Mini Me

Big and living or little and plastic or china, I love horses. According to my mother, that love goes back to my toddlerhood. I started riding at ten and got Amy, my first horse at twelve, but I began collecting model horses when I was six. (Santa, you had no idea what you were starting...)

1,000+ plastic, china, and resin model horses later, I still enjoy finding new pieces to add to my collection and love to scope out antique shops, flea markets, and other places looking for horse shaped objects.

My most favorite piece, a Hagen Renaker Designer's Workshop Sherif, that I found at an auction for $4 back in the mid 1990s.

Rumor has it that my mother may have been in collusion with Santa Claus.

She has never confirmed nor denied that rumor. 

(This photo was taken in my horse room which also serves as my sewing room. She and I were sewing a quiet book for my granddaughter, Corinne, and this is one of the pages we were working on. She knitted the snowman's scarf.)

I love to read model horse hobby blogs and especially enjoy those who take their collecting hobby further and make saddles, bridles, and other tack for their models. Some go beyond that and make scenes with dolls.

Over the holidays I had a chance to try my hand at making a doll scene. I have NO ability to create, but I can go to Hobby Lobby and get some dollhouse miniatures or repurpose other things. Here's my first go:

The idea is a living room/sitting room set up. No furniture yet, but I thought this display case looked a bit like built-ins in a home. That was my beginning piece.

The Christmas wreath was one of a pair of earrings that I repurposed (yikes, the things we teachers will wear to bring the holiday spirit into our classrooms!!),  and the pot of flowers is from a jump set I had from one of my performance show set ups. The model horses were a gift from a student years ago, and the books (dollhouse props) are miniature classics (Peter Pan, Moby Dick, etc.) The railroad lamp, another dollhouse prop, reflects my own love of trains (I go by train to Colorado and Utah to visit our kids and grandkids).

The doll is an old Brenda Breyer - I hope to sew her some new, more in-scale clothes. And the beautiful sleigh bells are a favorite of mine and were made for me by Jennifer Buxton of Braymere Custom Saddlery - they are perfect replicas of Abby's sleigh bells!

So many things that reflect me and the things in my life are included that I dubbed the scene "Mini Me." And while there is obviously room for tweaking, it's a beginning. Best of all, it was a fun project.