My Brother, Beau N' Arrow, and the Give Away!

Second Post of the Day

I have not yet mentioned the fires that California has been experiencing. My absolute deepest fear is fire, and I cannot imagine what the people in that area of the state are enduring. I am aware that several of you regular blog readers live in the area. My prayers for your safety have been with you. 

Remember my post about my supportive kids? Well, then there's my brother, Steve.

Yup. That's my brother! He has been teasing me about my horse collection since I first began collecting as a little girl.

Steve winning at Bank last Thanksgiving. (He's still giving me a hard time about that.)

But honestly, his offer to help was serious - he just has an irrepressible sense of humor. (I responded tongue in cheek that he could come over and pick up the doggy poo in my back yard.)

One of the best examples of his sense of humor was actually caught on film during our 2022 Dirty Santa exchange. 

It's hilarious in and of itself, but when you consider that James had died just three days before this was filmed, and Lisa is laughing that hard, well this sister's heart is grateful for her brother's quirky sense of humor.

In Breyer news, yesterday Breyer announced another Limited Edition for this year's Breyerfest.

This is Beau N' Arrow. (I love that name!) He is a portrait model and will be available to all ticket holders.

Beau N' Arrow is on Karen Gerhardt's Cleveland Bay mold. I don't collect that mold, but I do have Oliver, the 2019 BreyerFest Celebration model. There is a heftiness about this model that, for some reason, I enjoy.

A shelf-eater, I use him to model many of the XLT haversacks I make. (Including one in today's earlier post.)

The January Give Away is underway! 

And here are more of the pictures of the Hartland ebony woodcut TWH that I said I'd share. Although he looks it, he is not glossy, but his finish is still lovely. (Some of them dull with time or get a milky appearance.)

I bought this piece forgetting I already had it. (Not the first time that has happened! Hah!) 

This piece has its original felt pads - they are in excellent shape especially considering how old they are

Remember, comment on any blog post starting with both of today's and through Sunday, January 19, at 11:59 PM Eastern. 

Update on a Mention in the Blog

 A few days ago, I wrote that April would be busy, and I was right. But I didn't write about one of the biggest things that was also going on this month. It actually began way back in February and was mentioned briefly in this blog post about the major snowstorm that we had had.

My brother Steve had become terribly ill during that storm and an ambulance had to be sent out to get him as neither he nor his wife could get into town on those roads.

My brother Steve with Teacher Daughter Lisa last Thanksgiving.

Well, he has continued to be terribly ill and was having excruciating bone pain. Doctors were unable to find the cause. Finally, a new doctor ordered an MRI two weeks ago and that showed that he had a massive tumor wrapped around his spinal cord and then several vertebra going down his neck and back.

Steve was rushed right away into emergency surgery with the neurosurgeon first going in through the front of his neck (a four hour surgery) and then through the back of his neck (a five hour surgery) to remove what turned out to be a massive abscess. (Not cancer! Hooray!) Oddly enough, bloodwork never indicated that he had an infection.

The abscess had eaten away a good deal of bone (hence the bone pain) and so Steve had to have a lot of mesh and metal put into his spine to replace all the bone that had been destroyed. 

He's home now, but is very weak. My sister-in-love, Cindy, is ill herself and needs help caring for him. She, too, was in the hospital while he was and will have some surgery next month in Indianapolis. 

Steve needs daily infusions of antibiotics at the hospital for the next eight weeks but he cannot drive yet so my sisters and nephew Eric are taking turns with me to get him there every day. It's actually been nice to sit down with him while there and just chat - I've learned some things about him that I didn't know.

And, I am VERY grateful that he is feeling better and that, despite the rough road he is on in his recovery, he is healing. 

Don't forget to email me at horsiemama8@gmail.com if you want to win the BreyerFest pony pad! Entries close at 11:59 PM Wednesday, April 13.

Photo of my daughter-in-love Vanessa setting up a shot for the video.

The Aftermath

Finally! After two days, the storm has moved on. And what a mess has been left behind.

The last five or six hours of snowfall, the winds kicked up and the snow began drifting.

This is one of my living room windows.

A drift next to Teacher Daughter Lisa's privacy fence is almost as tall as her fence!

I'm glad that this drift is not in our driveway, but I sure feel for the Howard family!

Interstate 65 skirts West Lafayette and Lafayette on the east and there were multiple accidents on it throughout the storm.

Pepper and I walk to the park across the road and play frisbee every morning, but yesterday she stayed right by the front door, clearly telling me she did not want to go out in the storm.

Unfortunately, my brother Steve, who lives out in the country by the barn, had a medical emergency yesterday while the storm was still dumping snow and winds on us.

Steve and Lisa working in the kitchen Thanksgiving Day.

Due to the bad roads, none of us could get out to him and he and his wife could not get into town, so my nephew had to call for an ambulance to get him to the emergency room. I haven't heard anything on his condition since late last night and hope to hear from Eric soon. (Good thoughts and prayers are welcome.)

This was our home last night. Compare it to the picture Craig took the night before (below) and you can see the drifting. (Look at how the drifts grow against the neighbor's home, under our garage light, our mailbox, and under our living room windows.)

 So, just how much snow did we get? Because of the drifting, it is hard to tell, but our local weather forecaster says it was at least 13 inches. 

Roads are still a mess, and schools and businesses are closed again today. And, it's going to be some time before things return to some semblance of normal. Temperatures are plummeting and we are expecting record cold temperatures of -18 to -22 below zero this weekend. (No doubt Pepper will decline her daily frisbee game again.)

I've got another "sew day" ahead of me as a result, but much as I love to sew, I am really looking forward to having "barn days" again.

Dad's Slides: Evidence of Horseyness

My sister has been going through our father's photos and slides, scanning them into her computer, and then sending us the files. It has been interesting to see just how much horses have dominated my life, even as a child.

Eight years old and with my sister, Leslie. I have no idea where this was taken; I think we may be at a summer day camp held locally in one of the parks.

Our cat, Figaro, had a litter of kittens when I was eight. This is Tinker Bell and Wednesday (their brother, Thursday, was born a day later.) See that book?

I loved Scholastic Book orders and would buy every horse book they offered. I no longer have Born to Run but I remember that because of reading this book I learned how to spell the word "separate" correctly - it was on the main character's spelling list and she was practicing it!

Speaking of books, I almost missed the book on top of the things I am carrying in this photo. It was Christmas Day and we had driven over to my Grandma and Grandpa  Honeywell's home for dinner.

Sand Dune Pony by Troy Nesbit!

And it is still on my bookshelf in my library upstairs along with other childhood favorites.

Buttons was a wonderful parakeet - very friendly and people oriented. He learned to talk and loved to play with us. I almost missed the horse I had cut out and taped to the wall behind him.

Another almost-missed. I was smiling to myself at my brother's long hair before I noticed Cee down the moraine in the pasture behind him.

Me at eleven on Gambler's Maid, my favorite horse to ride at the stable where I took a couple of riding lessons. 

I also had my first bad fall in the same spot another day. We were cantering and Gambler shied at something along the trail. I fell off, hit my head, and was knocked out. (No surprise, I have a model named after her, too.)

How I wish my Dad was still alive. I'd love to talk to him about all these old photos that he took and tucked away in our basement. But that's not possible, so I will be content with enjoying the legacy that Dad left behind on film.

Childhood Favorite Made in Japans

My brother has been in the hospital for the past few days and so my time after school has been spent there instead of at the barn or doing model horse related things. So, today I am posting some pictures of the MIJs I pulled out when I cleaned the hobby closet.

My very first pieces in my "play collection" (1963 to when I found out about Ellen Hitchin's club, IMPHSA in 1970) were Japan chinas. They were played with and very, very loved. Here are a few of my favorites.

Black Diamond, a Lefton Saddlebred. He was in pieces and I had him professionally restored about ten years ago. One of my favorites.

 Bobol, a gift in sixth grade from my friends Bobbie Sue and Carol (his name is a combination of theirs.) Unknown make.

 Counterpoint, a Little Bit sized Lefton and named for a horse in a childhood favorite book, Scarlet Royal.

Mollasus, a traditional sized Rossini piece. She has a special place in my heart and for years was the "mother" of my woodgrain running foal, Needles. (One of my first Breyers and a gift from my dad when I got braces.)

Old Maude, my sister's drafter and her favorite china, a Brinns/Inarco piece. This is actually a duplicate I found and bought, but I do have the original Old Maude, too!

When I stopped by to see my brother last night, he was no longer in critical condition, had been moved out of the ICU and into a regular room, and had had the ventilator and other tubes removed. I think it will be just a few more days and then he will be moved to a care facility for a while and our lives will return to a more normal routine.

Which means I will have time for Abby visits and hobby puttering. Stay tuned!