Another new test color!

It's been a while since we had a new test color to drool over, but fear not - there's a new one on the website!



Zippo isn't a mold I collect, but this one is very pretty! Wow!

Unfortunately, it doesn't look like the link to enter for him is working yet - hopefully Breyer fixes that soon. Presumably he'll cost $850 to the lucky winner again, but we won't know until the website gets fixed. Either way, he'll make a beautiful addition to someone's collection!

All 2019 Stablemate Club silhouettes are revealed!

Another reveal on the SMC blog - the last two silhouettes! Here they all are together.



So we're getting TWO new molds next year? That's a new one! I'm not terribly excited by the other new mold, though; he'll probably get sold on. And the G3 Belgian?! I've been hoping she'd show up in the club for years! Huzzah!

Now all I have to do is hope they tell us which of the molds is the gambler's choice, so I know if I need more than one membership or not. If the G3 Belgian or Mirado are the gambler's choice (or the Carrick-esque new mold, for that matter), I'll definitely have to renew all three of our memberships. Hopefully it's one of the other three molds so I can get away with only having one membership again next year.

2019 Stablemate Club teasers!

Exciting news, everyone! Four out of six of next year's Stablemate Club releases have been previewed on the Breyer website (and the misuse of "peak" strikes again!)! First, an enterprising Blabber found these two silhouettes posted on the Stablemate Club forum:

It's Mirado and the G1 Morgan Mare! I'm glad to see they dug poor Mirado out of obscurity, since the mold has been languishing unused since its debut at the end of last year. As for the G1 Morgan Mare, well, they had to use at least one G1, I guess.

Then, another industrious Blabber found these silhouettes posted on the Stablemate Club blog! (Don't worry, I didn't know that existed either.)






It's a new mold and the G3 Highland Pony! The new mold looks...interesting...the front end looks like Carrick, and the back end looks like they chopped it off of a Morgan or something. I'm sure it'll look better in actual photos. I'm not into the Highland Pony at all, but I'm sure they'll put a cute color on it.

So that's 2/4 for me - hopefully the fifth or sixth are things I want, or we'll be looking at another 2018 situation next year. Come on, G2 Morgan!

As for colors, I wonder what color the Mirado will be? A nice dappled black or bay would be pretty. I'm guessing the new mold is supposed to be a Thoroughbred, but since Breyer has been on a pinto kick lately, I wouldn't be surprised if it's spotted in some way or another.

I'm glad we're getting more new reveals, though! Hopefully we don't have to wait much longer to find out what else is in store for next year. I hope poor Mirado gets more love than just a release in the SMC; maybe he'll show up at Breyerfest or in a new RR set or something. Heck, for all I know he's going to be used at next month's Scottsdale Stampede (I hope not!)

Featured Model - 10/27/2018, Mini Merry Widow

Hello and welcome to another edition of Featured Model, the weekly blog event where I pick a model from my collection, give some stats on it, and provide commentary about it. Since Halloween is fast-approaching, this week's model is...Mini Merry Widow!




This cute little guy was released in 2005 on the G2 Morgan mold sculpted by Kathleen Moody. He's item #5917 and was part of the first Spooky Stablemates collection. These sets featured Stablemates painted like mini versions of previous Traditional Halloween releases. As his name suggest, Mini Merry Widow (or Merry Widower, as I call him) is a mini-me of the original Merry Widow.

The model is definitely one of my favorite Halloween Stablemates; just look at him! His masking is so intricate for such a small model, and I love the tinge of green in his color. I've always liked the G2 Morgan anyway - I love his sweeping tail and his prancy pose. I hope he shows up in next year's Stablemate Club.

As for the mini-me models, I love it when Breyer does things like this. I wish they'd do Stablemate versions of Traditional releases more often. How cool would it be if we got a whole line of mini Premier models, instead of one a year? Or miniature Holiday Horses, for that matter.

While he probably won't be a mini-me of anything, I think this mold has a fairly good chance of appearing in next year's Stablemate Club. He hasn't been used for much lately other than random regular runs, and he last appeared at Breyerfest in 2014. So, I'm hoping he shows up in next year's SMC - maybe even as the gambler's choice! Fortunately, we won't have to wait too much longer to find out. Let's hope the reveal is soon!

So there IS a second collector club horse this year!

I'd pretty much given up on getting a second collector club release this year, since we didn't get a preview at Breyerfest. Oh, ye of little faith:

It's Celeste! Huzzah! And are those a pearly mane and tail I see?



Looks mildly pearly to me. Yay! She'll make a nice companion for Silverado. It's interesting that they didn't paint up a foal to match her, but I find that kind of refreshing - a lot of the mare and foal pair releases end up only being used as mare and foal sets until the end of time, when either or both could just as easily be stand-alone releases (I'd be partial to a 2-foal set sometime, myself).

Anyway, this girl is definitely a beauty! Hope mine comes fast. I might have to put her on the shelf next to Celestine with that name, though...

Finn and Grace are here!

Good news, everyone! My Finn and Grace models are finally here, and I have photos to share! I'll start with Finn - behold!



No, I didn't get the rainbow, sadly. So this guy will be for sale. As a reminder, he's a mini-me of Lucy, and I think he matches her fairly well. His spots are smaller than hers and he doesn't have the molded-on halter, but otherwise he's a good match.

Although all of the Finns I've seen photos of look pretty nice, I wish the teeth had been executed a little better. They look like someone just slapped some white paint on there, and what equid has such perfectly white teeth, anyway? They'd look a little less weird if they were more of an ivory/slightly yellowed shade, but then I guess people would probably complain about it.

Other than the weird teeth, my Finn looks to be in pretty good shape, and since I don't collect the G2 Mule, he'll be for sale soon. On to Grace!

I got the dapple gray - my favorite of the three! Yay!

She's pretty flawless, too - I didn't see anything wrong with her, except for a slightly bent left eartip (which is common with these girls).

Dapple gray is my favorite real-life horse color, so it's not surprising that I liked this color best of the three. I'll be on the lookout for the other two, though. Hopefully the prices go down eventually...

As for her sticker, I'm not much for leaving those on (and it was already starting to come off), so I stuck it on her COA. I doubt she'll ever be for sale, and even if I did eventually sell her, I doubt any potential buyer would be terribly concerned about it either. As long as I still have it, right?

All in all, I'm very happy with my Grace - I just wish I hadn't lost so much money selling the previous two releases in the club. I'm really hoping next year's club either has more releases I want (not likely), or it doesn't have any modern molds at all (somewhat likely). Here's hoping!

As for next year's club, I did get a sneak peek of one of the releases with my Grace. Check it out!



Drat! I think I predicted the Pacer for the 2017 club, but I didn't stick with him for later years for some reason. Oh well! That's a beautiful color on him, but the mold isn't for me, sadly. Well, that's one Vintage Club 2019 release I don't need to worry about buying - hopefully we get to see the rest of them soon. Now, you'll have to excuse me while I go listen to the Rockford Files theme song.

The 2018 Retired List

Greetings, everyone! I finally had a little time to type, so here is this year's Retired List and my commentary.

ITEM # DESCRIPTION
Craft & Activity
4089 Chalkboard Horse
4115 Customizing - Arabians
4145 My Dream Horse Watercolor Painting
4200 Horse Crazy Color & Decorate Treasure Box
4209 Paint Your Own Farm
100180 Horse Crazy Real Horse Activity Set
Classics
688 3-Horse Stable
923 Grey Arabian
925 Bay Appaloosa Mustang
927 Dun Quarter Horse
935 Black Thoroughbred
940 Buckskin Paint
941 Grey Selle Francais
61060 Mobile Vet Clinic
61061 Sport Horse Family
61089 Barrel Racing
61091 Cutting Horse & Calf
62050 Starry Night
62058 Mason, 2018 Horse of the Year
66005 Classics Singles 12 pc Asst.

Ooh, lots of Classics getting retired! I'm excited to see what we get for new releases next year. I hope there's a new Mason!

Pocket Box
1583 Pocket Box Dogs
Pony Gals
7105 Jasmine Color Change Surprise
Spirit
9201 Chica Linda Traditional 1:9 Scale
9202 Boomerang  Traditional 1:9 Scale
9231 Spirit Floor Display

Seems odd that Chica Linda and Boomerang are being retired so soon, especially Boomerang, being a new mold and all. Sales must not be doing that well (although with the glut of stuff they produced, that shouldn't be a surprise).

Stablemates
5349 Truck & Gooseneck Trailer
5359 CollectiBull® Rodeo
5932 Frolicking Foals Pocket Barn
5970 CollectiBull® 6 pc Asst
6039 Mystery Horse Surprise 24 pc Asst
59202 Riding Academy

The Mystery Horse Surprise box is already being retired? Maybe we'll get a new one next year, complete with another chase model I can't get. Sigh.

Traditional
1357 Big Chex to Cash
1728 Cloud's Encore - 4 pc Set
1742 Picasso
1752 Rhapsody in Black
1753 Banks Vanilla
1757 American Pharoah
1760 Babyflo
1784 Cobra
1785 Slick By Design
1786 PVF Peace of Mind
1787 Let's Go Riding English
1788 Let's Go Riding Western
1790 Zena
9149 Man O War
9180 American Pharoah Resin
9197 Espresso - Springtime Filly

It's about time they retired Big Chex to Cash. He's been in the RR line for...10 years?! He must have been a big seller to stay in production that long - that's an eternity in Breyer years!

I'm surprised Zena is being retired after a bare year of production. Maybe she wasn't as popular as they thought she'd be? She may be too realistic of a sculpt for a fantasy-type model. Emma or Falhofnir might have been better choices. Cobra, Slick by Design, and PVF Peace of Mind got a year and a half - maybe they weren't big sellers either. The molds in question aren't terribly popular (except for SCO), so maybe the sales just couldn't justify keeping them in production longer.

I'm also surprised it took them this long to retire the American Pharoah resin - they couldn't even give those away at the end of last year.

There are a few things in this Traditional list that should be in the Classics category, like Man o' War and the Cloud's Encore set. Plus, there's no way Espresso is a Traditional - maybe they were trying to save space in the list or something.

Traditional Accessories
546 Nadia Schooling Rider
1383 English Accessory Set
2064 Turn Out Set
2072 Barrel Racing Tack Set
Wind Dancers
100111 Kona
100112 Sirocco
100113 Brisa
100114 Sumatra
100125 Singles 12pc Asst
100117 Kohilo
100118 Aura
100135 Wind Dancers Surprise - 24 pc Assorted
100141 Wind Dancers Mini Gift Collection

Interesting to see so many (all?) Wind Dancers going away - I wonder if there'll be new ones?

Breyer by CollectA
88376 Mountain Goat Billy
Enchantmints
B2702 Royal Garden Princess
B2703 Rose Petal Princess

That's all the commentary I have - hopefully we get some awesome new releases for next year! I can't wait to see what's coming up!