Sometime last year, a GoldieBlox video featuring three girls who’d had it up to here with princess make-believe and instead went about building their own Rube Goldberg machine took YouTube by storm. Three small girls went about using their everyday toys to build machines to open garage doors, twirl the baby, launch balls, all in an effort to turn on the telly featuring GoldieBlox and toys for future engineers. True, the company later ran into copyright issues with the Beastie Boys for using their famous “Fight for Your Right” anthem without checking with them first, but I choose to focus on it being a call to arms for girls to abandon Disney in order to get down and dirty. Then earlier this year, I wrote about my niece Ivy and her predilection for ditching dolls in favor of the Incredible Hulk. And today, today I came across Makenna getting up close and personal for some serious work on Yogi.

I got the biggest kick out of this. Who needs Barbie when you can get outside and work with a horse of your very own! I’m not certain if it is the fact that Makenna has her own grooming kit–replete with a personal tack bucket–or that Yogi stands so patiently through it all or that she was probably talking through the whole ordeal. I love that Makenna and her brother are outside. I love that they’re learning to be fearless. I love that they’re learning that caring for horses means that work and time and patience are part of the deal. I love that there are still horses that are the embodiment of being a “kid’s horse.” But mostly, I love that Makenna loves Yogi and that Yogi loves Makenna. To the moon. And back. And then around again.

And as always, thank you to Gwynn Tobel for documenting Makenna’s love for Yogi and Yogi’s love for her.