2017 Hobby Year Review

This was the busiest hobby year I have had in a while. Usually, because of school, I do not go to many shows during the school year, but this year I decided that if I planned well and started getting my entries ready early, I could attend some model shows. (It also meant that I was grading Friday's spelling and vocabulary tests in motel rooms, but that was fine by me. The kids thought it was funny when I told them their papers had traveled to Chicago etc., too!)

Here's a look at my 2017 hobby activities:


March - Great Lakes Congress, Huntley Illinois
This has to be one of the friendliest shows ever. Well run and planned, it is worth the four to five hour drive.

The competition is tough and the judges knowledgable. Who would think a show could be relaxing and competitive at the same time? But that's GLC!


May - Stone Country Fair, Shipshewana, Indiana

This show is only two hours north of me, and is a Friday/Saturday affair. I went up on Saturday as I was not interested in the tour of the factory or auctions. (Stone models are very expensive.) I won an award for having the oldest Stone model present.


June - Muncie Model Horse Get Together, Muncie, Indiana
Allison Pareis had the idea for a hobby get together and made it happen! We met in the banquet room of a Pizza King and socialized, swapped models, and had some informal seminars.

 One of my favorite hobby friends, Michelle Evans of Indianapolis was there. I love getting together with her!

Allison did a lovely job on this get together and had another in November which I was unable to attend. I hope she does more in the future!


July - BreyerFest, Lexington, Kentucky
I had not gone to BreyerFest since 2014 due to having surgery one year and Craig's retirement party the other. It was great to head down, and even better to meet up with dear friends!

 Jennifer Buxton

 Susan Bensema Young

Beth Dickinson (we met as pen pals through Horse and Rider magazine in 1971 and have been friends for forty-six years! I have known Beth longer than I have known my husband!)


October - Great Lakes Congress, Huntley, Illinois

Back to Huntley for GLC! And I ran into Tiffany Purdy, who attended the shows I held back in the 1990s when she was a college student at the University of Illinois.

November - Nancy Falzone's Get Together, Oregon, Illinois

 I was delighted to be invited to Nancy's get together although I certainly felt a bit out of my league with the likes of her, JoEllen Arnold, and Kristina Lucas Francis present.

But everyone was super nice, and the horses present were absolutely incredible. (For example, there are only four bay Hagen Renaker Zaras known to exist; three of those four were present!)

For me, this gathering was the highlight of the hobby year, and will remain one of my most memorable hobby experiences.


December - Great Lakes Congress, Huntley Illinois
This was their china collectibility show coupled with a pot luck holiday lunch.

Liz Isham Cory and Jamie Rott (photobombed by Steff Bodamer) put on the GLC shows.

The pot luck lunch was amazing - delicious and lots of variety.  And as usual, it was a competitive, well judged show but without the cutthroat feeling you can get at some shows.

That was 2017 - what's ahead for 2018? Well, I am already entered in the GLC shows and hope to attend BreyerFest. And, depending on when she holds it, I hope to attend another of Allison Pareis's get together.

Happy New Year! I hope that it is a good one for you with lots of hobby fun. 2017 was a good one for me; I look forward to 2018's offerings!

Christmas Horses

Breyer began a tradition a few years ago of offering a special horse on Christmas Day. In the past, the Christmas special has been posted at 11:00 AM so I was expecting it sometime around then.

We had finished our gift opening at 10:00 and I decided to check, just in case. I logged into the Breyer site and nothing was up, when all of a sudden my screen blinked and this picture flashed up:

 I think I must've been online just as they posted it! Needless to say, I put my order in then and there, still a little surprised that it had been posted an hour earlier than I was expecting it.

Yesterday my box arrived. I got what I was hoping for - Emerald!

Some people are complaining about the bell decal but I like it. And I already love Breyer's clearware, so this little mare is a hit with me!

Farmer's Field = Tundra?

I guess a harvested corn or bean field can seem like tundra, right?

It's flat, and when it's covered with snow and the temperatures are hovering around zero, who can blame this bird for thinking she is home?

That's a female Snowy Owl, not indigenous to Indiana, but several have been spotted in our area recently. My daughter, a birder (like me) and a photographer (unlike me) took these shots a couple of miles from the barn yesterday morning.

The theory as to why the birds are in Indiana is that there is a more abundant food source here this winter and so the birds are flying much further south than they normally would in order to survive. (They've been documented as far south as Indianapolis.) My sister and her husband live near this farm field and had spotted the bird twice, so yesterday Sarah grabbed her camera and we hopped into the truck to see if we could find one. We drove to the area Leslie said she had seen the bird, and there she was, sitting over a kill.

We stayed in the truck, not wanting to disturb the bird, and watched from a distance. (Thank goodness for Sarah's telephoto lens!)  It was pretty amazing to see such a beautiful, rare bird right here in Indiana.

Riding Indoors

We have five inches of snow on the ground and temperatures that are very, very low right now.

Look at those lows for Sunday, Monday, and Thursday! This cold snap is not going away any time soon. Neither is the snow - in fact, we are supposed to get some more tomorrow and possibly next week.

Between the bone chilling temperatures and the snow, my barn time is not happening for a  few days. To access the old and new barns, I have to drive down two unpaved, unplowed lanes. I also have a lot of hardware in my body (artificial knees and right hip plus a spinal fusion) and the cold really bothers the muscles around my artificial hip. If I get the shivers, it hurts. A lot.

So, any horsey stuff I am doing is happening at home. Like giving Mila her Christmas present of a rocking horse.

 Which, I am thrilled to say, she loves!

The Ghost of Christmas Past in the Barn!

Merry Christmas from Abby and me!

 It was very sunny outside, and the angle of the sun this time of year coupled with the time I made my visit to the barn...

 ... makes it look like Abby is being visited by the Ghost of Christmas Past. (In Dickens' book, that ghost has a very bright light that comes from its head and when it presents itself to Scrooge, it is so bright that he asks the specter to put its cap on.)

If you have never read the unabridged A Christmas Carol, I suggest you do - it is a beautiful book and much better than the movies about it. I read it aloud to my students this December and they were absolutely riveted. We even had a "Happy New Year, Mr. Scrooge" party to celebrate the reformed Ebenezer Scrooge.

 I played the role of Governess Isenbarger and hosted the party. (That's my student teacher with me.) In keeping with the time period, we ate Christmas cake, sugar plums, gingerbread, and fruits and veggies.

Beverages were a choice between wassail and hot chocolate.

 Mr. Scrooge was played by our Technology teacher who rearranged his schedule to join us.

My students all created characters who had had an encounter with Scrooge prior to his reformation and had come to the party to chat with him and celebrate the new Scrooge.

Two gentlemen, an undertaker, and a coachman. (I love how the students really got into their characters!)

We had some carolers who sang to Mr. Scrooge...

... and the men who had been collecting for charity on Christmas Eve and were thrown out of Scrooge's counting house.

 Three ladies came and invited Mr. Scrooge to their next dinner party...

... and we even had Her Royal Highness, Queen Victoria join us!

So, as you might imagine, I very much had the book on my brain with it being Christmas and having so recently read it as well as having had a big party about it. When I saw the sunlight playing on Sultanna behind Abby, I could not help but think of the book!

I hop you and yours had a wonderful Christmas!

Tim's Christmas Gift

I was a little nervous about what I wanted to give Tim for Christmas this year, but Loni, his wife, assured me that what I had in mind would be a hit.

She was right.

The gift was my McClellan saddle and he loved it! In fact, he was so excited, it surprised me!

I am really happy that he likes it so much. Tim does a lot for me with Abby - he gives her great care,  trims her feet and gives her her shots, charges me less than market rates to board her, and allows me free and complete access to his horses, barns, carriages and wagons, etc. If my grandchildren are in town, Tim lets them ride. In the five years I have had Abby, I have never had a sick horse or needed to call the vet for an injury. Tim's place is ideal for Abby and is a real horse haven.

It was nice to give him a gift he really, really likes.

Lisa's Very Special Gift

My daughter, Lisa, is a teacher like me. She's also the only horse lover among our children. (You'd think that, with six kids, the odds would be higher than that!) She is especially attached to Tim's Quarter Horse gelding, Hokey, and loves to visit with him when she heads out to the barn.

 Lisa giving Hokey a good scritch under the jaw. He often falls asleep under her ministrations.

She talks about Abby, Hokey, and the herd in class at times, and even has a picture of herself and Hokey on the "Get to Know Your Teacher" section of her web page. (Tim also let her class name Snickerdoodle when he was born. They submitted names and she sent them on to him so he could choose.) So, knowing his teacher's love of horses, one of her students made her a very special gift for Christmas.

A mini barn jewelry box! He and his dad made it together and gave it to her on the last day of school before winter break. And there was a surprise inside.

 Hokey! The student had found a small model horse the color of Hokey and put it in the barn!

The top of the barn opens for more jewelry storage.

Such a cool gift! Lisa says she thinks she might keep it in her classroom for a while and put teaching supplies in it so he can see her using it. Like me, she thought it was a neat gift, too.

What a thoughtful student and parent to go to the effort to make such a special gift.

More Pieces from Nancy Falzone

In the course of some emails recently, Nancy asked me if I had the Hagen Renaker Mini Family set in white. I replied that I had them in palomino and had just bought her bay set last month, but that I did not have them in white.

She told me that her set was for sale, and I bought them sight unseen. (Hey, it's Nancy. If she says they're nice, that's good enough for me - I don't need to see pictures!)

The quality of the photo I took of them for my files is poor, but here they are. I love the soft grey shading that they have!

I needed the HR Foal, Running to complete my set of palominos, and Nancy was able to help me out with that. She tucked this little guy in at a very reasonable price.

I am happy to add these to my collection, not only because they are beautiful old Hagen Renakers, but more importantly, because they belonged to Nancy. That makes them all the more special to me.

Horse Ornament Tree/Molly Update

Between the end of the semester activities and duties (report cards - ack!), the approach of Christmas with family coming in for a visit, and a new dog, things have been hectic to say the least and I have not had much time to blog. Case in point, we finally got our Christmas tree yesterday, but won't have time to decorate it until Wednesday night!

Having said that, I have put out out other holiday decorations bit by bit. It is amazing what you can get done in ten minutes. (Chopping a big task such as decorating the house for Christmas is much easier when you break it into bits!)

One of my favorite decorations goes upstairs on the overlook - a family room that is open on one side to the living room down below. It's a good place for the grandkids to play or to cozy up on the couch with a good book or for a snooze and is one of my favorite spots in our home.

I always put up a little horse tree on the coffee table to enjoy. Since Ian and Mila play up there when they visit, I did not put out my Breyer porcelain ornaments this year (my favorites are the Andalusian and the Friesian.) I actually have enough ornaments for two trees like this one and am considering getting another tree from Amazon.

A quick dog update - Molly is slowly adjusting to her new home and family.

It is very clear that she has been treated harshly in the past. That simultaneously breaks my heart and makes me furious. But she is coming to trust us and has begun to seek out our company and follow us around. She skitters at unexpected noises, and can be very hesitant, but she is making good progress. She has already wrapped herself around our hearts.

School goes all the way until Friday, and then I will be off until January 8. I am looking forward to some time off and a chance to spend more time with my family, my horse, and my dog!

Etsy Painting

Yes, my Secret Santa knew me, but it was not who I had guessed! It turned out to be Linda, the teacher across the hallway.

Her final gift was this painting she had gotten from Etsy of a girl feeding carrots to a horse in the barn. The girl could be me years ago.

It will look nice hanging in my horse room.

Santa Knows Me!

My Secret Santa at school sure knows me well. This week I have received chocolate, a few Star Wars items, and this Christmas decoration:

  A white metal horseshoe with some bling and my picture with horses!

She must've pulled the photo off my Facebook feed, so she has to be one of my Facebook friends. But that really doesn't narrow down the possibilities as to who my Secret Santa is, though, as I am friends on Facebook with most of the Hershey staff.

Our reveal party is this morning before school - my guess is Allyson, one of the fourth grade teachers.

I'll find out in a few short hours!

A 6:00 AM Surprise

I have taught with Sarah Williams since 2006 - I teach the 4th/5th grade Gifted class at our school, and she teaches the 2nd/3rd grade Gifted class that feeds into mine. But knowing and working with someone for a long time does not mean that they can't surprise you occasionally.

Sarah and I are attending a conference this week in Indianapolis sponsored by The Indiana Association of the Gifted, a teachers' conference with talks and break-out sessions on how to best teach gifted students.

Sarah and me in the center with other teachers from Tippecanoe School Corporation's gifted faculty at lunch Monday.

Yesterday morning I arrived at her home at 6:00 AM to make the drive south to Indy. She invited me inside, and as I stood in her foyer and waited for her to grab her coat, I looked at her Christmas decorations. Immediately, this caught my eye:

(Photo credit to Identify Your Hagen Renaker.)

A black, glossy Thoroughbred foal! A Hagen Renaker, nestled among her Christmas decorations!

"That was my grandmother's," Sarah said when I asked her about it. "When she died, we all took a piece from her collection of horses to remember her by, and I got that one."

I certainly was not expecting to find a Hagen Renaker at 6:00 AM among Christmas decorations as I prepared to travel to Indianapolis, that's for sure!

Meeting the Family

Molly got to meet some family members on Saturday.

 She passed the "good with grandchildren" test with flying colors. (That was our number one priority.)

Knowing that Molly was new and timid, Ian made sure his sister knew to be quiet by shushing her frequently.

 The two of them helpfully pulled out all of our old dogs toys out of the closet for her to use.

A bewildering array!

Our son who lives in Nashville, Cole, was up for the weekend, and he stretched out with Molly as she napped.

 And Lisa brought Millie over to our home - the meeting between the two dogs went well. That was our other "must" for Molly to pass. (Millie had some minor surgery on her paws last week, hence the cone of shame.

 It was a busy day, but Molly did very well. She ended up camped out under Craig's legs as the family sat around and visited.

Things seem to be working out!