9 Horses Celebrating World Smile Day

“Do an act of kindness. Help one person smile!”

The iconic smiley face traces back to 1963, when commercial artist Harvey Ball created the symbol with the intention of spreading good will and good cheer. Ball then watched as the smiley face became over-commercialized, and started World Smile Day in 1999 to be held on the first Friday of October each year, a day set aside to forget our differences and focus on good works and spreading joy.

That’s our mission here at Horse Nation every day, but especially in honor of World Smile Day, we thought we’d put together a photo collection guaranteed to make you grin: here are 9 smiling horses*.

*Okay, so they’re technically not smiling — they’re expressing flehman, yawning, or twitching their lip suggestively, but it still brings a smile to our faces regardless.

Flickr/Jen Novotny/CC

Flickr/Chris Fithall/CC

Flickr/LadyDragonflyCC/CC

Flickr/Pete Markham/CC

Flickr/Juan Manuel Fluxà/CC

Flickr/Troy/CC

Flickr/Guðmunda Jónsdóttir/CC

Flickr/smerikal/CC

Flickr/Virginia Hill/CC

Go smiling, and go riding!