Holiday Leftovers

Feeling a little overwhelmed: aside from getting the second Shingles shot yesterday, I also had to work this week. While I certainly appreciate the extra money, it’s put me a little bit behind on my end-of-the-year activities. 

I have to keep reminding myself to not multitask. And to also stop looking at various photos of carriages, sleighs, chariots and other horse-drawn vehicles, because I do not have time for that nonsense, no sir. Work on your taxes like you had planned all along, girl!

And quilting. I managed to finish one yesterday, and another today. Neither one particularly well, but as my Art School instructors drilled into our heads: done is better than not done. 

(Only 35 more to go, LOL.)

I passed on the $200 Grab Bags. I’m sure they’ll be at least decent, but as I’m going through all my sales and purchases for the year because of the tax paperwork, I can see that my purchases are significantly outweighing my sales. Which may be contributing to that feeling of overwhelmingness. 

Gabriel was supposed to arrive on Tuesday, but he showed up this afternoon. While I appreciated his punctuality, that’s when I knew he was going to be a loose-maned version:

He, and the other colors I’ve seen on the Internet are very reminiscent of vintage anodized aluminum from the 1950s and 1960s, especially the purple ones. 

There’s been some suggestion that the Gabriels might be overpainted BreyerFest Nikolases, and considering how thick and automotive-like the paint is, that’s certainly a possibility, at least with the loose-maned ones. 

Though I think it was more likely that they were molded at the same time as Nikolas, and painted a little bit later (September, according to the VIN). I don’t doubt some leftovers from the BreyerFest run could have been added in to supplement the run.

As I am rather fond of anodized aluminum (I’m very much a Midcentury Modern girl!), and I may consider chasing down the rest of the set in the future, if and when I get things a little more under control here. In the meantime, the next two days are going to be nothing but quilting and taxes. And sleeping, of course. 

In a little BreyerFest news…

I found it a little odd that the G2 Standardbred wasn’t included in the One-Day Stablemate selection for next year’s BreyerFest. But as I’ve pointed out before, Breyer has way more Standardbred or Standardbred-adjacent molds than most of us realize, so I am going to assume that we’ll see at least one of them somewhere in the lineup.

Hopefully not as one of the prizes or raffle pieces, because my luck is nonexistent there. I briefly did a deep dive in the research between success and luck yesterday, and it was just as depressing as I thought it would be. When it comes to model horses, I am definitely not a part of the 20 percent who end up with 80 percent of the goodies!

Off to bed early again, hoping to feel a little bit better tomorrow. I’m kind of amazed I managed to get anything done at all today, all things considered. 

Little Miracles

After a few minutes of consideration, I decided to buy a Gabriel anyway. Mostly predicated on the assumption that Tahoe is very clearly not happening for me. 

I have no preference on the color, though I am intrigued by the braided mane change on the purple and gold ones. I haven’t been a big fan of the alternate braided manes on molds like Roxy, Idocus or Newsworthy, but it looks nice on Nikolas – in fact, I think I like it better than the loose mane version!

They upped the quantity of “Coals” to 24 this year, and I am going to presume that they are equally divided between loose and braided mane variations. I’d love to be able to find out in person, but I am not counting on that at all, especially since I already had my Christmas “miracle”:

FWIW, I did actually gasp when I opened it!

This is the first time I’ve ever pulled a Chase piece from a non-Walmart Blind Bag assortment in the wild. Judging from the state of the box when I found it, it had been gone through at least once before, obviously by someone in search of the metallic “Ultra Chase”, because all 24 pieces in the box were present and accounted for. 

There was no method to my madness: after I had groped for all the missing pieces from the standard Mystery Horse Surprise Series 3 and threw in a couple extras just for funsies, I literally grabbed the first Croi-corn I felt in the Mystery Unicorn Surprise box and headed to the checkout. 

(I bought a big bag of taffy, too, but I do that every time I go to that store because it’s the only place in a 20-mile radius that sells the good stuff, and I’m too cheap to buy it on the Internet.)

Other than that, I spent most of the 4-day weekend binge-watching my shows (yes, Strange New Worlds is as good as they say it is!) and working on a couple of long-term sewing projects. 

I was mildly surprised that they announced a second BreyerFest Diorama Contest – an online one, to complement the in-person one – though I am just as hesitant to enter it as the original. I think I’ll stick to my current plan of live showing and customizing, depending on how the beginning of the year shakes out. 

Nikolas

Reeves threw us a curveball this time around with next year’s Celebration Horse: instead of a Draft or Warmblood on an existing mold – as many of us were expecting – we’re getting a new German Riding Pony mold by Brigitte Eberl!

https://www.breyerhorses.com/blogs/breyerfest-blog/our-2022-celebration-horse

The prototype for Nikolas is very reminiscent of the 2009 BreyerFest Special Run Buttercream, on the Idocus mold. That release initially met with a cool reception, but has only grown in popularity in more recent years. 

And also, a little bit, like the Classics Buckskin Duchess released as a “Thoroughbred Cross” in 2006 through 2008. From personal experience she appears to be one of the tougher Duchesses to find, at least in good condition.

New mold introductions are nothing new for BreyerFest; the first was the Celebration Horse Rejoice in 1998, and one of the best known is (of course!) Eberl’s legendary Alborozo in 2008. 

It has been a few years since we’ve gotten an entirely new mold for the Celebration Horse, but it makes perfect sense that they’d enlist Brigitte Eberl to bring it to us. 

(I hope this means that we’ll get a Brigitte Eberl seminar, yes? In person, or at least online? Because I want to pencil that in as one of my activities if that’s the case.)

My only minor concern at this point is that there is definitely going to be some grumbling about the size this mold: as is the case with the paint, some hobbyists put a lot of weight into the weight of the materials used to make it. 

In this case, the fact that my Internet time is very limited right now is a blessing: not that I don’t think there’s some merit in discussing the issue, but now is just not a good time for me to engage in it.  

More stuff has arrived at my door – including Gingerbread! – but the boxes will have to remain unopened until the weekend. I did get a chance to open my Dahlia and she… was unsurprising. But more about all that next time.