Blogidays Day Twelve: Prop Talk

On this final day of Blogidays, I thought it would be fun to discuss the elusive and often frustrating topic of Stablemate scale props by just going through what's currently in my prop box, and how each item was made or where it was purchased.

First up is my little stepping stones doll/prop. The doll (who's permanently attached to the stones for super easy setting up at shows) is customized from a generic plastic figure I bought in a huge lot a while back- more on her later. 

The "stones" are just little pieces of a dowel glued down to a rectangle cut out from the back of a Breyer box. Painted the whole thing green, and it's that simple!

Flower pots are a performance essential, and mine are from Micheal's a million years ago. They're wood stained with a color of leather dye that I never actually liked on leather!

Same goes for the standards- just various dowels glued together and stained with dye. Paint or real wood stain would probably get better results, but I kind of like the uneven, weathered look that I ended up with. 

Measurements-wise, I'm a total eyeballing girl. I just kind of go with whatever size looks best with the horse (references photos of real jumps for comparison). The jump cups are sculpted from Apoxie Sculpt, but I've had a lot of luck with just plain ol' soda can and super glue in the past.

This little mailbox is another Micheal's find. 

This is exactly how it came out of the package- talk about an easy prop!

Moving on to dressage, my dowel collection comes in handy again. The markers are just square dowels cut down and painted. I'd really like to try some kind of stencil in the future to get cleaner letters than what I can manage with a Sharpie!

My dressage railing is another super easy dowel creation- literally just cut down to size, glued together and painted. 

The options out there for Stablemate cows are considerably more limited than the Traditional cow choices- I personally like Breyer's little running calf. 

(I know Cassie Thomas also has some great little cows out there, too!)

My hunt for in-scale Stablemate flowers has been a long and difficult journey, but for the moment I'm loving these teensy tiny dried flowers I came across on eBay.

They're actually meant for nail art, but they just happen to be perfect Stablemate scale! My only gripe is that they are really, truly tiny, and sometimes difficult to work with, not to mention very fragile! It sure beats cutting out minuscule petals from tissue, though, so I'll take it. 

This is the crown jewel of my prop box: a meadowbrook cart by Argylefarm I had made back in 2011. 

This baby is hardwood, handmade goodness that has never failed to take the blue ribbon in every class it has ever entered! 

While I'm a very stubborn DIY-er, I don't mind turning to other artists for items like this that I know I'll never be able to make myself. 

The girl in green started out life the same
"mold" as her friend in blue!

Maybe the biggest difference in Stablemate and Traditional props is the use of dolls- they're much easier to come by, and tend to be an overall higher quality, in larger scales. While I'm usually fine leaving the riders off my performance horses, there are some games and Other Performance entries I have cooking that could really benefit from little tiny people.

The little guy in red was a product of me grabbing a package of little people at
Micheal's, only to bring them home and realize they're much too small for this
scale! Ugh!

Finding 1:32 scale people is a bit of a treasure hunt. For riders, you have your standard Breyer and Breyer knock-off (the rider with the purple shirt is just slightly too large for this scale- ugh!) dolls. The horizons expand a bit when you step outside of horse-specific dolls and open up your search to just any people in the right scale.

I turned to my good friend eBay, and ended up getting a lot of 20 something little plastic people intended for use with model trains. The two standing men in these pictures were a part of that lot, as well as both the ladies in the previous picture. These were a total jackpot- they're just about the right size, and made of a hard plastic that's easy to saw apart, sculpt on, sand down, and paint to get just the pose I need. 

Moving right along, we have our standard poles and cones, made from bamboo skewers and clay respectively. I've been eyeing some cones meant for little racecars to possibly upgrade from my own less than polished version... I'm sure there's someone in the hobby who produces cleaner ones too!

As for footing, this tiny scale is much easier than the larger versions. For a while I simply used sandy-colored felt cut to the size I needed- no mess, not fragile, and easy to get to and from shows! I've recently upgraded to some sandpaper glued down to a wood plaque:

The hard surface helps the horse and any props stand a little more securely. This little board is my catch-all "arena" base, that can cover everything from dressage to roping.

For my more outdoorsy, trail-type entries, I turn to this grassy base I splurged on over the summer. In my hurry to get ready for my last show, I temporarily attached it to a piece of cardboard, but I think it's high time I secure it down to a cleaner base.

I love its dimension and varying textures! 

That just about wraps up my prop tour, as well as Blogidays! I've had a lot of fun coming up with the posts over the past twelve days, and I hope you've enjoyed them! We'll now return to your regularly scheduled two or three posts a week.

The very exciting news on the holiday raffle front is that we just broke $100 raised for Free the Children! This is double our initial goal, and both Anna and I are just absolutely over the moon. Thank you so much to everyone who has already entered! For those of you who haven't- what are you waiting for? You only have twelve days left until the winners are picked!

Speaking of hurrying up, if you still don't have a present for your model horse-y friend, you're in luck! This holiday halter is still up for grabs here. 

Thank you to everyone who's been reading and commenting, and happy Blogidays!

Blogidays Day Ten: Halter Raffle Follow-Up

Earlier this week, I got my most favorite kind of email: one with pictures of my tack in its new home!

Angelique received her raffle halter this week, and was kind enough to send me some stunning pictures.

First of all, that's just such a gorgeous horse. Second of all, am I the only one getting a serious ethereal feel from theses pictures? Love it!

So soft and glow-y. Thank you so much Angelique! I hope you enjoy!

This is seems like a good time to remind any of you out there with my tack that I love, love, love getting pictures of my tack on your horses, whether at a show, in your home, or even on a tiny saddle rack. It's fun to really see that it doesn't just ship off in the mail and evaporate! 

Blogidays Day Nine

Today was another out and about, non-horsey day for me, so no really exciting updates to share. 

Instead of a real post, I thought I'd share a link I've been loving lately- Equestrian Reality is a hilarious blog that any horse person can definitely relate to. I did a lot of giggle-snorting at her "People You Are Likely To Meet In A Stable Yard" post, but my favorite is her "Lady's Guide to Preparing to Hunt Side Saddle in Ireland." 

Downton Abbey spoiled me.

It's been a long-time dream of mine to create a Stablemate scale UK fox hunting performance entry, and her blog is a treasure trove of reference! 

Just under two weeks left to enter the holiday raffle! We're so close to our next goal, which could mean either TWO goats for families in developing countries or healthy school lunches for a school for a month. Either way, keep it up!

Blogidays Day Eight: Stirrups Tutorial

On the eighth day of Blogidays my true love gave to me... a guest post! 

When this posts, I'll be out Christmas tree hunting and will definitely not have any studio news to share, so Anna was kind enough to help me keep up the Blogidays roll. 

This is a perfect topic for those of you wanting to try out mini tack, but not sure you really want to invest a lot of cash into it yet. Take it away, Anna!

Make Your Own Stablemate Stirrups

For as long as I can remember, I've alway thought - Why buy it when I can make something almost as good myself? This mentality has lead to everything from trying to knit my own socks to horror story quality customs. 

However, this idea stubbornness works well when what you're trying to make is so small, most people probably won't be able to see it very well anyway (at least this is what I tell myself).

I'm growing a garden of stirrups

That said, I have never found the appeal of spending many dollars on itty bitty pieces of metal that will just hang from my saddles. They're barely seen. I mean, I already made the saddle... so go big or go home, right? Right?

Note from Grace: These are the cast irons I
use from Horsing Around UK

I've been using this method of stirrup making pretty much since I first started making saddles for the stirrups to hang from. It works well, and I've learned to make them in batches of 10 or so pairs so I can feel surprised when they're already there and ready for me. (It's the little things.)

You'll need:

• Tin Snips
• Some nice thick-ish wire. I use the green botanical stuff from Michael's 
• Needle Nose Pliers
• Scrap Leather (any color) 
• Silver Paint
• Some Color Paint
• Scissors
• A saddle/horse (optional - for figuring out stirrup size) 
• Silver Sharpie (optional... kind of)

I start off by cutting off a good length of wire. Better to waste a little than find out your piece is too short in the middle of a stirrup.

Take those handy needle-nose guys and grab the wire so that theres some on either side. 

After doing this enough I was smart enough to sharpie-and-clear-nailpolish a mark on the pliers so I would always get the same sized stirrups. I highly recommend doing this once you find the place on the pliers that gives you the right size. (up until then it's just trial and error) 

Fold the short piece of the wire over the top of the pliers like so:

And then take the longer piece and stick it straight up along the side of the pliers.

Next, use your thumb nail or tweezers to fold over the long piece not quite against the pliers but so that it makes a little loop over the top of the short wire piece. 

Here's a handy diagram:

Next you'll fold the short tail across the flat inside part of the pliers and squish it flat...

And then repeat with the long part of wire.

Another handy diagram:

In reality the two short pieces across the bottom will be next
to each other, I drew it like this so you could see both easier

Wiggle it off the pliers, clip off the extra short end, and tada! The skeleton of a stirrup is there! I always leave the long side attached until the end so I can paint/glue things without touching the actual stirrup. 

This is where, if you haven't found the perfect size of stirrup yet, you can compare next to a saddle or horse. 

If it looks all good, you can add some silver paint. Go ahead and apply it pretty thick and in a few layers. This helps to "seal" the little valleys between the wires, and make the top where the leather will thread through more realistic by closing up some of the extra space. 

Keep something squishy nearby to stick the stirrup into to dry after painting it. 

Notice how I made the top loop bit a little
smaller with the paint

Next, take that scrap leather and cut a little rectangle big enough to fit snuggly inside the stirrup, but not so big it rides up the sides. (I guarantee you'll get it wrong and have to fix it. I have never gotten it perfect on the first try and if you do it's probably through dark magic or something.)

Using super glue or regular tacky glue, stick it to the inside bottom of painted and dry stirrup. I prefer super glue because my interest in any given thing is about as long as it takes super glue to dry, which means if I don't use it here I'll most likely put the stirrup and glue down to dry and never pick it up again. But, if you have a fear of moving too fast or commitment in general, tacky glue is the way to go. (Tell that to the next person you date: "I'm sorry but I feel like I really just need to be tacky glue with you right now")

Anyway, after that you're free to paint the little grip pad whatever color you like! White and black are traditional of course, but because this stirrup is only for the tutorial and I'm an adult and can do as I please I've gone with red for the holidays! 

Classy!

This is where a silver sharpie really comes in handy. Undoubtedly you will mess up the colored paint just a little, and instead of going back and forth between accidentally putting silver on color and color back on the silver as you try to fix it, you can just take a silver sharpie and gently poke it over where you messed up with color. Easy peasy! 

Finally, just trim off the long tail and silver-sharpie the green tip. 

Done!! I love these guys because a) I don't have to wait for shipping ever and b) the cost of all the wire and paint and leather I bought that can make hundreds of them probably cost as much as two pairs of the cast guys.

Let me know if you try it and this method works for you! I hope it will help some people like me who refuse to buy certain things. I'd love to see what you guys make!

Grace again: I'll pass along any comments or questions you guys might have right to Anna! And be sure to check out her blog and Facebook page if you haven't already.

Blogidays Day Seven: Booty

Most of my day was spent making boots. It wasn't too exciting. 

However, I took breaks to make a mess on the customizing side of the table...

Working on this guy.

My customizing skills are quite rusty, but it was a fun little project despite his flaws.

I also laced more reins...

...to finish the hunter bridle. 

The customizing kick got me looking at this guy again, who the eagle-eyed might remember from a post over the summer:

I have big jumper dreams for this guy. 

Maybe it's time to finally get him some clothes?

And a proper stand?

And hey, if I'm going to be painting, it's high time my poor donkey got some color. I'm thinking some kind of pinto pattern... what do you guys think?