Meet Nicola and her two mare: Fashion and Hattie! I met them on their very pretty little yard, just up the road in Goring. The ponies were sparkling clean and stood waiting in the sun, early one Saturday morning. Nicola was ready and waiting and took me on a little walk around their fields to show me what we had to work with.
The horses were both Welsh Section D's, one of my favourite breeds. Nicola's mum, Juli has followed me on Facebook for quite a while, this summer she very kindly organised a shoot for Nicola's birthday!
Our first challenge was to try and get some photographs of both the girls! We were provided with plenty of cheeky behaviour from the ponies - Fashion went on strike refusing to put her ears forward whilst Hattie stood their looking very pretty with her "smile." Poor Juli and Nicola's Dad had to work very hard to get their attention... the dogs thought it was great fun all the toys that were being thrown around, at one point Nicola's Dad threw his hat up in the air and the breeze carried it and smacked poor Nicola on the nose!
First up it was Fashion's turn, after their group shots, we turned to face the other way so that she could be looking towards the road, the noise of the people walking past and the occasional car passing was enough to get her attention. Fashion is 15 years old and has been part of the family for 7 years now - Nicola has had to focus on her studies to become a Nurse recently so horses have had to take a bit of a back seat, however, during this time they've enjoyed plenty of hacking across the crop fields and a bit of showing, including workers classes.
Both the girls mean alot to Nicola and her family, Hattie in particular though, because she was homebred. Sadly they lost her Mum whilst she was still a foal. Her gorgeous palamino coat looks amazing at this time of year and glistened in the morning sun. Whilst we were focusing on Fashion, Hattie had her head in the bush picking blackberries, so after we quickly gave her mouth a wipe over, she stood beautifully amongst the golden grass.
Hattie's colouring was a bit of a surprise to Juli as her parents were bay and chestnut! We headed in to the fields along the back of the stable. The trees provided us with some nice variety in posing for the photographs, as well as some shade from the bright sunshine. The girls cheeky Welsh nature was certainly coming across, they were so lovely thought and obviously such a massive part of the family.
They thought all their Christmas' had come at once when I suggested we took them in to the other paddocks with knee-deep grass! Nicola popped aboard Hattie and laughed when she said this might be just a little too exciting for Hattie, however she was an angel! Once again, the golden colours within the grass looked just so lovely against the shimmer of Hattie's coat.
We finished the shoot up with some black background images in the stables. The dogs were then allowed out to play and I couldn't resist taking some photographs!
