@Background Pony  
The cider episode. Cider season is in the fall.
 
By the same logic, there’s no reason to equate one show season to one year, and the lack of aging amongst the cast would say not to do so. The development of the cast makes the most sense if only a short time has passed. The CMC still haven’t gotten their marks, Twilight didn’t go a week without a report until the second season, the Cake twins are still infants in the third season…
 
Because 4 years really isn’t that long.
 
Contrariwise, I’d say that living in my current location for even half a year is a while, more than long enough to get comfortable. Different standards, and all that.
 
The fact that she said a short while rather than something like a few short years struck me as telling. If nothing else, I’d estimate low based off of her words, and a year per show season just sounds ridiculously long to me.

@Sjogre  
What Fall episode was there in Season 2 other than Luna Eclipsed, which aired before Hearth’s Warming Eve?
 
Does it actually even matter? We’re talking about show season to show season, not how time passes inside the show season itself. It’s pretty safe to say that a show season equals one “real” year.
 
And as for Twilight saying she hasn’t been in Ponyvill long, I’ve lived in my current town for almost four years now and still think I’m new here, the locals think I’m new here, and when anybody asks I tell them I’m new here. Because 4 years really isn’t that long.

@Background Pony  
So it was. I missed that reference, which was buried far away from the other references to birthdays.
 
However, Pinkie’s birthday still wasn’t celebrated for a second time. It easily falls into the same situation as the seasonal episodes, which don’t fit into a coherent timeline. After all, this is the same series that keeps putting winter before fall.

@Sjogre  
Do you even watch the show?  

@Background Pony  
Pinkie’s birthday was not mentioned during Friend in Deed.
 
@Background Pony  
The winter episodes both came before the fall episodes. Going by seasonal evidence, Luna Eclipsed took place about four months after the Summer Sun Celebration, meaning that all of the first season took place in that time. While I find that time period acceptable, weather seasons are a terrible way to track time in a cartoon.
 
Due to the format of the series, off screen friendship reports are extremely unlikely. Twilight never went as long as a week without sending one in. Max time period for the first season is less than six months.
 
Since Zecora headed into Ponyville once a month at the start of the series, Bridle Gossip took place one month, at most, after Twilight arrived. It was the ninth episode. That gives us an average of two episodes per week, about. Events happen quickly in Ponyville.

@Sjogre  
There was a winter in S1 (Winter Wrap-up) and another winter in S2 (Hearth’s Warming Eve).

@Sjogre  
Feeling Pinkie Keen in S1, A Friend in Deed in S2 (not during the episode, called out as happening in several days).

@Background Pony  
At the very least, Pinkie Pie’s birthday in S1 was within a month of her birthday in S2
 
What? When did Pinkie have a second birthday?
 
The only references to time passing are that less than a year has gone by. Heck, as of the last episode of the third season, Twilight herself says that she has only been in Ponyville for a short while.

The show seasons do seem to match full years. At the very least, Pinkie Pie’s birthday in S1 was within a month of her birthday in S2, and both seasons had winter episodes at around the same time; there’s no reason to believe time would transpire any differently going towards S3.

@Background Pony  
Don’t think that I’d call the first three seasons that long, but even aside from the job at the rock farm and hauling a wagon around, she also had to learn all that magic. Since she can’t learn spells just by watching the way that Twilight can, learning as much magic as she did required working her rump off, wherever she studied at.

dupe.

@Background Pony  
This is the pony that pulled her wagon between towns over the country side to perform on free-admittance shows, then worked on a rock farm for 2 years.
 
I’m pretty sure she knows more about a hard day’s work than most ponies.

Trixie learns the Values of a hard days work.

She ain’t goin’ back to no rock farm.