Collections within My Collection: Flockies (Part 1)

When I was in elementary school, my friend Bobbie Sue and I would hold model horse shows at each other's homes. I remember putting my plastic models into a large paper grocery bag, slinging it over the handles of my bike, and pedaling  several miles to her home.

There we'd set up a ring using Lincoln Logs, grab a timer for the barrel racing class, and make paper ribbons for the winners.

What a wonderful memory! (And I still say to kids who get a model horse, "Play with it! Enjoy it! Don't just set it on a shelf and never touch it again!")

Bobbie Sue had this gorgeous white flocked horse with a "real" mane and tail that she named Ross.

Not the actual Ross, but a photo of one like him from online.

A gift from her grandparents, Ross was the penultimate model horse to me - but I never found one like him. (This was before the internet.)

Until I did.

Even better, I found him in my favorite horse color, black. (This may be the seller's photo.)

Decades had passed and eBay was a thing. I didn't know about the German company Steha Leha that had manufactured these or anything else at the time. I was just looking for circus horses to add to my collection.

Boy howdy, did I find a doozy! 

I'd forgotten that Ross had wheels in his hooves, and even now I have been known to happily roll this boy around on the shelf or my desk.

After finding the black piece, I started actively looking for more Steha Leha circus horses. I have found a lot of Rosses and several more circus horses, but that flocking on the body is fragile and easily damaged. Manes get messy and even pulled out, and tack disappears. And the price for a Steha Leha even in poor condition is high.

I kept searching and in 2021 I found another one, one in good enough condition to justify the seller's asking price.

Unlike the black Steha, he has some flaws and someone had pulled all the green feathers off his saddle pad.

But for a white flocked piece this old, I think he looks remarkably good for his age

and I am happy to have him in my collection.

There is another flocky that I keep on the shelf next to the two Steha Lehas.

Vintage Club Gawain.

Released in 2022 as a flocked unicorn on the Shannondell mold,

he is quite the model horse! I unwrapped him, looked at that mane and tail curled and spilling everywhere, and decided that I would not move or adjust anything. 

Like all my flockies, I carefully slipped him into a plastic bag, making sure the bag wasn't pressing down on him, and slipped him onto the shelf beside the two Stehas. (Those bags extend beyond the backs of the models and are left open to allow for some air circulation.)

More flockies coming - stay 'tooned!