Seize the Day Surprise numbers and Salzburg!

 Good news, readers! The Seize the Day Surprise run numbers were released today- read them and weep! Or not, I guess. 

-            Matte Silver Bay – 1150 pieces
-            Matte Blue Roan – 1625 pieces
-            Matte Dapple Grey - 965 pieces
-            Matte Flaxen Liver Chestnut – 1020 pieces
-            Matte Palomino Tobiano – 870 pieces
-            Glossy Silver Bay – 384 pieces
-            Glossy Dapple Grey – 384 pieces
-            Glossy Flaxen Liver Chestnut - 384 pieces
-            Glossy Palomino Tobiano - 384 pieces
-            Glossy Decorator - 634 pieces

My impressions? I was definitely not expecting the blue roan to be the most plentiful of the matte ones. Nor was I expecting the dapple gray to be the second rarest - nobody wants him! Mine has been sitting for sale for $110 for at least a week with no takers. Anybody want him? Let me know if so. I guess that does explain why it took so long for me to get a matte gray, and why I got two blue roans. There's also a note that the decorator's paint job was based on Carpe Diem, which...huh? They don't look alike at all. He looks somewhat more like Carpe Noctis, but there really aren't a lot of similarities there, either. Weird. 

In other news, the sneak peek from last month's Collector Club newsletter has been revealed! Say hello to Salzburg, the last Exotic Destinations web special for this year! 

He's pretty, but nothing I need to buy. Good luck to everyone entering! I'll be over here waiting for the second chance sale to be announced. Speaking of sales, there's also a Christmas in July sale happening tomorrow at 10am EST, and there was mention of "rarities" that may be available, so definitely be sure to check that out! 

Breyerfest Closeups: Mini Zafirah

 Greetings, readers! Well, it's pretty late in the day, but I decided to write a quick Breyerfest Closeups post before I hit the hay. Today's model is: the mini Zafirah! 

This is the free Stablemate for this year's Premier Club and will be sent out at the end of the year, presumably included with the final release. She's a teeny version of Zafirah! I gotta admit, those front legs don't look nearly as bad at this scale. 

I'm tempted to keep her...but I'd rather try to trade her for the Vintage Club mini Lipizzaner. 

Sorry for having so few photos, but it was hard to get any decent angles. The front legs do look better here - they aren't as evenly lined up with each other as the Traditional version and don't seem to be so abnormally straight, so she looks a little better. But I don't think I'm going to keep her. 

That's it for the Breyerfest Closeup, but I do have something else to add - another TSC model appeared on the website today! 

Say hello to Gibson the Bubble-Butt Belgian! Very nice. He looks a lot like Dusty on the Halla mold from a few years back. I wondered if there was going to be another Traditional or not. The TSC stuff must be selling pretty well if they're coming out with all this new stuff. 

Also, the fine print on the Cow ornament is that there's a Traditional Blue Cow coming as well! But she apparently hasn't been added to the website set. Maybe on Monday? In other, other news, the Merle and Classics Pony Family set I ordered have apparently already shipped - which is good, because I was a dumbdumb and had them shipped to our old address, which we're leaving in three weeks. I hope they arrive before then! 

A veritable avalanche of news!

 Wow, so many things to report on today! Okay, I'll admit I kinda forgot about updating some new reveals on the blog yesterday, so I'll start with those. Firstly, the special run for next year's Breyerwest has been revealed! 

That's right - it's a glossy version of Chardonnay from this year's Breyerfest! I wondered if we were going to ever get glossy store specials. I believe they'll need to be preordered in advance, one per customer, and ID will be checked at the door - they're really serious about people only getting one of these. So if you want one, good luck! I don't need one, fortunately. 

Next, here's my first Atli model! 

Not gonna lie, I was hoping to get one of the other colors, since the chestnut doesn't seem to be very popular so far. I have another one coming at some point, though, so let's hope that one is a more exciting color than this one. Quality-wise he's fine - I didn't see any issues with him, except that the chestnut color on his legs doesn't go quite far enough to cover up the gold underneath, so it looks a bit like he has gold mapping. No biggie. 

Okay, on to the news from today! I'll start with the Black Friday sale (not sure why they opened it, uh, checks notes two weeks before Black Friday, but whatevs). Lots of cool stuff there for Collector Club members, so if you got anything, congrats! I didn't see the sale in time to buy anything, but wouldn't have gotten anything if I had, so I'm cool with it. 

It'll be interesting to see if anyone gets a matte Claude - I'm surprised they had any left over to start with. Same with Midas, honestly. 

And lastly, the Ponies & Palm Trees event is going on as we speak, and the special runs for the event have been revealed! Behold: 

Ugh...very sad I didn't get drawn to go. I need that Duende and Bouncer for the conga! Secondhand prices will be through the roof, but maybe I can trade for one someday or something. Anyways, congrats if you are there and get to buy some of these beauties! I hope attendees are able to get the models they want. Kind of a weird mix of molds for something that was supposed to be based on polo, but I guess that's Breyer for you. I guess the Strapless fits, but not the rest of them. 

That's all I have for today - I'm excited to see the centerpiece raffle model for Ponies & Palm Trees, though! Good luck to the attendees! 

Featured Model - 4/3/2022, White/Blue Cai Lun

 Hello and welcome to another edition of Featured Model, the weekly blog event where I pick a model that I don't own but has an interesting history behind it, give some stats on it and provide commentary on it. This week's model is...the white Cai Lun auction model! 

This model was a OOAK offered at the Breyerfest live auction in 2006. He was produced on the Belgian mold sculpted by Chris Hess. 

This guy is interesting because he's an alternate version of the normal Cai Lun, which was offered through QVC in 2001. According to IDYB, he sold for $1200 at that year's auction - a pretty standard price in a year when one of the live show prizes was the sale topper at $2600. In this blue-and-white color scheme, he looks a little like Blue Willow china, which could have been the intention. Interestingly, it looks like the auction model has a little extra detailing - I don't think the regular Cai Lun has those swirls/vine markings on his lower legs. I suppose he would have looked a little plain without some extra details, and we can't have that in an auction model. 

The Belgian (frequently referred to as the Bubble Butt Belgian) has his share of fans amongst collectors, and releases on him tend to sell well, though I don't personally have any in my collection. The Josiah release on him was my favorite of the 2020 Vintage Club releases, for what it's worth - and I did buy the pin of him! Haha. I have to admit most of the colors he's been released in over the last 10-15 years have been really nice - Red Rocket is another good one. There have only been a handful of releases in that time frame, though, so it's hard to say when he'll be used next. Maybe as a web special? I guess we'll find out! 

More Black Friday stuff and another test run!

 So, first off, more stuff has been added to Breyer's Black Friday sale! Most of the really juicy stuff sold out pretty much immediately, but you can still get Griffin, Reuben or a candy cane zebra. None of their prices are actual sale prices, for some reason, but I guess that's just the way it is. Make sure you're logged into your Collector Club account when you try to view these. I missed out on the good stuff, but I only would have gotten a Fylkir anyway, in hopes of getting the silver black. Not sure how they still have more Fylkirs kicking around the warehouse after the amount of times he's shown up in blind bags, but whatevs.

In more exciting news, there's another test run on Breyer's website! Looks like they're not done milking us (or a lucky one of us) for all we're worth. Check him out:

Nothing I need for my own collection, but it might be worth entering for resale purposes. They jacked the price up to $1,000, though, so it depends on if someone thinks he's worth that much or more. With the prices the auction models have been bringing lately, who can say? Anyway, good luck if you're entering for him! 

Josiah is now available!

Good news for Vintage Club members! The latest release, Josiah, is now available for purchase!



Okay, I admit this one is more appealing to me than most vintage molds. But I'm not a bubble-butt Belgian fan, so he won't be coming to my house. He sure is pretty, though!

This does make me wonder what's taking so long with the next Stablemate Club release. I don't think I'll be keeping either one (it's probably either the G1 Arabian or the decorator, neither of which I collect), so I'm not in a huge hurry to spend more money, but they don't usually wait this long, do they? Well, I suppose they'll get to it eventually.