My day today

I have been tacking...

and tacking... 

and tacking! 

I still have a couple small projects to finish, plus I need to pack. This has been a long day, but the end is in sight. I am almost ready for the Battle of the Breeds!

The Phoenix has landed

Twenty three and a half hours later, the newest member of the Purdy hoard herd has finally arrived. Meet Flying Phoenix. She is a Breyer Bristol customized to a mare with interchangeable mane and tail. Thank you so much, Tiffany! I love her!

Purdy disappointing

I was supposed to get a new Purdy horse today.

Tiffany paid for overnight shipping, so she should have arrived before noon today. Unfortunately, the USPS website indicates that she has yet to leave state of Illinois. This makes us Purdy unhappy.

So instead of playing with my new Purdy horse, I went to the barn.

It was fine.

Well...

It was better than fine.

But still, I really want my new Purdy horse.

I hope she arrives tomorrow. Today was Purdy disappointing.

Know the difference!

This meme has come across my Facebook feed multiple times in the last couple of days.

Every time I see it, I think, "That needs fixing," so today, I broke out the Photoshop and made the necessary changes.

Yes, I like that so much better!

My Black Friday saddle

Mary Jo isn't the only one who bought a saddle on Black Friday...

I did, too!

This wasn't a planned purchase. My friend, Regan, is dispersing most of her model horse tack collection. She asked me to help with sorting, pricing and photographing, and I couldn't help but notice that her Janet Edington saddle was on the chopping block. 

I have always loved this saddle.

So now it's mine.

I really didn't "need" another Western saddle, but I have no regrets. I think I will always love this saddle, and I am happy to have it in my tack collection.

Saddles and stuff

I don't really enjoy shopping, so I only visited two retail establishments this weekend. The first was Colorado Saddlery.

I didn't buy myself a new saddle, but it's possible that I enabled Mary Jo to do just that.

No regrets.

The second was Thompson's Hobbies. I did make several small purchases there, including this 1:9 scale table and rocking chair. I didn't actually need either of these things, but I have a I have a policy of buying affordably priced, properly scaled items whenever and wherever I can find them. At less than two dollars each, these certainly fit that bill.

Ideally, I would have stained them, but that doesn't usually work well on inexpensive, pre-made items like these. There's just too much extra glue around the joints. The stain doesn't absorb evenly, and it ends up looking sloppy. Instead, I decided to go for a distressed paint look.

I added a pink pillow... 

 and now this is the perfect spot for my dolls to hang out when it's too cold to ride.

I am really pleased with my weekend enablement and purchases. Hopefully, the weather will cooperate and the new-to-her saddle will get more use than the too-cold-to-ride chair in the upcoming week!

Mountain Trail at the Oregon Horse Center

Every year in November, my Facebook feed fills with shared photos from the Oregon Horse Center's massive and amazing indoor Mountain Trail Championship show. This is a unique event that is tailor-made for model horse showing, so I was really excited to see that this year, one of the competitors was a fellow hobbyist, Logan Shortridge. I asked if she would be interested in writing a post about her experience, and this is the happy result. Thank you so much, Logan.

P.S. I love Killy.

Mountain Trail at the Oregon Horse Center

by Logan Shortridge

Earlier this month, the National Mountain Trail Championships were held at the Oregon Horse Center in Eugene, Oregon.

For the last sixteen years, these two indoor arenas have been filled to the brim with natural trail obstacles.

In other words, it's a performance showers' wonderland! 

I attended this show and posted photos of the course on Facebook. Jennifer saw them, and now I’m on a mission! Get as many reference pictures as possible! 

A week later, while some of the Breyer community was off on a Scottsdale adventure, I was back at OHC for the 2018 Mountain Trail Winter Fest Show with my horse, Killy...

and my iPhone camera.  

Mountain trail classes are offered both in-hand...

and mounted with all sorts of variations, ranging from ‘two and under in-hand', "ride one/lead one" and ‘bareback.’ 

The best classes to watch are the fun classes! In the ‘cattle drive’ class teams of three herd a cow through a maze of obstacles. 

The ‘canine companion’ class challenges a horse, rider and dog to complete a course together.

The Silverado arena is a 116’ x 285’ arena that is transformed every year into the largest indoor trail course in the United States.

The process of setting it up takes 2 weeks and lots of heavy lifting. Horses are asked to perform a slew of tasks including walking through ditches,

navigating log piles, 

crossing bridges...

and walking behind the thirty waterfall.  

The Logan arena is 120’ x 200’ and has a more technical feel to its courses. 

Sidepassing along a balance beam, 

rolling logs, and crossing a teeter-totter are a few of the smaller arenas obstacles

People come from all around to compete in this amazing arena from Montana, and Alaska to Canada, Sweden, and France. A competitor may ride English or Western in any attire fit for a trail ride. 

Though most of the competitors ride stock type horses...

it is not uncommon to see Arabians, Mustangs, 

Gypsy Vanners, Fjords...

and Mules!

Thank you so much, Logan, for this wonderful write up, and congratulations to you and Killy for winning the Reserve Champion Junior Horse at the 2018 Mountain Trail Winter Fest Show!