Somehow, It's June - Studio Update!

Well, hello there! 

Yes...  it's been a while since I've dusted off Ye Olde Blog here, but let's not dwell on that.  

I have been BUSY in the studio and here are just a few things I've been working on.  

First up, this Arabian presentation set that is very nearly finished.  It will be a sales piece and I hope to have it available soon, maybe next week.

I've got several other presentation sets underway.  Some I had started years ago, others are much more recent.  One step that many of them were stuck at were the chain parts, such as the noseband and lead chain.  So I recently made a batch of those pieces.  Here they are underway.

I tend to make things in batches.  I find it easier, once I'm in the groove, and have the supplies and tools at hand, to make several things at once.  

Today I did it with some small pieces of leather lace scrap that I'd put aside with a post-it note saying they could be keepers or... something else (a secret for now).  I went with the something else.  The plan was to cut out a few to test the idea, but then I kept going until I cut up all of the scrap in this little pile.  

I'm SO happy with how those little things came out and I'm looking forward to making my planned project with them - and sharing it!  It's also cool that I have a solid use for little pieces of leather lace scrap now.

Recently, I finished another idea I'd had for a bit now.  My tack desk sits in a corner of my studio room and I wanted to make some strips of hooks on the two walls to hold supplies, projects in progress, and finished pieces. 

First, I took some measurements and then cut some strips of aspen wood with my laser.

I also used the laser to draw on where I wanted the hooks to go, which is a super easy way to make sure they're evenly spaced and straight.

To put the hooks on, I thought I might have to pre-drill the holes.  However, the aspen wood is soft (one reason it's handy to use for certain projects, and the hooks have sharp points on the screw end.  So, I was able to screw them in by hand fairly easily.    

Then, I put command strips on the backs of the strips and stuck a couple of them on the walls around my tack desk.

One went above my tool holder and, so far, it's holding mostly finished halters, on the right side.  (Shameless plug, these are currently available in my Etsy shop).  

The other, longer one, went on the left side, closer to where I sit.  Here, I've started hanging up sets of tassels (you can see the turquoise ones that are now on that presentation set I mentioned up above).  There are also a handful of braided ropes, for reins or leads, and a few pieces of leather lace to finish projects next on deck to be worked on.  

I'm already REALLY liking these hook strips.  

Over on my YouTube channel, I've done a few more unboxing videos.  Also, I've experimented with something brand new: video game streaming.  I've gone Live three times, so far, playing Minecraft, and then World of Warcraft.  It was a lot of fun, even if only a few people were watching- ha!  Plans are in place to do more of this, though I may create a separate channel for those shenanigans.  It's been a good test of equipment and software, as I'd like to branch into live streaming some studio things, too.

Most recently, just yesterday, I filmed a double unboxing video aaaand, the return of my vlog. 

So if you'd like to hear even more about what I've got going on, check it out!  Be warned, it's 33 minutes long.  As a YouTube watcher, I find I actually like watching longer videos, since I often watch while I'm working on things and I can just watch/listen along.  I'd like to do a combination of longer and shorter videos on my channel.  Ya know, something for everyone. 

If you have something you'd like me to blog, or vlog, or make a video, about, please let me know!   

For now, I'm going to wrap this up and get back to work.  

Oh, and I got a new respirator.  Ain't it a 'beaut??

Epic U.S. Trip - BW Swap and A Good Vintage

I really don't know where time is going this spring/summer.  In my defense, I have been BUSY making things - on the Studio end and also hopping with a steady stream of small orders for our laser business.  Anyhow, here's a fairly quick post about the Swap Meet and the edition of A Good Vintage that was held at BreyerWest 2017.

Picking up where I left of, after the Open Show, it was time to get to The Phoenix (Inn) to check in, dump some stuff in the room, and rush to the Swap Meet.

Here was my table, once it was set up and I had a chance to take pictures.  Some things I had up for offer had already sold by this point.  (yay!)

I tried to bring a good selection in a small package (about half of one of my suitcases).  Up for sale were saddle pads, a handful of CM Stablemates...

... also some of my stablemate blankets, and a couple of Arabian presentation collars, with Cassie modeling Antar's set.  I also brought a few piles of tassels to show some of the "coming soon" planned color combinations.

On the other end of the table were the laser goods, all model horse themed.  Saddle stands, desktop plaques, ornaments, and demo stall signs.  I had greatly reduced the price on the saddle stands (since they took up the most room in my suitcase and I was buying horses!  haha)

After the Swap Meet, which was a lot of fun - I sold several things and..  bought several things, it was time to go back to the room and attempt to rest up for...

A Good Vintage!

A Good Vintage was held at BreyerWest on Saturday March 25, 2017.  I was more ready for this one than the Open Show, or so I thought.  The Open Show had been sold out, so I thought the only horses I'd get to show would be my "oldies".  However, a couple of last minute openings for the Open show had popped up, so I'd brought a LOT more horses than just 10 for AGV.  They might have been picked out first, but I was still writing out my cards to put with them...  the night before, after the Swap Meet.

After setting up my herd of vintage customs, I took some quick pictures.

From left to right:

Reckless (wearing his amazing halter from Jennifer Buxton) and his "son", Hazard.

(most of the stablemate crew were featured in a post I wrote about my old custom horses)

Hawke Nevarre, Crown Royale, and Days in Avalon.  

Maskav, Backflip, and Showtime.

Ashley was there too, I just love her.

As soon as I got my little herd set up, I had to go to the first workshop that I'd signed up for, so I was occupied for the majority of the Vintage show.  When the workshop was over, I took pictures of most - if not all! - of the vintage customs that were entered.  Here are a few of my favorites:

(I think this one was the big winner in the end)

Some of the prizes - they were beautiful!!

I was SO thrilled to find that three of my entries had been awarded tiles.  Ashley (hers is a pretty pink - perfect), Crown Royale, and...  Reckless!  Yes, I teared up a little; so proud of my old man!!

It was another wonderful day.  In addition to the Vintage show, I attended two workshops and I hope to talk about them too.  The educational offerings of BreyerWest were a huge draw for me.

Littler Things and Bigger Things

The biggest news for this post is that two (raw) copies of Sarah Rose's Mini Khemosabi resin landed here today!  They weathered the trip to Japan very nicely and are out stretching their legs in the studio.

I've long admired her work and I'm so happy to finally have a couple of small pieces of it.  I think it is so cool that she has been making small versions of her highly popular Traditional scale resin horses.

From making ponies smaller, we move to...  making saddle stands bigger!

That was one task I accomplished today:

During my visit to my friend Jennifer last month, I discovered that my saddle stand design is a bit too small (mostly too short) for Western saddles (oops!)  Of course, I might know this if I ever finished my Rio Rondo saddle kit that I started...  years ago.  I did use what I have of it (lower skirt, fenders, and stirrups) to help decide just how much I needed to embiggen the design.

A bit of time in the software, a prepped board fed to the laser, some wood glue, and clamping later, I had a prototype for saddle stand version two - or what will be the Western saddle stand.  It is roughly 3/4" taller and almost 1/2" longer than the original version.

In other news:

I had a request today for a saddle stand in a custom color scheme that I think will be very fun to make!

Also, I will be moving plans to experiment with the laser and leather (cutting out saddle pieces, anyone??) to the short term list.

Also, also...  Jeff declared today that he will be ordering a 3-D printer.  (eee!)  That's been on his list for some time now.  He had one on order during a Black Friday sale last year, but they oversold them and refunded his order.  He was quite sad, but it appears they are back in stock.

Oh, the ideas!

Crazy Busy

Yesterday, I thought I had a neat idea for a product we might be able to sell over here with our laser business.  So I posted a picture of one of them to the FB business page and shared with a couple of local groups.

I don't have words for what has gone on since.  I've been completely inundated by people who want them - want multiples, custom ones, and on and on.  I started trying to keep track of the requests as they came in: who, how many, when they'd be stopping by, but once I'd filled up 3 post it notes, that idea went out the window.  I decided to just make a pile of these things and wait at home for people to stop by.  

Funny random fact: when I made the post about the item, I had originally made: 4 of them.  I had to make a bunch more in a hurry!

Anyway, it's a good thing - sales are good, money is good - but I can't remember the last time I've been this exhausted. 

In other news, I also sold 4 (four!) saddle stands today!  I'm more excited about that than this other stuff, haha, but sadly I'm just too tired to celebrate much - yet.

Since I don't really have a picture for this post, I present this pretty girl, listed on the BLM Adopt a Horse website.  This evening (when things finally slowed down) I took a break by "window shopping" through a bunch of the mustangs that are up for adoption.  She is a 2-year-old filly and one of my favorites currently listed on the site.

photo from https://www.blm.gov/adoptahorse/horse.php?horse_id=9091

I miss working with mustangs, well - horses in general. 

Incoming Vendor Show Madness - and Where's My Book??

I apologize for the radio silence this week.  This coming Saturday is our next vendor show and it's supposed to be "The Big One", or so we have heard.  Due to being overseas and the time it can take to ship things (more on that later...), many people stationed here do their shopping at this "Fall Show" for Christmas presents to send home.

So we had been planning, hoping, to be READY for this one (...).  We are actually going to have two tables for the first time, one for each of "our" businesses.  The laser, and my crafty things.

However, lately we have been quite slammed with laser orders - a good problem to have, but still stressful.  On top of that, both of us have been sick much of the past two weeks and not up to doing much.  As a result, this week started with quite a log jam going on, topped off by the "Big" show now barreling down on us.

I haven't much time to craft and no time for horse stuff.  :(  The laser is pretty much the equivalent of my day job and, for the moment, business is close to booming.  There's been a lot of overtime going on.

Laser all the things!

On the Studio front, I've decided that this show will most likely be the "last hurrah" for a lot of the other crafty things I do - at least as far as making them any kind of priority and attempting to market them.  After this week of madness, I'd like to throw myself back into the studio organization with a goal of purging (even more) crafty stuff.  What really brings me joy are the model horses: customizing, sculpting, painting, hairing (!), making tack and props, showing, and so on...  Most of the other crafty things I've started doing over the years were poor substitutes, outlets for creativity when I "wasn't doing the horse thing anymore" (was just punishing myself, really).  Not to say I didn't/don't enjoy them, but I enjoy the horses more.

I'm looking forward to an "official" redirection.


Unrelated, but I mentioned it up top:

Shipping things:
Five weeks ago, I ordered a book that I have been wanting for... years.  It's been a bit of a saga to find it and get it, but the time was right, it was available, and I pounced.  I have never been SO eagerly awaiting something to get over here, and...  it is taking its sweet time.  I usually don't haunt the tracking information on a package, but after 3 weeks and no show, I started watching this one.  It was shipped the day after I paid for it, was zipping around for a week, and then stopped.  It sat in one spot for an entire month (I was juuust about to report it lost to the seller) before it started moving again, just a couple of days ago.  I don't know what happened, where it is now, or when (if?) I'll see it.  I'm trying to look on the bright side, for this week anyway, and realize that even if it WAS here, I wouldn't have the time to use it.  (It's a how-to book, I'll share all about it when it gets here - optimism...)  At this point I think everyone here who knows me is tired of hearing me go on about the book.

I keep asking around:
How long it can take for things to get here?  I've never seen this before. I've heard horror stories about some things taking months, but so far it hadn't happened (yet).
Has anyone had this happen before?
Should I be concerned?
Should I just keep waiting, or figure it's lost?  (before it started moving again)

Now I've told you all about it too!  Ha!

Tiny Horse Holders

Ever since moving here to Japan last summer, I've known that earthquakes will be a problem.  As a result of that, most all of my model horses have been packed away this whole past year.

In the process of getting the studio organized over the past month or so, all of the horses had to come out.  Off and on over this past year I had tried to make some sort of holders for my herd of Stablemates - the ones I was most worried about suffering damage in a 'quake - but I wasn't able to come up with something that I liked and that I thought I could easily mass produce.

Under pressure to FINALLY get everything unpacked and make "home" for everything during the great organizing quest, I had to stop hemming and hawing and make holders for the tiny herd.  I wanted to come with with something fancy, made out of wood - and I still do - but I wrestled once again with how I wanted it to look, how it should go together, what materials to use, etc. etc. 

Suddenly, in a flash of brilliance, or desperation, I thought: why not use cardboard??  

That led us to this.

I didn't quite mean for this post to be a step-by-step tutorial, but I did go ahead and document most of the process that I used.  Maybe this will give someone else ideas on how to make their own tiny horse holders...

------------------------

At last, the dish pack box that was so carefully packed up over a year ago was opened.  Inside, a TON of Stablemates: OF, CM works in progress - along with some Safari horses, and random other tiny equines.

Eeeee!  It's so good to see them again.  Several of my GI Arab stallions here, including my beloved Solo (JCP SR rose grey).

Okay, on to the holders!

Tools used: scissors for any trimming needed, a ruler, pencil, scotch tape, and glue.

And of course: cardboard, lots of cardboard.  I used our laser to cut the pieces out.  It's wonderful to have the high tech awesomeness for my use, but I'm sure the cutting could also be done with scissors or a hobby knife (carefully!).

Here are the pieces that went into each holder.  From top to bottom: the bottom, back, front, and 17 dividers - giving me 16 stalls per holder.

Necessary: glue.  Optional equipment: supervisor cat.  She inspects my glue bottle, seems a bit skeptical.  I used regular old Elmer's glue.

Also optional: a candle or other desired creative ambiance, and a beverage of choice.

First step was to glue the back to the bottom.  This was probably the trickiest step, having to align the whole length of it just right, with nothing else as a guide or to hold onto.  In all of these steps, I didn't wait for the glue to dry, so that I could shift the pieces if I needed to.  I just let it get tacky to where it was holding, but still flexible.

Then I glued on the side pieces (just two of the dividers), using them to square up the back piece.

Out comes the ruler and pencil.

I actually marked the center of the bottom piece and placed the center divider first, but I didn't take a picture of that.

Here are all dividers on one side put in...

... and here they are all glued in.

I found that a gap of 1.25 inches between dividers will fit almost all stablemate molds, except for a few of the newer ones.  Those who needed wider stalls are the: G3 Andalusian (rearing) and G4 Reining.  The G1 Drafter was almost too chubby to fit, but they did go into the regular stalls just fine.

Additionally, my holders were too short for the G3 Mustang (running) and G4 Hanoverian (extended trot).  For all of them, I made one holder with a gap of about 2 inches in between dividers, to fit the wider molds and be able to put the longer molds in at an angle.  I don't have every single SM mold to test sizes, but nearly!

Moving on, here is the front piece put on.  I put the fronts in a bit of scotch tape "traction" until the glue died, or was mostly dry.  

Here is one finished custom made tiny horse holder!

Next up, specifically with the dreaded earthquakes in mind, I used some of this stuff:

I put two small wads of it on each end of the shelf, front and back.

Then I set the holder in place and pushed down on the floor of each end stall. They are stuck on the shelves very nicely and certainly won't be able to slide off!

Fast forward several days and many hours later, all of the shelves have holders and all of my little herd are unpacked!

Over halfway through the entire project, I thought about painting them so they would look...  less like cardboard.  As an experiment, I painted one front piece.  I think it looks nice and I'm considering going back and painting all of them.  Of course it would have been easier to paint them during the construction process, versus once they are stuck to the shelves, but oh well.  I can always use another project, right?  ....  Right?

Speaking of other projects, now that the tiny herd is secured, that leaves... the big'uns.  My quick and dirty fix after unpacking them was to strap tape across the front of their shelves.  They can still play dominoes right now, but at least they shouldn't be able to skydive off of the shelves in a quake.  Next up will be to fashion holders for them.