Maui Waui Festival With Unicorns

We have just spent two very tiring, but enjoyable days at Maui Waui Festival with the Shetlands, sorry I mean Unicorns. I mean, Who takes ponies to a Festival?  Errrr we do!  I have to say, its been amazing being sober for a start!!! (Last year I spent a considerable amount of time drunkenly riding a mechanical Bull!!). Alcohol and Shetlands do not mix so it was squash only this weekend.

Jo is going to be doing childrens pony parties in the future. So as we know the Festival organisers, and its only a few miles up the road, at the last minute we thought this would be a great trial. Jo spent last week emptying the supplies of various pony make up suppliers (Yes they exist). It was way too late to get a licence for the ponies to be ridden.  So we had a petting pen. We supplied the children with glitter, brushes, stencils, glitter gel and various spray/chalk in colours and had a sort of Pimp My Pony Party. Children, ponies and glitter!! A perfect mix!

I should explain..... Maui is a very family orientated Festival. We were in the Childrens Area, away from the Bands and any loud Drum n Bass. We set up Sheep Hurdles to make a round pen on a very lovely clover filled area. The ponies being on restricted grazing at home, thought they were in heaven. They love children, and love being groomed, hugged, petted and pimped. 

They wore their Unicorn Horns and were covered in glitter stencils by the children. They were braided, brushed, sprayed, kissed, hugged and generally loved by all the kids.  Jo and I were also liberally covered with glitter. The coloured hairspray was very popular, a fair few children left with their own hair coloured. Not to mention my hair, which was coloured by an enthusiastic child who also put face paint on me.  Luckily we had baby wipes available......Lots of baby wipes!!

The ponies were amazing.  We had to unload them in the farm yard, and I led them past all the campsites each day. They were absolutely unfazed by all the noise and weird sights. It was a fairly slow walk both days, with both children and adults wanting to say hello, take pictures and even sketch them. They didn't bat a single eyelid at drones, tents, impromptu drum bands, archery or someone dressed as a Phoenix!

In fact this morning, Mini loaded herself onto the lorry.....and this evening Sweet Pea refused to be caught.....in the round pen, to go home. They both jogged along the long trek to the pen this morning....in a hurry to get to there.

All in all, a very successful trial.  So, if anyone wants a pony party, (Unicorn party) please message me.  Or go to East Suffolk Ponies on Facebook and book via messaging.  We should have the licence through very soon, so they can be ridden as well.  But PLEASE.....Give us a few days to recover :-) We will be lying in a dark room for a while!!