Some days it's nice to take some time off and take a drive through the countryside, visit places and people. Today we wanted to check out different waterfalls in their winterclothes. 
First stopp was River Laxá, which was guarded by huge icicles, the water playing around them, steadily forming new ones. An amazing view and hardly possible to catch in a picture.
Second stopp was Goðafoss, always impressive in it's winterclothes and always some tourists around.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Finally some snow, maybe it will stay so we can go skiing. Our youngsters liked the powdersnow quite a lot and made everybody run crazy, galloping and bucking all around. They definitely enjoy life!

 

 

 

 

 

Hope you had a perfect start into the new year 2017, we definitely had.
It was time to get our ridinghorses inside, at least start to fetch them from their winterpasture at Ísólfsstaðir. List and Ögn were not as happy about it as we were, but they'll have to work a bit for their food the next months. Not going to do them a lot of harm. Sæla joined them, too, as did Magnús' horses Þokkadís and Glói. All of them are going to get a haircut.
Magnús, Sigtýr and Embla will join them inside soon. 
The mares, youngsters and foals got a new haybale today, Sjarmi getting nosier and nosier and already seeking a bit the human contact. And he likes to play with the plastic wrap of the haybales.
Due to the windy weather the horses were a bit tense and ready to run with the sightest distraction, showing off a bit.
High up in the sky there was a special view as there were rather many so called glitský (Polar stratospheric clouds, Polare Stratosphärenwolken), a wonderful spectacle of nature.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And a happy New Year!
Today's Ingólfur's father's 80th birthday and as usual, the whole family met at his place, having cake and chats, singing together and so on.
I think he liked having us around, eventhough he doesn't like to get that much attention. Anyway, he couldn't help getting attention today ;)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Finally home after a quite long time trying to go back north. When I arrived to Iceland on 27th of December, I was supposed to go straight north with the last flight to Akureyri. Well, after getting to know, that my bag was still in Copenhagen (they had to leave all the luggage there just to take extrafuel to get all the way to Keflavík) and my flight north being cancelled due to bad weather, I stayed with Nonni, Sigrún and their kids. The next day, the planes still didn't go north and not the day after. I was so lucky that Nonni was heading north anyway and I sneaked a trip with them. My bag was on her way north already, got it today. 
Well, it was good coming home and meeting the horses today. Always very calming.

 

 

At the moment I'm visiting my family in Austria. My dad had his 70th Birthday 2 days ago and today we celebrated. It has been quite some time that all the family met so we enjoyed being together quite much, had a lot to talk and laugh about. Great to meet the whole bunch!

 

 

Our friend Gísli has been breeding horses successfully for quite some time. Among others Höfði frá Húsavík, which was worldchampion in fivegait and pacetest 1993 with his rider Sigurbjörn Bárðarson. Kamban frá Húsavík is very well known for winning the kids class at Landsmót 3 times in a row, his brothers Hraunar and Flói are doing well in Europe, whilst his first prize sisters Hrauna and Bjarklind are Gíslis main breeding mares at the moment. 
Today he asked us to take some pictures of the youngest offspring of Hrauna, a promising young stallion born 2015, sired by Vökull frá Efri-Brú.
Hersir had quite some fun showing off and it was great to watch him.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our riding horses are still in vacation at Ísólfsstaðir and enjoy every minute. There's no snow at all and they have a huge pasture to roam free and pick the best places to feed on. Therefore List hasn't lost a single gramm of her fat yet. Well, that'll be something to work on, when she comes inside for training again, not going to bother her about it now.
The youngsters are having a good time too, always hoping to get a clap or some treats. Snerpa's mane still hasn't decided to which side it should lean and therefore stands straight up into the air. We'll see where it will end. Rögnir looks a bit like a tiny coldbloodfoal, strong joints, a lot of muscels and a big belly. Most important they are all healthy and enjoying life.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As the forecast was good I decided to give the location at Höfðagerðissandur another go. It was a bit cloudy and windy, but I got some quite nice shots.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We used the great weather and huge bag of bread we got at work to visit our horses and improve the fence.
Our youngsters liked the Tortillacakes best, starting to hit each other with them. Afterwards they checked Ingólfur out and got a good scratch.
I like the way Rögnir is developing, big, nice gaits and very nosy.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Remember the sticker I made in FabLab in early August? I finally found a place and time to put it up and I really like the result.
As we repainted our bathroom there was an empty wall, which needed an eyecatcher.

 

We started our day early with our trainingshorses at Saltvík, just to be able to finish training before lunch and give them the rest of the weekend off. They definitely liked going to the other field today, running and bucking around before going to eat. 
Afterwards I checked on the foals, youngsters and mares, which are at the big meadow down by the sea. They were happy to see me, hoping for some treats. Rögnir and Sjarmi are getting to know each other better and start being friends. The youngsters are enjoying being together and up to a lot of stupid things whilst the mares keep a bit away from them, eating just like they get paid for it. Snerpa and Kóngur are developing very well, eventhough it looks like Kóngur got all the mane... Snerpa still looks a bit like a fat punk. Fönix starts to trott more and more and Vordís definitely can't deny being his mum, they look so much alike.
Last but not least, we visited the riding horses at Ísólfsstaðir. They have a great time off there and soooo much space to wander around, looking for the best bites on about 60 ha of land, which include 2 big heymeadows. Think they are not going to miss any gram...
The weather has been really great the last weeks, no snow yet, warm southern winds and a lot of sunshine. My roses definitely love this and are still flowering. Hope they'll last a bit longer.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As much as I like photographing, working with horses and my job at school I like to work with my hands, craft and create. Especially working with leather is fun and I already made a few headstalls, nosebands, show halters and so on. But I always wanted to design my own browbands, which you could actually move between headstalls and just use the one you are in mood for. So no need for 10 different headstalls with different browbands, just 1 headstall and 10 browbands.
It took quite some time from the first drawing until I finally got myself to work, but it definitely was worth the effort. These browbands are handcut out of leather with fishleather appliqué. 

 

 

As the weather was better today than yesterday we fetched our youngsters home. 
First ones to get a ride were Fönix and Kóngur as Snerpa decided it was really stupid of us to try and put a halter on her. The guys went to our stable, where they waited for us to come back and get them to the vet for deworming. Next ones to be fetched were Vordís, Snerpa and Rögnir. We got Bensi and Hrund to help us catch Rögnir and putting him in the trailer, but in the end he walked alone in there (after quite some "catch me if you can" and showing off in trott). We squeezed Vordís in and off we went. Our vet dewormed all 5 and then they were released to the big meadow by the sea.
Now it was time to get Fjördís and her foal from Helluland. Kiddi assisted us getting all the mares and foals in a small paddock, where we caught the couple we were taking home. Back home our vet dewormed the pair, took DNA samples and chipped the little guy. When we were finally releasing them into the field it was already that dark it was nearly impossible to take pics. But good to have them all back home!

 

 

New evening, new location, new luck. Went to Höfðagerðissandur to try and catch the Northernlights over Lundey. It was rather windy, but very nice lights. When the show took a break there I drove to Laxamýri and tried my luck there. Think I have to find myself a different spot next, but it was a good start.