Futurity

Saturday I traveled north to spend a few hours helping my nieces, MacKenzie and Riley, prepare for their first foray into model horse showing. The show is in a couple weeks, and its a novice division. I think its going to be small, which would be perfect. I brought a bunch of my own stuff to show them what performance showing was like, too.

And I may have created some monsters.

Kenz and Ri were both excited about the whole idea (Riley may yet explode before it happens) and I had a really great time working with them. We talked about halter showing a bit, and then performance stuff. I set up a couple performance entries so they could get an idea of what we do. I left behind my enormous fishing tackle box full of older tack I don't use anymore so they can play with it and try it out. We made tags for their horses.

And then we got to business. Kenz and Ri play with their horses, and I am glad that they do. Last time I was over, they had expressed a desire to try and go to Nationals in Harrisburg this year...which means played with horses will need some refurbishing. I brought along some paint for touch ups, but they first project they offered was a MUCH easier one--black scuffs on white markings. I can do that! Pretty soon we were all scrubbing toothpaste on the offending areas and those horses cleaned up well.

I had to continually stop myself for pushing my hobby prejudices onto them. I would love them to share my hobby, but it really needs to be what they want to do, if they are going to stick with it. So I kept my mouth shut when everyone grabbed a paintbrush and went to town touching up areas--I had to remember the point was not to perfectly restore OF models, and the girls were already thrilled with the toothpaste trick.

Eventually, Kenz asked where one got customs.

"Oh, we can make those!"

"WE CAN?!"

Oops. I had not thought about bringing stuff for a project like this! Fortunately, n=my brother had a couple cans of automotive primer and a decent outside work space. The girls brought over a few horses to give new faces to, and I primed away. My inner hobbyist did clutch her pearls and gasp a bit when the idea to paint at least one horse gloss black with pink flames was floated, but fortunately, another portion said "Oh, his. Why not?"

Why not? I'm interested in seeing what they come up with.

Kenz and Ri have actual ponies and horses in their life, something I didn't when I was their age. My carpet herd was mostly stallions. Theirs are mostly mares and geldings--I think I registered about 25 horses between the 2 of them for this show, and there are 3 stallions. That's it. There are also 3 grade horses--a concept that is a hard sell for hobbyists. We like to have some sort of explanation behind why our models look the way they do, so we invent all sorts of crazy combos, rather than just accepting a horse for how it is. I find how they are entering this thing--what breed your horses is sort of mattering less, NAMHSA already in place and entrenched, the level the competition, a mentor, family support--really interesting. I hope they have as much fun with it as I do.