Dancing ponies and Driving ponies

My other prints have arrived! They are just lovely! The first pair are from Victoria Usova - you can check out her Etsy shop here. I've always loved her whimsical work, especially her flying horses. One day, when I'm rich I'd like to comission her to paint my cavalcade of children and ponies. I think that would be wonderful - all the kids playing their musical instruments, and the horses with their names on their necks, like carousel horses. Hmmm, but since I'm not rich, maybe I'll have to have a go myself!

The last print is from an artist who I've admired for a very long time. Ellen Morrow paints many things, but I especially love her crows. I am lucky enough to have a little ACEO original of hers, a moonlit unicorn, but I really covet her crows. Unfortunately, some of my best customers also collect her work, and I have never felt comfortable bidding against my customers on ebay. I would hate to upset them!

I should have been painting this week, but instead I have been working with Marlene, the little Dartmoor pony. She will be 4 this May, and is just the most amazing little mare. So keen to work, and eager to please, she is a joy to handle. I have been long reining her for the last three days, and she has taken to it like a duck to water. We have been out in the field doing tight figure of eights, and lots of transitions, and I reckon if I had a little exercise cart she would be driving in another week.
But I haven't, so we will ride her out instead, if her bit arrives. She is working in her halter here, though she is bitted. It has been minus 4 for the last few days here, and it just seems to me that the quickest way to put a pony off being bridled is to put a freezing metal bit into a sensitive mouth, so I'm waiting for a new rubber snaffle to arrive.

Looking at these pics of her made me nostalgic for my old mare Phoenix. I dug out a couple of photos of her, and have to say the resemblance is uncanny! Marlene is narrower, but she is after all only 3 years old, and will likely broaden a little. She shows all the signs of being a worthy sucessor to Phoenix.

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