Foal Action Shots

I can't quite believe that Inara's been home for nearly a fortnight. It's been quite a whirlwind since she arrived home, she's grown already and she's learning to take all kinds of new things in her stride.

First off, this is the young lady we're talking about, she poses beautifully :)

And here she was early last week, looking a bit scrawny and bewildered by having such a big field and only her mum to share it with:

She soon started testing out her galloping legs, and I can confirm that she's very fast, often too fast to catch on camera!

But I did get some better shots...

And here she is today, on the day that she and her mum were (re)united with my other two horses, Millie and Sam. Poor Inara got left out while her mum said her hellos to the others, she couldn't quite make out what the fuss was all about. But look how she's grown in just a few days, compare this robust looking critter with the scrawny beast in the first pic taken just six days earlier. All that galloping's clearly paying off! :)

We've been making hay on the farm this week, 1500 small bales of it. We make 'barn dried' hay, which is taken off the field earlier than normal hay and drying is finished in the barn by a set of huge electric fans. It makes sweet tasty horse hay (yes I've tasted it and it is sweet!), but it takes a lot of extra work as every bale has to be loaded into the barn and stacked by hand on its edge within a few hours of being baled, otherwise it degrades and starts to grow mould. Which meant several 11pm stop-outs this week while I helped my father and brother to offload the trailers into the barn. We sell most of it, but I've bagsied some of the best bales for Inara and her mum's winter fodder. She'll need the very best hay to grow properly :)

All of which has meant that my spinning and knitting activities have had to take a back seat this week. But I've still been spinning whenever I could, and I've managed to keep up with my Tour de Fleece objective to spin every day. I've even finished a fair amount of yarn, helped along by some new spindle-shaped goodness. Plus I've discovered that spindling while on a hay trailer is risky (a long way down if you drop the spindle!), but very effective - provided you don't mind picking out hay seeds from the fibre. Next time, I promise news and photos of spinning, my swallowtail shawl, and other crafty goodness...