Towards a Better Bench

 

This post is about a couple of wonderful gifts that have wound up on my tackbench, and both of them promise to enhance it.

First off I want to thank an old friend for an extraordinary present.   I somehow let slip I'd used up nearly all the linen thread she had gifted me with back in 2019.  Honestly, all I did was mention I needed to go shopping for the stuff,... it can be bought, it's affordable!   Here's what I started with then, enough to get hooked on and make several years' worth of tack (below).  I made a wooden spool from a thick dowel and thought the matter closed.

I just loved this thread.  Of a glorious polished smoothness, friendly to the touch, and a perfect ivory color just right for braidwork, it had natural, almost handmade irregularities to its gauge.  It was quite tough and withstood the heavy use and constant pulling in and out of my braiding far better than cotton threads.  I used it carefully, at first only in a few buttons, saving every inch I could.  

I used it in the L2 and L3 Hackamores.  I may have used it for the stitching on the Goehring, and I may have used it for my first orange bosal in the fall of 2022 and for its consequent Carrizozo's Hackamore.  I definitely used it in Dry's Orange Hackamore.  I used it in one of the nosebuttons for my next book, and that was a mistake:  the thread was thicker than my standard, and threw off my measurements.  It made a liar out of my earlier chapters on exactly which thread I'd used for the 8 pieces I was profiling.  I decided to merely mention it in the book.  The half-finished nosebutton will go on to another fate,... as of this writing, a future trade. 

But imagine my surprise when I received a totally unexpected small fat package from Sue Rowe!  I couldn't figure what might be inside.  Sue has sent me unheralded gifts, usually uplifting postcards.  But this!?  When I saw what it was, I almost cried.  There was enough to supply even the heartiest braider for years.  I spent a happy time rewinding it onto my original dowel.

Thank you, dear Sue Rowe.  This is a gift from the heart.  

Another recent gift, just 2 days ago, was one of the prizes for judging at Michelle Sepiol's Tioga County Model Horse Show.  (What a show!  Enlightening, fun, exhausting, inspiring!)  It was a large mug, larger than any I'd seen.  It occurred to me it would serve beautifully as a tool holder.   After a couple happy hours on Sunday reorganizing and cleaning my tack bench, Hooray!  I'd gained a few inches more of precious space, and was down to 2 tool holders instead of 3.   Such reorganizing hasn't happened in decades.

New mug holding leather stamps (center).

This is a lifetime collection, many of the leather stamps being inherited from my mother.  I'd never been able to have them all in one place before.

Short tools in the mug, tall ones in the cup to the right:  Paintbrushes, feathers for dusting, files, dental picks (in back), and metal tubing are all in there.  Apologies for the dirty-looking water in the glass rinse jar.  It is replaced with fresh for any new projects!

Stone foal for scale.   Her Jaapi halter has been adapted by me to her small size.  First time I've ever done that, and it was challenging to open those little metal crimps without breaking them.  I did it by first very carefully pressing on the sides with pliers -- just 'til it opened a tiny bit -- and then gently widening the crimp over a blunt awl.  To close, I glued down the ribbon first.  Throatlatch, jaw and finally nose strap were shortened. 

Here's a final view from higher up, giving some perspective.

Why do I reorganize the tack bench now, when my family is about to leave on a trip for a number of weeks?  Is this not exquisite torture, when I have pieces to clean and restore (a parade set and some harnesses), balanced against the braidwork for the book, at the moment 2 bosals and then 2 more complete hackamores?  None of which can be done while on the road.  Believe me I have tried--!  I will be lucky to put in a few hours on something simple like a mecate!  Perhaps there might be more than a day right before the trip launch when, everything cleared off and ready, there can be pure tack-work time.  But such a thing is not guaranteed.

Hope does spring eternal, but I honestly think the restorations will only get done in November and December.   As ever, thank you for your patience.  It is so greatly appreciated.

Dry's Orange Hackamore

 

This post is all about Dry the Sea's beautiful new Hackamore, with its colors of off-white, dark brown and international orange.  I'm keeping it!  The post also talks about my plans (what plans?!) for Christmas on Mane Street and gives a glimpse of my next book's current stage.  This is a very long post, so sit back and enjoy.

I'd been working on a bosal hackamore for myself ever since April.  I'm not sure how long I've been in love with neon orange for model tack;  it's gradually grown over the past few years.  This fascination may have been aided by collecting blankets; I got a bright neon orange one I particularly liked from Hobo Cat Creations (Amber Wylie) somewhere around 2019.  In 2022 I made 2 bosals with blaze orange, one for IMTM and one in November  (see here).  Somehow neon colors seemed appropriate to my current life.

 It was a wonderful coincidence that International Model Tack Month (IMTM) happened at the same time I was finishing up April's Hackamore's chapter and starting Fancy's.  Here's a photo taken April 11 of this year.  In the manner of these things, what started as a fine idea for a nosebutton got completely carried away.  

Above, I'd put in the light blue dummy thread on the white foundation (lots of work, two entire nosebuttons braided at this point), put in 8 brown interweaves in the center (lots of work, the math dictates 4 + 4 instead of 8 at a time), and then it occurred to me to try echoes of bright orange -- !  The result was so exciting I wondered how I would ever get back to what I was supposed to be doing!  I quickly took a few pix, promised to make myself one later, and took them out.  In hindsight, this was another example of repression leading to greater desire.  I don't know why some of the best ideas come after all those bends in the road, but they do.

Thus you all get to see a peek at the next chapter of my next book.  Fancy's is the 6th of 8 pieces profiled.  For those interested, the above bosal still did not qualify for the book, although some of its photos will be used.  (Material out of scale and too hard to get.)  Its fate [not done yet] is to become a gift for a friend.  As promised, I decided to squeeze in a whole 'nother bosal.  IMTM gave a glorious excuse.  Below: Dry's nosebutton before tightening.

Dry's bosal was started on the 11th and finished on the 22nd of April.   This was one of the few times I entered IMTM and completed my piece on time.  We will forgive that the same thing happened in 2022.

May went to family trips.  Not just any trip:  This was the one where we found out five weeks was too long.  CO, WY, MI east coast, MI Upper Peninsula, MN.  Seasoned travelers though we were, there was a limit.  Finding it was uncomfortable and could have been very bad.  That's all I'll say;  but the strains of that trip, and yes the triumphs too, became woven into the hackamore in the way model tack can sometimes carry.  If I'd had any ideas of letting this piece go, they were dropped then. 

Here's one of the many triumphs, shot June 1st by my husband in the Primitive Picnic Ground of Cascade River State Park, North Shore, MN.

Cascade River State Park, MN

What made the hackamore more intense was the effort that had to go into the orange thread.  Since it was too small for my button-braiding standard, I had to spin two threads together, and ultimately three, to make it bigger (thicker).  The thickening was all done by hand, in hotels, inch by inch.  'Precious' thread has more psychic effort in it, more spirit somehow.  This effect is not new to me, tho the color certainly was.  

There was a lot of dinking in the headstall design, particularly the cheeks.  To match an existing bosal was relatively new for me, but great fun.  The brown and white of the braided ring, for example, balances the lack of brown on the browband sides.  These shots don't show it, but the solid orange buttons had to be replaced with a different gauge and a different button.  Below:  Taken September 3.

 One of the more charming stories within this Hackamore is its conchos and buckle.  Stuck in an oil-change waiting room in Boulder CO, I spent a happy hour acquainting myself with every offering of The World of Model Horse Collecting (TWMHC), Alison Beniush's eBay store.  I should've done this years ago!  What riches!  Cast buckles, bits, brow conchos, stirrups, oh, everything!  I had long since reached the stage of being willing to pay for brow conchos.  In a clever plan-ahead, I ordered some hardware for this hackamore so that it'd be waiting for me when I got home.  And it was. 

In the event, the buckle proved too big.  I dealt with this by squeezing it narrower.  I intend to replace it later.  But I absolutely love the class of these tack parts.  Please don't leave us anytime soon Alison!

In early June, while still on the road, I received the news that Colette Robertson's Smaug's Hoarde would be dispersed.   I was immensely relieved that I didn't have to do more than clean up a few pieces and sell them at BreyerFest!  All praise to Christie P. and Kim W.,...  And then, as is known, those pieces swelled in numbers from a few to 8 to 10 to more, and their cleaning-up swelled to updating, repair, rebuilding and restoring.  This was followed by auction holding, writing letters, photographing, blogging, banking (which took weeks), packing, shipping.  There went June.  There went the first part of July.  There went BreyerFest, and my 5-day covid quarantine after (I passed).  It was about then I found that working on Dry's Hackamore had become a psychological necessity.

I told myself that making his mecate was working on my next book.  This lovely mecate was made the same way that Rinker's was, and his is the last piece for the book.  His mecate is the most detailed of all four mecates included.  I needed to test my measurements.  Dry's mecate, however, showed me they were still off.  H'mm, hmm, what does that do to hopes of finishing -- !!

Photographing a piece dark (underexposed) tends to bring out the orange.

 Dry's mecate was finished last week, at the end of August.  Yesterday, rejoicing in new horses, I held a quick photo shoot.  There are lots of pictures here of the hackamore on 3 other horses.  The star has to be my new Jota and his neon orange Jaapi halter.  You can bet I grabbed that halter at BFest the moment I saw it!  Thanks Jody of Jaapi!

It's a bit challenging to photograph so contrasting a horse.  Shade helps.  The saddle here is a Terry Newberry.  I thought the purple blanket would go well with the orange.

Below: a close-up of this horse, whom I've named Beyond the Pale.  I confess that this portrait was Photo-Shopped to fluff out the two tassels and remove the mouth hole.  The original straggly tassel can be seen above.  Time and play have fluffed it more since.

Here's Miss Independent.  This time I looked for a saddle blanket with orange in it.  The jewel tones of another saddle's blanket (by me) was as close as I could come with my existing collection.  The saddle is TSII #446, the Peach Rose.

I  particularly like this portrait.  Aren't those warm colors something!  Yes, I am etching her mane to white.  The angle of browband to bosal gives her a quirky playfulness.

One last horse, a blood red bay.  The orange does not fare too badly against this color.

This mold, Roxy, has a sweetly wistful feminine face.  Photo-Shopped to remove the hole and fluff the mecate tassel.

In Other News:

I have finally begun work again on Fancy's chapter, so long put off.  Colette's beautiful TSII #325, an exquisite Classic scale prism tape Parade Set, will get restored when I can, -- hopefully soon, -- and it and TSII #402 are promised a blog post of their own.  Truly Colette held the best of the best.

My plans for Christmas on Mane Street have taken a very long time to germinate.  I'm still not 100% sure I'll have anything to offer; or how to offer it.  (Time spent on FB should cure that technological hurdle.)  I thought Mane Street would be a good opportunity to advertise my first book, the Guide;  but that turned out not to be the intention.  My October goes to another trip (3 weeks this time!) so I only have Sept and Nov.  I'm currently thinking that mecates and bosals for Fancy's chapter will yield something.  They don't have to be in the original colors.   I'll know more at the end of the month.

As ever, Thanks for your patience.

Two Saddles

 

When a person is busy selling saddles during BreyerFest, it is not easy to get out and go shopping for tack for herself.   That was particularly true this year:  Of two saddles recently purchased for myself, only one was gotten at BFest, and that on the last day, Sunday --- practically the last hour.  The second was purchased a week after I got home from BreyerFest.  Some things just take time.

For the record, my shopping list of 3 horses didn't get filled either;  I came home with only 1 of them (below).  But I got 8 other horses, so I'm not complaining!

This post will be a thorough look at those two Western saddles.  One is a Donna Hutchins (above) and the other is a Darleen Stoddard (top).  Neither artist has been represented in my collection before this, yet both are important saddlemakers I have long wanted -- Stoddard in particular.  My Western saddle collection is all about tackmakers I admire and wish I had pieces from: pieces I can afford and can acquire when circumstances allow (in other words, can find for sale at all!).  

The Hutchins was a surprise, an impulse purchase at the very tail end of BreyerFest and my last big plump for the event.  It was, in fact, the last thing I got, all the sweeter for being unexpected.

I had never seen anything like it.  Even knowing Donna's work, fanciful with curlicues and nail art, almost Art Nouveau in feel and execution, this seemed a one of a kind.  Those black lines are drawn on the leather. 

At a guess, Micron pens to the fore!!  There are exhaustively delicate strips of handcut, stamped silver tape around the borders, plus a wealth of roses, rose leaves and white dot rows:  nail art that gives this saddle a candy Rococo flavor.  It is a gem of near-elven elaboration.

The bridle cheeks have matching roses set in shaped cheekpieces.  The braided floss reins even have their own buckles.  This is amazing and delicate detail.

My collection of pictures of Donna's work starts in 2011 and tapers off after 2018, with one in 2019.  Most of her saddles are very pretty in design and amazingly detailed, full of restrained flourishes and elaborate, if fragile, decor.  They often have strong contrast.  Here's a shot of the breastcollar, showing the central rose, which is repeated on the saddle conchos and bridle rounds.

Here's a close-up I'm using to show the cinch:  It was drawn on too.  I don't know what to call this kind of tooling:  Not tattooing because it doesn't pierce, but dang, that sure is ink...

The saddle is signed "La Rosa Espinosa  ScS  2012" in the same ink under the fender.  This stands for "Shadow Cat Stables," Donna's stable name.

Fragile, yes.  The tape was lifting, and I glued it down in several places.  No doubt the blanket (dark grey felt, see 2nd, 3rd and 4th photos) was chosen not to detract from the saddle.  I found it invisible on a dark horse, and not at all up to the standard set by the saddle.  I think a one- or two-color simple cross stitch blanket would be a help here.

The Hutchins saddle is a work of art I would hesitate to use for anything but photos.  The Stoddard set is an equal work of art with very different bones.

This was the auction no. 21 saddle for C. Partee's Colette Robertson dispersal sale.  I think it was the original piece which got me thinking Darleen was really good and that I wanted one of hers!  Darleen's style was well set by the time this saddle was made, in 2003.  Imagine my delight when I found that, contrary to what the auction photos showed, the crosses in the plates were gold!!   Having recently failed to win a fabulous Stoddard Parade set in silver and gold during the July 11 Colette auction,

I was all the more desperate to obtain a Stoddard.  Even so it was a close thing.  I've learned so much about auctions this year, from both ends!, but they are no more perfect than they ever were in distributing goods to the deserving.  The hard part about holding auctions like these is seeing friends you wish could win a piece having to bow out.  If they (if I) must lose let it be with grace.

On this saddle there can be no criticism of the blanket!!  The whole style was strong, heavy and well made.  I am reminded of the Sergeant's catalog saddles:  angled skirts, large plates, plenty of silver, and elegantly simple complete tooling, in this case basketweave with a theme of crosses.

I did, however, have criticism of one part of the bridle.  Darleen had used a rare but effective way to make the cheekstrap adjustable, relying on friction through the buckle on an attached wire ring.  The friction was so tight it was nearly impossible to move the strap.   There were silver tape strap tips, and there was no earthly way those tips were ever going through the rings.  To adjust them was to destroy them, so, slowly, carefully, I wound up gently taking them off, to stow safely elsewhere until called for.  Strap tips are the very devil to execute in model tack, and silver tape -- however useful overall -- just isn't a good material for them. 

That said, there was something else about this saddle I loved.  It had a second unexpected beauty:  Jewel concho points!

So hard to photograph!  In desperation I shut off the lights and pulled out my pocket flashlight.  Shooting Mink pins has taught me this.  With the Stoddard saddle it resulted in the jewel looking very green,... you'll just have to take my word for it!

That's not corrosion, that's reflection and my camera's exaggerating the flash of aurora borealis bling on crystal.

I'd rather not PhotoShop it better.  I'm already struggling with the right color on these saddles.  Dang shop has got one incandescent and one LED and it results in some weird colors...  These dark background shots are actually the most realistic ones of the saddle's color.

I am so happy and relieved to finally acquire these two saddles.   My collection is richer for having these artists.   Thank you Christie and 'someone in the 300s.'

Tawas Point Bird Festival 2024

 

I wrote this up back in May but couldn't find the right pix for it.  Finally I've decided to use a combo of my own shots of birds, even though they were not present at the time, and pix taken from the web.  Above:  Baltimore Oriole in my back neighbor's apple tree, May 2015.  This diary entry was one of absolute joy, amazement and delight:  Not only was it the day of our first birding festival, and a major one at that, but it was a grand experience of emergence.

Below:  One of the few images I found of the trail itself, which runs along a narrow peninsula between Lake Huron and Tawas Bay, on the upper east side of Michigan.

image from Tawas Area Chamber of Commerce

2405.18  [May 18. 2024]

What a day!!!!  Err-er-R-R-R-!!! [rooster crow]  Golden Winged Warbler!  Too many Blackburnians!!! [warblers]  Nighthawk on a stick!  Parulas!! [warbler]  BAY BREASTED Warblers, male and female!!  Magnolias!! [warbler]  BTGs!!!  BTB, female!!!  [Black Throated Green and Blue warblers]  WAAAYY too many Redstarts, Blackbirds, and Grackles,...  BOBOLINK,...  Black Bellied Plovers, Dunlin, Nashville [warbler], Tennessee [warbler], HOUSE WREN and many more:  66 species today, 64 at Tawas.

Tawas Point State Park + Birdwatching Festival!!!

Perfect weather!!!!

Kirtland's Warbler    image from Tawas Area Chamber of Commerce

We got there 7:26 am and didn't stop til about 1:30, w/ about 1 potty-break for each of us, and no drinking.  That's how amazing and wonderful and overwhelming it all was:  Incredible, astonishing, record-breaking, beautiful, magical.

American Redstart       photo by Tom Warner/Audubon

 It was more:  For both of us this was a major emergence.  So much time mingling with so many people even if it was outdoors, was in scale quite different from the Party of 12 at Fox Hills [family gathering].  This was CROWDS.  Of perfect strangers, of all ages.  I didn't seek out packed areas, I avoided people, I rarely spoke face-to-face; but even here, masks were almost non-existent;  & what few I saw were for insects.

Tawas Point Lighthouse    image from Tawas Area Chamber of Commerce

I discovered I still had an inner reserve, reluctance, resistance, (refusal!) to breathe completely carelessly.  I could not throw off entirely my hard-won awareness.  The air was still during the morning, w/ all that fog.  But I was no longer avoiding scent-trails, no longer keeping a distance, no longer hesitating to pass, or walk alongside.  Both of us mingled freely and yes spoke with a handful at length.  We were exposed to something like 300 people today -- approaching BreyerFest!!! -- so if we get sick we'll know why and how.  But surely, surely,... (I can say no more, for fear of jinxing!)...  This day marks as far + farther than I've been in 4 years 3 months.  Indeed & truly, 2024 is a year of emergence for us,.... giving our first major birdwatching festival about 4 years' worth of deeper, near spiritual importance and meaning on a personal level.

Everything had a double glow.

Blackburnian Warbler       image from Cornell Lab

 Oh, to finally come home--!!!  --That's what it felt like.  To a home you didn't know you had;  but every part of it was familiar.  I am ONE OF THESE PEOPLE despite my leather binocular strap, & rawhide-&-silver hat, nothing else of which matched or even approached.  Despite my buck's-head shirt, which makes me look like a deer hunter.  {{After killing a deer yesterday, I can no longer claim not to have ever done this!!!  It was by car & totally accidental; an entirely separate story.}}  Oh to find your own tribe,.... AFTER a lifetime of knowing my tribe is Equus Plasticus!!!!  It was a doubling, an enlargement;  As a third language would be for a bilingual person,....  36 years of birdwatching w/ Geo has taught me.  The law of averages, that's all,...

image from Tawas Pt State Park Facebook page

 ....we have always avoided these festivals before, that's all....

Bay Breasted Warbler    photo by Bill Magoros

To say I'm happy is an understatement.  I am still amazed.

Golden Winged Warbler    image from Wildlife Management Institute

2408.06 (present, August 6)  My beloved trip planner and birdwatcher extraordinaire had used every tool at his disposal to find out when the right weekend in May would be for maximum spring migration at a natural warbler trap.  The skill is a combination of analyzing years of bird data and meteorological know-how.  In the way of these things, we landed right on top of a birding festival which had done the same thing.  In hindsight it was almost funny.

Bobolink     image from Cornell Lab

And you will be glad to hear that we didn't get sick.  

Not even at BreyerFest.  

Can't wait 'til next year!!