The three travelers walked down the road of Ponyville. Shining armor led the way, walking ahead of the others. Twilight cantered at his side, trying to keep up with her brother's longer stride. Spike trailed behind them slightly, not falling too far behind but not tryiing to keep pace with the two either. The dragon held a scroll of paper in one claw and a pencil in the other. It had been a scroll that they had picked up from the Mayor's office where it had been waiting for their arrival.

"Summer Sun Celebration: Official Overseer's Checklist," the dragon read as they left, "Number One: banquet preparations. Sweet Apple Acres."

After getting a map of Ponyville and asking for directions, the three soon found their way to a farm near the edge of town. The group stared at the farm as they approached, none of them having ever seen an actual one for real before in their lives. The ground was surrounded by a white wood fence, the road leading them to an open archway with a piece of wood hanging down that had a space in it shaped like an apple.

Beyond the fence stood a house that looked like it had been converted from a barn. It was bright red with white trim. It was almost mistaken for an actual barn, but the flower planters from the window sills and the additions made to the building such as the porch and a little fence of its own. Off to one side there were animals. There were chickens clucking around near coops, pigs snorting happily as they wallowed and ate, and cows standing around in pastures, munching grass with a few gossiping about the ponies they had seen and some of the other cows in other parts of the pasture. Off to another were some gardens with plants. Most were too small or young to be recognizable to the group from Canterlot. It was safe to guess they were probably something grown to be eaten though.

Most of all, there were apple trees. Hundreds, if not thousands, of apple trees. Entire hills were covered in them as far as the eye could see. Many of them were covered with the fruit. They grew small and large, in green, yellow, red, and mixes of the colors as well as shades in between.

"YEE-HAW!" a voice shouted, getting the group's attention. They watched as an orange mare in a cowboy hat ran toward one of the trees as fast as she could go. Shining Armor tensed as he watched, wondering if the mare was going to slam her head into the tree at full speed. Was that something they did? Run at trees and headbutt them?

Instead the mare skidded, turning around in front of the tree. Balancing on her front hooves, she raised her back ones. The three red apples on her flank shifted as she flexed her legs, lashing out to kick the tree trunk. With that single strike, dozens of apples fell from the tree, landing into the fruit baskets surrounding it.

Spike and Twilight stared, mouth hanging open in surprise. They had never seen an earth pony kick a tree like that before. Shining Armor also stared with his mouth open, but for different reasons.

He had never seen a mare like her before. She was taller than most of the mares he had met, and muscular. He knew unicorn stallions who were not as well toned as she. Her mane and tail were both long and bright blond, with both tied at the end with a small piece of red ribbon. The mare had big green eyes, with little white freckles dotting the outer edges of them.

"Well looks like we have a pony to ask," Spike said. Getting no response, he turned to look at Shining Armor curiously. "Shining?" Moving closer, the dragon waved his claw in front of the stallion's face. "Shining?"

"Is something wrong?" Twilight asked, turning to look at Spike and her brother. "He looks sick. Shiny!" The filly moved closer to her sibling. "Are you sick? Are you having an allergegic reaction? It's the apples, isn't it?" She grabbed at her brother, shaking him. "Are the apples killing you? Say something!"

"Ugh," Shining groaned as the shaking stopped. "Twiley, calm down. I'm not sick. Just..." He looked from his sister to the nearby earth mare "...caught off guard. That's all. Come on." Straightening up, he started walking toward the mare. Twilight and Spike looked at each other in confusion a moment, before shrugging and following after him.

"Good afternoon. My name is Shining Armor." Before he could even get another word out, the orange mare had his hoof in both of hers and was shaking it vigorously.

"Well howdy-do Mister Shining," she said with a southern twang. "A pleasure making your acquaintance. I'm Applejack. We here at Sweet Apple Acres sure do like making new friends."

Shining Armor stared at the mare shaking his hoof, not saying anything at the moment.

"So," Applejack let the hoof go, "what can I do ya for?" As she said this last part, she gave a wink.

Shining's front leg continued to shake, swaying up and down rapidly, until Twilight grabbed a hold of it and held it in place. Spike, meanwhile, chuckled at the stallion's situation. Shining blushed, giving a quick glare at the snickering dragon, before composing himself and turning his attention back to Applejack.

"Well," he explained, "I ... we.." he motioned to Spike and Twilight, "are here to see about The Summer Sun Celebration preparations, and the list says Sweet Apple Acres is in charge of food."

"We sure as sugar are," Applejack replied, puffing out her chest. "Would you care to sample some?"

Before Shining Armor could respond, the sound of a growl came from Twilight's stomach. As all eyes turned to the filly, she let out an embarrassed chuckle, her eyes shifting to look away from the others.

"Well..." the stallion said, "It has been a long trip, and we did walk here from across town. So I guess..." That was when he noticed that Applejack was no longer standing in front of him. A metallic ringing echoed from nearby, followed by the voice of Applejack shouting.

"Soup's on everypony!"

The sound of hooves reached their ears before the trio was caught up in a pony stampede, finding themselves pushed forward with the crowd whether they liked it or not. Before any of them could begin to process what happened, Shining Armor, Twilight Sparkle, and Spike found themselves sitting at a covered table.

"Now," Applejack said with a grin, "why don't I introduce you to the Apple family." All around them were numerous ponies. With that, the mare began to list off names, nearly all of which had the word apple in them. The few that did not still had an apple related theme. As each pony was introduced, they appeared at the table and dropped off food. Before it was finished, there was so much to eat in front of them that none of them could even see the pony that was being introduced.

"And," Applejack finished up, shoving an apple into Shining's mouth, "Granny Smith."

Not far from them, an old green mare with a pie on her flank sat in a rocking chair, snoozing away as she swayed back and forth.

"Up and at'em Granny Smith. We've got guests." Applejack's call caused the elderly pony to snort awake. Saying something about soup and other things that were hard to catch, Granny Smith slowly made her way toward the others.

"Why," Applejack put a hoof on Shining's back, "I'd say, they're already part of the family."

Shining Armor swallowed the apple in his mouth and looked around.

"That's a lot of Apples," he turned to look at the table again, "and a lot of food. I'd say it's well handled. Let's go ahead and try some of it."