute he is happily tölting round the school and then suddenly…… trot!

Now where on earth did that gait come from?

Klængur never trots with me.  Never.  Perhaps he knows I would instantly fall to bits.  The two beat trot really hurts my back.  Sort of ow-ow, ow-ow, ow-ow and I ache afterwards.

At the end, there is nothing like a good stretch.  You can almost hear just how relaxed Klængur was.  They both worked very hard.

Meanwhile, Bjørn rode Taktur outside.  He is the black dot in the distance.

Today, me and my feet stayed firmly on the ground.

The rain, it has rained – quite a lot by the looks of things.

Everyone is doing well.  The grass bellies are going. It is a very slow process, though.

Unusual friendships are being forged.

The bigger ones are all being ridden regularly.

Little Albie is turning into bigger Albie.

We have dropped his afternoon feed but he still has milk and cereal in the morning.

He looks well on this.

Albie has developed into a sturdy independent Shetland pony.  Just what we wanted.  When he sees us, he just thinks food or love will come his way.  He relies on the rest of the herd to be his friends.

Tor is still very important in his life and come spring, we may wean him off her.   It is all in his head.  She doesn’t let him nurse.

This time last year, Delia was wearing a rug 24/7 but it has not been nearly as cold or rainy and she is maintaining her weight well.

Little Newt is putting on weight.

He has spread out a bit more.  His thick Shetland woolly foal coat is coping superbly with the rain. It just flattens down and he remains completely dry underneath.  Very efficient.  He has paint on his back from the auction (different colours indicate different destinations once sold).  This paint is solid and not budging.  I am not going to cut it out as that will interfere with the effectiveness of his winter coat.  It will brush out when his coat falls out in spring.

Newt likes carrots.  He is finding his place in the herd.

One of us. One of us!

It’s a dreich day.  The horses and ponies are fine.   We left them to it.

I popped over to Sandness to check the others.

All good there.

Home again, to a mug of Parisian hot chocolate (it was delicious) for everyone.

I know it is early, but I am in a very Christmassy mood.  Last year was completely ruined for me by one of my spinal discs (L4-L5) prolapsing.  I spent most of the Christmas period in an analgesic fog.  Not nice.

So, as Floss is now home from University, the tree is up and it is beautiful.

As always, full of all my favourite Christmas ornaments – the tomte or nisse family, the angel, my silver Dala horse, the snow goose….They all mean a great deal to us all.

There is also a bit of a sheep theme.  Funny that.

This year, I bought three sheep and Daisy kindly “sheepified” them.

First, there is Lambie – accurately coloured in.

‘Bert in all his glory.

‘Ster, complete with precise markings.  I doubt there are any other Christmas trees in Shetland with a fleckit, moorit and katmoget sheep decorations.  But, then again, I could be wrong!

Then we started the difficult bit.  To make this year’s Christmas card.

I had to employ the help of the local elves.

Enjoy xx

(by the way, this is Wu’s happy face and no one was harmed in the making of this photo).