Guess who arrived by ferry to Shetland this morning?

Everyone is very pleased to see her and she brought the fine weather with her too.

Zoot is happy, happy, happy.  Anna is her all-time favourite person.

Lyra was in heaven with her Daisy (as always).

I left everyone hugging, chatting and sitting in the field together….

…. and occupied myself with my camera taking happy snaps.

So our summer has now officially begun.  Andy and Charlie are looking forward to being ridden, Hammy is going to be trained to do something useful plus the youngsters (Zoot, Carina, Lyra and Gwendolinda) are going to the local show with Daisy and Anna.

Well, that is the plan anyway.

Anna says it feels like she never left.

So smiles all round.

Welcome home (your British home, that is) Anna!

“And now to consume our body weights in Pimms and prawn-cocktail crisps. In true summer style.” – said by Daisy and Anna.  Not me, I am a Cheese and Onion girl!

All is quiet on the western front here at Thordale, well quiet-ish.

Andy, Charlie and Hammy know which way their bread is buttered (we don’t do margarine in this house, ever) and are being nice to The Minions.  I am very pleased with them so it is carrots all round and a huge relief.

I think the threat of Taktur was enough to terrify them into submission.  While we were out riding, Taktur managed to push his way through a gate this afternoon.  He was standing by their fence and, on our return, we could see everyone was very pleased that we quickly removed him.   They are much more of a group now.

Sadly, Taktur’s love remains unrequited so his mood is somewhat difficult.  Still, he does have good manners when the headcollar is on and leads nicely.  Mostly because I am busy reading recipes to him that involve pieces of him if he starts barging.  I hate bargy horses.

Back to the real world.  I went out this afternoon as I see such photographic potential while I am taking Taktur backwards and forwards everyday down the road (4 miles) to Sandness.  I can never stop when I have him tap-dancing in the back of the trailer so I took the car out for a little drive instead.

I particularly like this Shetland ram.  He lives, with his friend, by our gate that leads into the scattald (open hill).  His coat is wonderful.

~~~~~~ The End ~~~~~~

(see what I did there – geddit?!)

I was in two minds about doing this but…..

Here goes.

I put Andy, Charlie and Hammy back in with The Minions.

Things seemed calmer this time but we are keeping a very close eye on them all.  Hammy knows we are watching.

Firstly, Andy approached Storm who made all the right faces and then, surprisingly, initiated a grooming session with him.

It was a case of “Little and Large”.

Charlie and Waffle have teamed up.  Games started and, to be fair, Charlie initiated the game so Waffle happily joined in.

Hammy is the joker in this pack.  Sometimes he is nice and then his ears go back and off he chases.  He likes Silver at the moment.

I think he is only being nice so he gets to play with Silver’s toys.

Silver loves his bally-ball.

Actually they all do.

My concern is for Storm.  He is the weakest of the group and I do not want him picked on.

Anyone found picking on The Minions this time will be put out in the big field where Taktur is bored and waiting……

Hammy has been warned.  Actually, they have all been warned.

I am so bored of the will-they-won’t they sex saga.  Today, they didn’t.  Hetja squirted, teased and then gave Taktur both barrels – hmmmm…..

Taktur was a much nicer gentleman (we had had words about the previous ‘haviour) and he stood back while she tarted around him unmercifully.  Maybe tomorrow.

So this is Plan B – tomorrow morning – I take Klængur over to live with Hetja.  I remove Fákur and put him with Esja and Hreyfing.  Hetja loves Klængur, and I mean really loves and he is very happy to oblige despite being a gelding.

Then in the afternoon, we will take Taktur over and see if Hetja is perhaps a bit more, err, up for it.

Anywho, I am bored of all this sex talk so here are some photos of the most beautiful Shetland ponies.  I spent an afternoon with them last week and had great fun taking photos and chatting to them.  They live at Bergli Stud.

If I didn’t have a black Shetland pony stud, I would definitely have fairytale looking ones.

They are just so purty!

We are going to do this “in-hand” to prevent damage to everyone involved and today, Hetja was much more receptive.  I think she appreciated the introduction and subsequent chatting up.

Note-to-self – do not stand downwind to a mare thinking about being in season!  Live and learn.

Although she was calmer, Hetja was not 100% receptive but it was an improvement on yesterday.  She would not stand still and did try to kick him again, but she was less panicky.

Tomorrow might be The Day.  We did not persevere and we let Hetja go back to her field and think about things.

And we took Taktur home and gave him his grub.  He was happy enough when we put him out with the geldings.

Meanwhile, as the horse trailer needed cleaning, I let The Minions out of their field to “help”.  They investigated everything and playing King of the Castle should take the fear out of loading as well.

It was lovely watching them wandering about playing with anything they could get their teeth on.

Darling boys.  The perfect therapy.