An Overlooked Find in My Tack Trunk

 First Post of the Day

As I prepare for Feast School Days, I've looked at a lot of 18th century paintings, one of the best ways to find documentation about life in the 18th century. This painting made me pause - something I'd already passed over was perfect for my presentation!

I ran out to the barn and retrieved my dragoon blanket from my tack trunk. It had been stored in there since my high school years when I was riding in my high school dragoon unit.

Thanks to Susan Bensema Young, I have learned that the actual name for a dragoon blanket is "shabraque."

I have done some research but found conflicting information as to who actually used the shabraque in the militia. Some sites say that they were used by officers to help militia members distinguish who was in charge; other sites say entire regiments wore them.

It you want to see some really beautiful reproductions, Hussar Saddlery is a good place to go.

George Washington with a shabraque. (See the bearskin on the pommel covering his gun powder?)

My shabraque has been in my tack trunk for fifty plus years but it is in good shape. Still, it needed a washing and after checking the fabric content, I decided to wash it in cold water and on a gentle cycle. (What? You don't wash your saddle blankets in your own washing machine??)

I air dried it and then checked it over for any needed repairs. It's now folded and been added to the sidesaddles and riding habits draped over my dining room chairs.

School Day is two weeks from today and I am just about ready. My friend Belle is borrowing a riding habit and will be joining me in the presentation. I've written up an info sheet for us both; the rough draft is below.

We won't read this aloud or anything, but it's a nice thing to have on hand if nerves take over or your memory blanks for a moment.

Tick! Tick! Tick!

The Give Away ends tomorrow night at 11:59 PM Eastern. Comment to win!

AI - The Genie is Loose

Second Post of the Day

Most people know that I do NOT like AI. In fact, I detest AI and do not use it. 

Can I be fooled and miss something that is AI? Of course - AI can be quite sophisticated.  But I can usually recognize its use when I am doing research or writing, be it for a blog entry, sewing project, or something else.

So, with such a distaste for AI, can you imagine my dismay when I got this email?

My reaction was instantaneous and I said aloud, "Oh, no you don't!"

Academia.edu is a reputable site for educational researchers. We use it for publishing and storing papers that we have written or for finding papers to use as we do research for papers that we are writing. It's a respected site, though not quite not as big or essential to the educational community as Research Gate.

Regardless of how reputable the site is, using AI on one of my papers was a serious issue to me. I opened the email to see more about what Academia.edu was doing. My dismay grew when I read the email.

An AI had created a podcast with one of my papers? No, no, no, no, NO! 

As I looked closer and saw the length of the podcast, I could only wonder what was included in that podcast. The podcast was just 4:45 long; that paper could not be read completely in that amount of time.

I was curious but I was absolutely not going to click on the link to hear it. And, while I am glad that this so-called podcast is private to me, I am NOT happy that it has been created.

This particular paper generated a lot of interest when it was first published in Research in Science Education in 2002 and it has been heavily used by other researchers for years. My guess is that Academia.edu selected it for that reason, perhaps hoping to make it more usable by researchers who want the information and prefer the podcast approach.

Whatever their reasons, though, I am not happy about discovering AI being used with my work. AI is creeping into everything, everywhere. 

We truly have let the AI genie, for good or for bad, out of the bottle.

Writing - How My Journey Began

Second Post of the Day

After I wrote my first book, Mermaid Isle, in sixth grade (a poorly disguised Cinderella under the sea story), I thought that one day I might grow up and be an author. I envisioned myself writing fiction that was centered around horses and maybe with some romance thrown in.

As an adult, I even got several chapters written about a single gal on a ranch but, like Mermaid Isle, soon realized that my story was not very original.

It was during my teaching career that I actually began writing. Really writing. I worked with three different professors in the Education Department of the University of Illinois and published four papers in education journals. 

Those required a LOT more work than a blog post - meetings, winnowing down the topic, deciding who would address what, meeting again, writing, writing, writing, revising, revising, revising, and then finally submitting the paper for publication. 

One of those papers (the one above, I think) had over 25 drafts before it was sent off for publication.

Those professors gave me an opportunity to have a real voice in Education beyond my local community and I will always be grateful for that. I also discovered that I loved writing nonfiction.

In contrast to my professional writing, most blog posts take me one to three hours to write. That includes gathering pictures, collating them, making several drafts, proofing, and finally publishing. (The teacher in me is always chagrined when, after all that, I read the published post later and find a spelling, grammatical, or punctuation error. Hah!)

It was through blogging that I realized that I had become an author, albeit not the kind of author I thought I'd be. Between my professional papers and my blogs (I have 13 of them, but Horsiemama and Teachinmama are the two I write in most) I am a writer of non fiction. 

Well, Dogs of Our Lives is fictionalized...Anything to find a sun puddle! Looks like there's a halo around Tammo's head. (This picture may be used for the next Dogs of Our Lives.)

Since I love to write and I love model horses, I was excited to begin research on the new series I am planning about the BreyerFests I've attended over the years.

Yesterday I made a huge mess in my office as I began going through boxes and papers.

This tub proved to be a gold mine of BreyerFest memories.

By the end of the day, I had a good stack of memorabilia and ephemera to look through and photograph for the series. (And Pepper and Tammo were glad to have their covered bed back.)

That will be today's project and the beginning of the actual writing of the BreyerFests series.

June Give Away

The June Give Away is related to Fonso and the 1880 Kentucky Derby. Unfortunately, what I wanted to show you is still in transit so here's a photo:

A commemorative Kentucky Derby pin! (That's the seller's photo and I don't think the colors are true.)

Comment on any blog post published beginning today (and including the previous one about Emily's birthday) through Saturday, June 14 at 11:59 PM EDT to enter. I'll spin-to-win on Monday or Tuesday.

 

Covid & More UV Light Findings

Yeesh! What a ride this bout with Covid has been! It knocked both Craig and me flat.

Craig rarely gets so sick that he goes to bed, but this time was different. (I love that his two buddies are keeping him company as he sleeps.)

Two days later it was me who felt like she'd been hit by a truck. I had chills and my head hurt terribly. I realize that I'd felt this way before with Covid, so I got a test out and checked.

I've had Covid several times, but never has a test showed a positive result immediately after I put in the drops. I still waited the time that was directed, but the results did not change - they remained a very clear positive result.

I'm still sick but at least I feel well enough to get up, eat a little (I've lost 6 pounds in just two days) and write a bit. I'm sleeping a lot during the day and tire easily, but I am on the way to being well. Grateful!

Thanks for all who commented or reached out to me. It was much appreciated.

So... Back to using my UV light to look at my new models. And after having found the black mark on my Zulu, I was dreading what might show up on my Gilded.

He's on the Geronimo mold, a mold I like very much

and things looked good at first.

The only visible iffy place I could see was under his off front leg where it looked like there was a small black line in the gold.

Sure enough, under the UV light, there was a heart shaped blemish.

I discovered another one on his near hind hock

and a third one on his neck. 

Oddly enough, he also had some lines that appeared to be drawn on his legs. They almost look like the barring that you might find on a horse with primitive markings.

None of these are visible without the UV light, though.

Finally, a third type of mark were darker smudge-like marks above his near hock.

Completely invisible in normal light, but obvious in the UV light.

Wondering if I would find flaws on every model I looked at, I pulled out some recent models, seven of them, including another recent Geronimo.

None of them had flaws.  Good news, but puzzling, too. I mean, what are the odds that two of my newest ones would have significant flaws and others not?

I decided to pull out my 2021 BreyerFest Dani and check her sort of as the "ultimate test." 

When she arrived, she had a lot of masking left on her that I had to remove.

It was EVERYWHERE. I peeled and peeled and peeled masking off.

The fact that it was blue made it easier to find, but still, it took quite a bit of time to find it all.

It seemed to me that if any model had issues, it might be Dani, and so I put her under the UV light. 

Nothing! She was clean all over, and I looked carefully. That was a relief, but I am still puzzled. Why would two new pieces have such flaws? Did they come out of the same group in the warehouse in China? Do other models from that same group have flaws that only show up under a UV light?

Or do I need to look at a bigger sample of models from my collection? After all, seven (eight with Dani) isn't that many.

It is a puzzle for sure. Not only will I go over all future models with a UV light, but I hope to start going through my entire collection, shelf by shelf. That will be a huge job, but hey, I'm retired! Besides, I love to do research and actually did a lot of research, writing, and publishing when I was in the classroom. This will be an old familiar project for me, for sure.

Wish me luck!

(Go here for some of my research papers.)

The Palomino Project: Beginnings

 My head is spinning from all the research I have been doing, but I am ready to start writing about my findings.

First, to back up a bit, the Palomino Project began while I was sharing here on the blog about my "burnished gold" palominos. I'd pulled seventeen palominos off the shelves and was looking at that lovely carmel color so many early Breyer palominos sport.

And then I remembered something I'd read once, a theory that stated that Breyer's original palomino color was very orange and then faded with time, becoming lighter, even a lemony yellow. 

But that was not my experience. I'd had many of these models since their original release and purchase, including three that went clear back into the 1960s and were from my original carpet herd. 

While the manes and tails were a creamier color now, the coat was still the same beautiful carmel that they'd been decades ago. Puzzled, I did some rudimentary research and found nothing. Hmmm. 

I decided I would dust off my teacher/researcher chops - I did a lot of research and writing in my teaching career; surely I could find out more about this theory and any documentation for it if I dug deeper.

A research project begins with a question or two that you wish to study and mine is,

Was Breyer's original palomino color an orange shade that later shifted to a lighter yellow color? Or, was it originally a carmel tan that has remained mostly the same with the passage of time? What documentation can be found that supports one or the other position? 

After you have your research question, you need to organize and figure out what you need for the project and how to approach it. For me, that starts as an outline - I like to know where I am going and then plug in the tools and strategies necessary to getting me there. (Photo from Sande Schneider.)

The outline for The Palomino Project starts with this important caveat:

BE KIND AT ALL TIMES.

It's easy when you are doing research to get so caught up in the data that you forget there are human beings behind that data. Humans who have feelings, who have invested their own time and research into what they share with you.

So to be very clear, my goal is to treat folks with differing opinions or data with respect and kindness at all times. I'm interested in knowledge and an accurate portrayal of Breyer history, not who wins any sort of debate.

The rest of the outline looks like this.

Outline

1) Question(s) and possible hypothesis

2) Sources to use (people, books, blogs, etc)

3) Personal observations on non changing palominos within my collection from the 1960s

4) Examination of an orange palomino FAF in my collection

5) Findings from books, articles, internet

6) Interviews with knowledgable hobby historians (I contacted 5 and asked to interview them)

7) Examine early results; adjust or change question/hypothesis if needed

8) Do comparisons to other Breyer animals in similar colors from same time period as orange color

9) Draw up conclusions, write down any new equations or tangents to be addressed later, assess results.

10) Share findings.

I'm enjoying digging into the topic and chatting with some really knowledgable ladies. More tomorrow, so stay 'tooned!

Go here for a list of those research papers I wrote and published; I'm pleased to say that The Emotional Labour of Caring in Teaching has been cited or quoted over 400 times in research papers worldwide. And "labor" is spelled that way because it was originally published in Teaching and Teacher Education, a British education journal. (You don't argue about spelling with the editor who wants to publish you. LOL)

50th Anniversary: My Niche

In retrospect, my "hobby niche" was really a no brainer and you may have already guessed it. It was right in front of me; I just needed to focus the topic lens a bit. My niche? Writing.

Writing was something that I had been doing for the past twenty years or so. I'd published research papers in education journals  and written curriculum for Indiana elementary students through Purdue University's Pollinator Protection program.  

I was also a blogger - Horsiemama and Teachinmama are the biggies, but I have other blogs on sewing, pets that we have loved, and more. 

Many of the things I have written have been Science related and that led to an invitation from the Indiana Department of Education to help write Indiana's state-mandated test, the ISTEP, for 4th grade Science. 

Although I was NOT a fan of the ISTEP, this was an opportunity to have input into making changes to a test that I'd long felt was unfair to students and needed major tweaking so I accepted their invitation to come write the test. 

As I looked back on all the writing I had done and how much I loved to put the proverbial pen to paper (or, fingers to the keyboard), I had an "aha" moment and realized that my niche was staring me in the face - I could use my writing skills to give back to the hobby that I loved. 

I got started right away. I was aware that Great Lakes Congress had their 35th anniversary coming up so I approached Liz Cory and Jamie Rott and offered to research and write the history of the club for them. It took me the good part of a year, but it was so much fun to delve into the club's history, and interview those who'd started it and those who'd helped to keep it running and viable for so many years. 

Jamie and Liz at a GLC show.

I had copies printed of the finished GLC history, but at Liz's suggestion, I also put it online in (what else?!) blog form.

My other idea had been to write the history of the model horse hobby, but I knew that Nancy Kelly had written about that in her book, Exploring the Model Horse Hobby. 

However, the focus of her book was  different from mine. My idea was to write about the people like Ellen Hitchins, Simone Smiljanic, Linda Walter, and others who were early hobby leaders and organizers.

That project is currently underway and let me tell you, it is a huge undertaking, far bigger than I anticipated. But I am doing research, and have been helped by others who have been willing to send me ephemera (thank you, Nancy Kelly!), put me in touch with folks (Liz Cory, that's you!) or give me an international perspective (Beth Peart, you opened up a huge rabbit hole!)

Mares and Tales group shot, September, 2019.

 A side project that got blended into my original one came via Nancy Falzone. She asked me to write her personal hobby history, and that of her long time hobby friend, Marlene Kosanke. When she discovered that I was working on my own project, she offered to gather a group of long time hobbyists at her house where I could interview them and we could share early hobby stories. (Thank you, Nancy!)

Now dubbed Mares' Tales as a working title, I am heavy into researching. Nancy's get together provided a lot of valuable information, but it was also just the tip of the iceberg when it came to hobby history. It's slow going, but I am determined to record our hobby history before it is lost.

Shortly before my mom died, she was offered a contract to write seven more books. I still remember her telling me about it and then laughing, "Lynn, I hope I live long enough to get them all written."

My mom and Local Son Curt at one of her book signings in 2009.

As I look at the scope of the project I have undertaken, I have wondered the same thing - is this a project I can complete? I'm celebrating fifty years of personal hobby history, but the model horse hobby's beginnings actually go back another five to ten years earlier than that, and there is a lot to write about, even with the narrower focus on people. Can I finish this?

I guess time will tell. But in the meantime, I an happy to have found my niche and feel as though I am contributing something valuable to the model horse hobby.