Christmas Blanket Debacle

Second Post of the Day

Breyer has been having a multitude of shipping problems this holiday season. I have not been immune to them; my issue has been with their 2024 holiday blankets.

Breyer's holiday blankets come in three different patterns and as a gambler's choice. Like other blanket collectors, I ordered several, hoping to get one of each. 

Instead...

I received six that were all the same.

I soon learned that I wasn't only one who received identical multiples. It seems as though the pickers just grabbed from one bin rather than grabbing from several bins so an assortment would be shipped.

A hobby trading flurry ensued and many of us now have the assortment we had first hoped for. (I'm still working on a trade for the white, but I did get the blue.)

About a week later, this shipping notice arrived in my inbox.

Wait! What? I'd already received my complete order - nothing was missing, and I had paid for what I'd gotten. Why would Breyer now be sending me one blanket? 

All I could do was to wait for the box to get here and see what was inside. Maybe it would make sense then.

The box arrived Thursday, sent by the shipping manager himself. (I covered that as there was some personal information on the address label.)

My curiosity was really piqued now, and so I stopped addressing Christmas cards and opened the box then and there.

One red poinsettia blanket, my seventh, was inside. I could not believe it. I absolutely do not need a seventh blanket - I still have some left from the first shipping of six to trade or sell!

Quickly I checked the accounts I use to purchase things from Breyer, and none of them had been charged for a single blanket. That was a relief, but it also posed its own problem - now I had a blanket that I needed to return as it was not mine.

Although I have never had much success with emailing Breyer, I decided to email them anyway, explain the problem, and ask them to send me a mailer or shipping label so that I could send the blanket back to them. Hopefully Breyer will respond, and if I don't hear back from them, then I feel I have done my due diligence about returning it, and will donate it to a future GLC show.

I am now closely watching my Breyer account to be sure I am not charged for buying this blanket, paying for its shipping to me, or its return shipping back home to Breyer. 

Anyone need a blanket?? 

Comment to enter the December Give Away! Entries close tomorrow night at 11:59 PM. 

A Visit with Susan Bensema Young

Midwest Mini Mayhem is in the books and what a show it was! I have lots to share with you, but I haven't gone through my pics yet. Hopefully tomorrow I will have those done although today is a busy day. (I am speaking today to a gathering of high schoolers from across the Lafayette area who are interested in becoming teachers.)

In the meantime, I will share something that I don't think I mentioned was on my calendar for last week - a visit from long time hobbyist and tack maker Susan Bensema Young!

In 2016 I contacted Sue about a bridle that I had bought that the seller thought might have been made by her. Sue looked at the photos I'd sent, checked her records, and confirmed that I did indeed have a bridle that she had made. We have been friends ever since and gotten together in person several times.

Last Thursday was  one of those days. She and her husband George were heading west to visit family and traveling through Indiana so they dropped by for a few hours.

Sue always takes along at least one model on her trip and a box of tack making supplies and projects. She also collects model horse blankets and showed me this one that she had made years ago from an early Breyer blanket making kit.

And this one, not made from a kit, but by Sue herself decades ago.

This last blanket was incredibly well made. The stitching, even down to the tiniest pieces, was beautifully done. The sewist in me was quite impressed. (I can't remember the name of the person who made it but I will see if I can find out.)

 

Sue has a love of braiding and showed me two examples of her work. I actually took this picture so I could see that braiding. It was so tiny, I had to photograph it and then enlarge it to see the detail. As I was wondering how she was able to do such tiny work, Sue pulled out her magnifying glass that was inset onto a stand and showed me how she used it to do that kind of close work. 

Of course, we headed out to the barn to visit the horses. I'd sliced up a couple of apples for us to hand out to the herd.

"Lynn, I will foal when I am ready, okay? Just hand over that apple now!"

It was early afternoon by the time we finished at the barn and we were hungry so we picked up some food and wrapped up our visit with a picnic in a park close to home. By the time Sue and George hit the road and headed off on their journey, I was hoarse from all the chatting we had done.

Thanks, Sue, for dropping by! It was fun to see you again and to look at your beautiful work. Safe travels!

New Doll and...Blankets??

A couple of items from Breyer's Black Friday sales that I'd bought recently arrived. One purchase was the doll, Kaitlyn Cowgirl.

I was surprised that she was simply in a plastic bag and not a box of some sort, so I popped onto Breyer's site to check if that was how they were all marketed.

As I looked for the doll, I discovered that Breyer had recently added something that I had not seen. And, it wasn't even marked as new - it was just quietly posted. 

Holiday blankets!

I collect Breyer's blankets and so I ordered three. They are shipped randomly, but I would like to have all three and  hope to find someone willing to trade if I get duplicates.

Two other things were in the box with Kaitlyn. Stay 'tooned!

Christmas Card of the Day

My sister was working in the archives of the museum and found this beautiful 113 year old Christmas card  in one of the collections. More below the card. 

This post card with a golden horseshoe was sent in 1908 from Anna Owen who was in Hoopeston, Illinois to her friend Ida Robinson Roadruck in Brookston, Indiana.

50th Anniversary: Winners of Giveaway 5!

 Here is the video of me drawing the winners of the embroidered model horse blanket. (Thanks, Craig, for acting as cameraman!) 

If you are one of the winners, please email me (horsiemama8@gmail.com) or message me through Facebook to tell me your fabric and thread choice, cursive or print, and what you'd like embroidered on it.

Top from left: black, kelly green, rusty red, pink, and Breyer blue. Bottom from left: sailor blue, navy blue, yellow.

Thread choices from left column to right column: red, pink, white; purple, dark blue; medium blue, turquoise, rusty red; kelly green, neon green; gold, yellow, neon red; brown (I have two); black, grey, silver.

Today's winners! But don't be sad if you haven't been drawn yet - you still have won something. More on that tomorrow. Stay 'tooned!

50th Anniversary: Fabric Choices

 Second post of the day - you can comment again!

Yesterday afternoon I played around with those fabrics that I had shown as possible blanket fabrics for Giveaway 5. They just are not going to work very well for embroidering - you won't be able to see the words very well on any of them. So, today I bought a bunch of solid colored cotton fabrics online at JoAnn's doorbuster sale.

Top left to right: Royal blue, kelly green, pink, and yellow. Bottom left to right: Black, rust red, navy, and sailor blue.

I'll be drawing several names for Giveaway 5 so the chances are good that you might win one!

50th Anniversary: Giveaway 5 - Check It Out!

 Here is Giveaway 5! All comments beginning with today, October 21 through Sunday, October 25 at 11:59 PM will be entered into a drawing. 

Bonus - I'm going to choose more than one winner for this giveaway!

Comment to enter!

The Last Lot Has Arrived

That lot of blankets that I had been waiting for landed in my mailbox yesterday. It was unexpected - I had received the tracking information Sunday evening, but when I had checked online where the box was, it had not yet left the shipping facility.

At least, that's what the tracking site said. So, to have it show up Monday morning was a surprise.

(Photo by seller.)

The Dover blanket is why I bought the lot -  it never appeared in Breyer's catalog nor does it have an item number. Apparently it was a promotion by Dover Saddlery; if you bought a certain amount of merchandise, they threw in a miniature Dover quilted blanket. For more information, go to the Timaru Star II blog entry here which is where the information came from. (Along with a personal email from Sue herself.) As you might imagine, that blanket is extremely difficult to find.

While I bought the lot for that Dover blanket, I did not have the pink shipping blanket or the striped Newmarket, so I am pleased to add them to my collection. The 25th anniversary blanket is a duplicate for me as is the green Rambo, and so I will probably donate them to Great Lakes Congress for their raffle. (If you ever get the chance to go to a Great Lakes Congress show, GO. You will not regret it!)

I've put aside the blanket construction until after the holidays - I have to finish the alterations on that wedding dress (target completion date is the day after Thanksgiving) and I have some Christmas sewing projects and gifts that I need to complete. But I'll continue experimenting and making practice blankets when January rolls around.

Just What Do I Have?

Having just bought nine blankets off eBay, I thought it might be a good idea to go through my blanket tub and see just what I have so that I don't make duplicate purchases. (Which has happened before, but the extras make good donations.)

Four of the nine I ordered are here (the last five were sold in a lot) so this is what I have thus far. I'll do a separate blog entry on the lot when it arrives.

 The tub is getting full but I can still squeeze a few more in.

Breyer has done several types of packaging. I prefer the kind on the left as it is compact and sturdy, protecting the blanket, but the open-blanket style in the middle allows you to see both sides of the blanket at once, good when there is a different motif on each side. But it also takes a lot more storage space in exchange for that clarity.

The sealed plastic bag on the right allows you to see both sides of the blanket but it is very flimsy and not as protective of the contents.

Having said all that, most people open the packaging and use the blanket; very few like me actually collect the blankets themselves and keep things intact. So, I do understand Breyer's various methods for packing those blankets.

Susan Bensema Young's eagle eyes spied these next four blankets on eBay and sent an email to tell me about them. I checked with her first to be sure she was not planning on bidding on them herself before I snapped them up.

This green turnout blanket also came with the model! I already have Karinthia, but will check it against my other for variations. If there are any, it will stay with me. (Photo by eBay seller.)

 The blue turnout blanket didn't come with the model horse. (Photo by eBay seller.)

As you know from the variation post on Stud Spider, the brown canvas blanket came with the Stud Spider and both are staying with me.

The blue canvas blanket is in remarkable shape considering it was first produced in 1977 and is one of Breyer's earliest blankets. (Photo by eBay seller.)

Now I am looking for the red canvas blanket to complete my collection of the three different blankets produced in canvas. (Photo taken from Identify Your Breyer.)

A few blankets that came with models remain on those models - Milo, Crystal & Crispin, Eve & Claus, and Vixen & Blitzen - and will remain so instead of going into the tub. Personally I like them on the models.

As for the lot of five which I am still waiting on... They have not been mailed to me as of this writing. I won them on November 11, and the seller messaged me on November 16 through eBay and apologized for the delay. She said that she would mail them and send me the tracking number the next day, November 17, but I have not received that tracking notice yet nor does it show up on eBay. No explanation was given for the delay, but I am willing to give her the benefit of the doubt at this time. If I haven't received a tracking number in a couple more days, I'll check back with her and see what is going on.

Collecting Breyer blankets is fun, and a big thanks and shout out to Sue for her help in finding many of these!

Making a Blanket by Tearing Apart One

Besides collecting model horses and reading, my other hobby is sewing. I generally have some sort of sewing project out on my craft table and in progress.

Currently I am doing alterations on a wedding dress for a friend's daughter, Christmas pillowcases for the grandchildren, and replacement quiet book pieces for Kyle's kids. I love to sew and find it relaxing. (Well, the wedding dress alterations are quite stressful.)

I have always wanted to make blankets for my model horses, but just haven't been able to find a pattern. I contacted a few hobbyists who make blankets to see if they would sell their patterns, but had no luck. An online search turned up one, but it was not as fitted to the contours of a model's body as I wanted.

So, I decided to buy a Breyer blanket and go from there.

I took pictures of its closures - Breyer uses velcro. Not really a surprise - it is an easy way to make a blanket fit.  

I was surprised, though, that the sewist who made this blanket did not use white thread to match the velcro. Most likely a cost cutting move. Changing your bobbin or spool of thread takes time; multiply that by dozens of blankets a day, and I can see the reason for the yellow thread on the white velcro.

After looking at and photographing the intact blanket, I got out my seam ripper and began taking it apart to see how it was constructed.

I took closeups of the details. I have been sewing since I was a teenager and know that I will regret it if I don't!

I picked off all of the grosgrain ribbon (actually two ribbons, yellow and white, stitched together into one) to get a clear understanding of how the blanket had been put together.

The darts were really interesting in how they were stitched. I used tailor's chalk to outline them.

How the darts look on Breyer's finished blanket.

Velcro is also used on the girth. Eventually I would like to order some Rio Rondo buckles, but I am beginning with velcro until I become familiar with the pattern and then put my own tweaks on it.

I have been wanting an embroidery machine for years, and actually have a list of five that I am looking at. I'd love to put my own stable name on the blankets that I make or the models' names. (I would also use the embroidery machine for my other sewing projects, of course.)

In the meantime, I have pulled out the fat quarters and leftover fabric from past sewing projects and am going to make a few practice blankets tomorrow.

Wish me luck!

Cleaning the Hobby Closet

Last weekend was Fall Break, and so I cleaned out my hobby closet, a task I had had on my summer to-do list, but never accomplished. This time I got it done.

I pulled out all kinds of things from Johnny West dolls, Thunderbolt, old hobby magazines, ribbons I had won with my horses and my collection, and more. It was a real walk down memory lane.

It also made a big mess in the horse room.

 Yeesh!! I can't believe I actually got all that stuff put back away in the closet. But I did!

I found a real treasure - this painting. It's not Abby, even though it sure looks like her.

That's a painting of Amy, my very first horse and my favorite of all time. It was because of the similarity to Amy that I bought Abby - I truly had no intention of ever owning a horse again.

The mother of my pen pal, Sue Seese, was a talented artist. She painted portraits and full body paintings of horses and sold them. (A restaurant in Los Angelos displayed them, and once we ate there when I was in California visiting Sue. It was fun seeing Mrs. Seese's horse paintings all over the dining area!) Her mom sent me this one as a gift. She also did one of Cee and another of me riding bareback on Amy that she also gave me, and they are tucked away in that closet, too.

Finding that painting made me nostalgic and even a little sad. I really loved that horse. But I think my favorite discovery tucked in those boxes of memories were these blankets.

I made them for two of my model horses to wear way back when I was in elementary school. I free handed the embroidery and the "brand" on Sham's blanket. (I still have Apache Joe and Sham in my collection - two oldies and well loved.)

The blankets need washing, but I doubt I will do that - they are so old and delicate, I would hate to have them disintegrate on me. But I did not put them back into their box; I put them in with my current hobby items. That way I will see them any time I putter with my collection.