Tips, Tricks, and Various Bits of Information

Just a quick something while I continue to plug away at class work and the edited version of the saddle tutorial.  Hope you find some useful info in here!  I may be able to expand some of these topics into full posts later, so if there's something you'd like to see more of, let me know!

Reference Material
My favorite book is The Essential Book of Horse Tack & Equipment.  It's primary focus is on english tack, but it's got great information on bridles, bits, gadgets, martingales, saddles, boots, you name it.  The photos are awesome, the diagrams are great, but the best part is the information on fitting and the thought processes behind it.  I love knowing the 'why', not just the how or what.

A great online resource is used saddle listings.  They usually show photos from a lot of different angles, including both sides, the top, and underside.  You do want to be cautious and make sure that you're using a quality saddle as your reference, though.  If you're unsure, a quick search with the brand name of the saddle will help shed some light on the quality.

Tack catalogs can be extremely useful, both hard copies and online.  Dover Saddlery and State Line Tack are the two that come to mind first.

Organization
I have the neat freak gene from my mom and the pack rat gene from my dad.  I like things to be neat, tidy, and organized but it's easy for me to squirrel things away willy-nilly when I'm stressed or tired.  I found that a really good way for me to combat that habit is to keep as much stuff as possible in clear containers within easy sight.  I'm less likely to pick a box and shove something in it if I have a visual reminder of what actually belongs in that box.

I have half a dozen or so rectangular bead containers from Hobby Lobby that I love.  Those are great for storing spools of wire, hardware, jump rings, beads, and are great tack boxes for Stablemate stuff.  You can get half-size ones in Walmart's crafting department, too, which works even better for me.  Here's a photo of the two I'm in the most often.

The most-used supplies live in the one on the left.  I've got silver wire, thread for raised bridles and saddle piping, stirrups, bits, chain, and metal embellishments & crystals.  Extra blades for the snap-off & Exacto knives live in the long middle section.    The case on the right holds extra silver wire as well as copper and gold.  Miscellaneous traditional and classic scale hardware lives in there too, along with some glue I never use, foil for western saddles, and metallic thread.  (I had to tidy these things up before I showed you guys! I would have felt like a hypocrite otherwise, haha)

Anything you use a lot should be in easy reach.  Glue, tools, and toothpicks live on the far right side of my desk.  Not only because I'm right handed, but because that's "dead" space that I can't work in very easily.

I've mentioned them before, and I'll say it again: Dixie cups are amazing.  I tuck all of the little bits and pieces of a project in it's own cup and use alligator clips and pushpins to keep them out of the way.  If there are enough projects going, each cup has a masking tape label added to it.

Little Tricks
Use glue as an alternative to gum tragacanth for smoothing down the fuzzies on the edge of cut leather pieces. This should be done after dyeing your leather.  Use a tooth pick to spread a bit of glue on the edge and fuzzy side.  Shape it with your finger or the tooth pick and let it dry.

To cut even pieces of lace, I lay a strip of double sided tape on my cutting mat.  Line your leather up with one of the guides on the mat and stick it down.  I use and Exacto knife and even up the top edge first, then cut my strips out.  I use this method for pretty much everything that requires straps.  Stirrup leathers, bridles, reins, breastplates, you name it.  It's best if you work with leather that you've already thinned, but you can thin each strap individually, too.  Dyeing is a toss up; the Eco-Flo dyes don't seem to absorb all the way through the leather, so I always have to go back and redo the edges.  It would probably be just as easy to dye after I've cut the straps.

Curb Chains

Curb chains can be tricky.  You have to make sure they don't get twisted when you put them on, and that they're not too short or too long.

This?

Way, way too long! I measured it first, but still got it wrong.  Oh well, too long is better than too short! I'll take four or five links out when my shift at work is over.

If you can ignore the freakishly long curb chain, here are a couple of shots of the rest of the bridle, sans reins.

Poor horse is also sans eyes! He's been a work in progress for time out of mind.  His saddle is also done, and I'll take photos of that later.  Girth, pad, and photos then off to new owner!

Oh, and because I know someone is going to ask where I find the itty bitty chain: I scavenge for some things that aren't readily available.  I keep an eye out at garage sales and cheap thrift stores for jewelry with chains fine enough to use for tack.  I generally have several sizes on hand, because the chain for a curb is often thinner than the chain for, say, a stud chain.

Raffle Results!

I cut and folded all 200(ish) comments this afternoon! I started out with a bowl, but outgrew it pretty quickly.  I ended up using my cat's sleeping basket (we call it a beddy-bye basket; anyone who's seen Aristocats will know what I'm talking about!) to hold the comments.  Of course kitty was very interested and cooperated nicely by scooping two comments out for me!  You can't get any more random than a cat, right?

She's picking the $20 credit winner in the photo.

The winner of the western or english set is....
Tami!   The winning comment was "What a great idea. I've enjoyed reading your blog so far and I love your tack :)" on 8/11/11.  I'm glad you've enjoyed reading, Tammi!

The winner of the $20 credit towards any future order is....
Tabatha Pack! Her winning comment was also from 8/11/11.

Thanks to all for reading and participating over the last month! Tammi and Tabatha, please send me an email at akirby@dreamflitedesign.com!

Raffle Ends TONIGHT!

Don't forget, all of you lovely wonderful people, that the raffle wraps up tonight! Comments will count as raffle entries until midnight tonight, central standard time!

And, so you have something to look at...

I wandered around the countryside a bit this morning and took some photos.  That was my relaxation for the day...NOW I have a website to update, class work to finish, and at some point a dressage saddle to work on!

Tackmaker By Day...

...Painter by night! Sort of...I don't repaint models often, but I needed something to help me calm down tonight.  Unfortunately, dapple grey was probably not the best choice, but I can't handle bays or chestnuts in acrylic and can't be bothered with pastels at 8pm.

Here's how it went down...

Alright! Base coated (ish) in acrylic, feeling pretty good!

Dapples, attempt 498...ready to chuck her at a wall.

Take 3: In Which the Derwent Pencil and I Come to An Agreement

You only see her right side because....that's all that's done! I'll keep picking at her, and probably put her back on the shelf for months after tonight.

Buckle Free Tack

A quick note before we begin: this post makes a lot more sense if you know what to call the parts of an english bridle. Wikipedia has an excellent description, sadly without a picture.  In a swift Google search, I didn't come up with anything better.  Now, on to the post!

The primary objective of buckle free tack is to preserve the appearance of working buckles while eliminating the stress they can cause.  This is really only effective at Little Bits or smaller scales, but is almost necessary with Stablemate or micro mini models.  Working buckles come in two forms: tongue buckles or slip buckles.

Slip buckles on the left, tongue buckles on the right

In real life, of course, all buckles have tongues and the shape varies depending on the type of tack.  In the model world, slip buckles refers to buckles without tongues at all.  They are usually quite functional, though not quite realistic.  Tongue buckles are truer to life, but can be harder to handle.  In Stablemate scale, the majority of adjustable tack will have slip buckles.  The use of tongues on strap goods is so frustrating as to be worthless, though I have on occasion done it (see photo above!).  In addition to the frustrations of actual use, already thin leather is substantially weakened by the small holes necessary for adjustment.

I have found that there are several frustrations with slip buckles in Stablemate scale.  For one, they slip! It can be difficult to get things to stay put as you are adjusting them, especially if the leather slips all the way out of the buckle.  Another frustration is the necessary thinness of material that comes with scale.  Buckles made out of 32g wire (like the gold ones above) are prone to bending out of shape and in some cases coming loose entirely.  Repeated use of straps causes wear, and with already thin leather each use makes it more difficult to thread the leather back through the buckle.  With enough use, straps will eventually break.  Keepers, small loops of leather that keep excess length from flapping around on bridles, breastcollars, and virtually every form of strap good available, are often left off for convenience.  No one wants to mess with a keeper after spending 10 minutes getting a strap back through it's buckle.

The pro of adjustable strap goods is, of course, being able to adjust them to fit a variety of models.  In 2008, I was convinced that the sheer usefulness of adjustable tack outweighed the headaches it caused in the making and tacking up.  It was gently pointed out to me that tack with faux or fixed buckles was highly appreciated by customers and, in the long run, much easier to use and make.  I am a stubborn sort of person, but eventually I realized that they were right.

When you fix the buckles on a piece of tack, you must either leave it on the model permanently or find some other way of getting it on and off.  That particular piece of tack will (in most cases) fit that one model exclusively.  If you are lucky, there are other models similar in size and shape that can share.  Molds within a generation of stablemates will often be able to share tack, but not always.  The G3 cantering warmblood is almost identical to the jumping horse, but their forelocks are different sizes, so they can't share.

Western bridles and western and english breastplates don't usually require any special on/off mechanism.  Without a browband, noseband, or throatlatch western bridles slip over the head easily.  Breastplates slide over the head neatly, too, and don't need to be split anywhere.

English bridles or bridles with a throatlatch and noseband require creative thinking.  The key thing is to hide the way you are securing the tack so convincingly that it takes a great deal of effort to locate it.  I have seen two primary methods used to accomplish this:

• The cheekpieces and cavesson are fixed, while the throatlatch and noseband are loose and stickywaxed out of sight. The throatlatch has a faux buckle, while the noseband is often buckle-less.
• The cavesson buckles are fixed and the cavesson is separate from the headstall, stickywaxing behind the ears somewhere and hidden by the crown.  The throatlatch must also stickywax under the crown, which often ends up being under the corner of the browband.

There are often some minor differences within each method, but that's the short of it.  In the first method, it can be difficult to get the noseband to sit correctly, especially if the stickywax isn't cooperating.  I've also found that it's not always easy to tuck the throatlatch up under the crown without something popping loose.  The chances of something slipping increase with each spot you have to stickywax, too.  I've used both of those methods, and eventually abandoned them for one of my own.  

When I make a fixed bridle, I begin with the cavesson.  When completed, it's put on the horse and buckled down with a bit of glue near the actual buckle to hold it in place.  The cheekpieces and headstall are made next.  The crown of the bridle is glued to the top of the cavesson and everything is buckled and glued.  The browband is glued to the headstall at the proper place, with ends left loose to wrap around in just a minute.  Now that the bridle is finished, I make a careful cut on one side of the browband.  Here's a bad photo that makes a good illustration.

The stickywax wasn't cooperating that day, and the browband popped loose from it's spot.  You can see where I made the cut, though, and when everything is fastened down properly it's not easy to spot.  Unlike the other methods, there's only one spot to stickywax and you don't have to worry about ear rubs.

In some cases, going buckle free means literally that: no buckles.  English girths are an excellent example.  It's far easier to stickywax the girth under the saddle flap than fuss about with buckles, which usually add bulk.  I like to glue both ends of the girth under the flap and then split it across the middle so that it stickywaxes under the horse's belly.  This would never work on a Traditional or Classic model, and I would probably avoid it on a larger Stablemate and Little Bit models.  In most cases, Stablemates are low enough to the table that a judge would never notice.  

Western cinches are the one place I retain working buckles.  It's true to the real piece of tack, can be accomplished in scale without excessive fear of damage, and isn't that hard to use.  

I hope this has been informative, and that I haven't rambled too much.  Feel free to leave questions, and I'll do my best to answer.

New Toy!

I picked up a cheap P&S camera via Amazon's Gold Box deals earlier last week, and it arrived yesterday afternoon.  It's a nice little Canon Powershot that was 60% off or thereabouts.  Definitely worth picking up, though it won't completely replace my Nikon D60.  I can take the Canon along to the lake or any other event that I consider 'high risk' in place of my Nikon.  Losing or damaging a $50 camera will result in far fewer tears than losing or damaging a $650 camera!  I'm pretty impressed with the quality, too, and excited to have video on it!

Unfortunately, I've already learned that my projected goal of Tuesday/Thursday blog posts won't happen.  Tuesday is press day at the newspaper I work at, and by the time we're done on Tuesday night I'm ready to fall over.  I'll figure something out, though, never fear.

In the meantime, here's a photo (taken on the Canon) of the press I help run:

The press is divided into two units, and I run the unit on the left.  Those white rolls of paper are thicker than regular newsprint and weight around 1300 lbs.   A full roll of newsprint is closer to 900.  The thing is a beast! 

Raffle ends this weekend, don't forget! 

School!

Class started today, so I'm busy writing due dates into my wall calendar and getting things organized.  I actually took the afternoon off of work to get a solid start on this stuff.  I'm taking three full semester classes this time around, which is the heaviest workload I've done so far.  It's not full time, of course, but if I can't balance work and school I get overwhelmed and go into a tailspin.  It's not pretty and doesn't do anyone any good.


Now that class has started, posting may be a little slower.  I'm going to try to post two or three times a week, and right now I'm going to schedule Tuesdays and Thursdays as blog days.  That will give me several days to work up a topic of some sort and spew out something cohesive, I think.  Today will be some miscellaneous updates!

First and most importantly, the raffle ends this Saturday (Aug 27) at midnight central standard time! I'll compile the comments information Sunday afternoon and try to get winners announced that night.  There have been 157 comments so far, which is totally exciting! I've loved reading all of them, and you guys have had some great things to say!


I started working on a trade project Sunday afternoon.  It doesn't look like much right now, but eventually it will be an upper level dressage set for Dinky Duke.  DD is just a little larger than Wee Jay, and is the largest I've gone so far.

The tutorial is officially with my volunteers! I've already heard back from Christine of Last Alliance Studios, and she has pictures of her first try up! She did a brilliant job both assembling the saddle and giving me feed back.  We've found one place already that needs clarification and more pictures. Leah at Shoestring Stable is also testing the tutorial for me, and as soon as I hear back from her I'll start revising and putting together a "clean" version. Right now the tutorial is functional, but not very pretty.  I want to format it a little bit and enlarge the photos.  It's sitting at 7 pages with 11 point type and thumbnail-sized pictures right now, so it's going to be the size of a small novel by the time it's done! I'm going to have to put it in a PDF, I think. Related but not: after using Adobe's InDesign so extensively at work, I find myself extraordinarily frustrated with the limitations of Microsoft Word.

That sort of sums things up for now! Theoretically, the next post will be about going "buckle-less", which is sort of a misnomer since there actually ARE buckles...you just don't use them!

Before and After

Before:

After!

The remodel is done, I'm moved back in, and I am so glad that it's finally over!  You can't see it, but just off screen to the right are my closet doors.  I have my halter and two bridles hanging on the handles, but that's not exactly what I had in mind for them.  Any suggestions for display?

I'm still plugging away on that website, but I'm going to try to get the tutorial ready to be proofed by my lovely test subjects.  Blog topics coming soon:  a bridle tutorial and an article (of sorts) about going buckle-free! When the tutorial has been proofed and corrected, I'm going to try to get it into a PDF.  Text-only it's four pages in Word, so you can imagine how long of a blog post that would be!

Almost There!

We're trimming out the room today, so I should be spending the evening and tomorrow morning moving back in! I'm so excited! It's just in time for class to start on Monday.  I also have a website to build that's due early next week, so I may not get a post in as frequently.  I will have time to respond to comments, though, so keep them coming!

Don't forget that the raffle ends on the 27th, and for those of you commenting as anonymous posters - please include a name of some sort so that I can identify you! There have only been a couple of comments without names, and I'd hate for someone who is interested in the raffle to miss out.

Statistics

I'm a numbers freak.  I took Pre-Calc & Trig in high school and LIKED IT. I'm also a fan of useless information, and I want to share that passion with you today by giving you statistics about this blog that you could probably care less about! I doubt you're all as interested as I am, but it's really cool to see how the pageviews have grown since I revamped the blog in January, and even more since I started the raffle in July.  The blog peaked in June with just over 1000 page views, but August is set to overtake with over 950 in the first couple of weeks.   

According to Blogger, the vast majority of you are from the US, with the UK and Australia a pretty even second.  After that is Canada, and then a handful of European countries like Germany, France, and Estonia (who knew?!).  Most of you use Windows OS, but Internet Explorer and Firefox are evenly tied as top web browser, with Chrome a close second.  

Most of you come over here from Jennifer Buxton's wonderful, wonderful blog, but quite a few make it over from my website.  Model Horse Blab has been a source of traffic recently, thanks to a post announcing the raffle. The search results that turn up my blog include dreamflite design, dream flight design model horse, and

"pics of so randoms studio"? People who are looking for pics of so randoms studio are actually looking for photos from Demi Lovato's Disney Channel show Sonny With A Chance. I'm sure they're quite disappointed to find someone rambling on about model horses and saddles!

Prior to the raffle, the most-viewed post was my product review of stirrup irons.  Now? The official raffle announcement with 161, followed by the FAQ with 48.  The most commented post? The raffle announcement with 30.  The recent galloping boots tutorial with 17, followed by "I Think I'm In Love" with 16, take second and third.

And, for some not-so-useless information, trim painting has progressed and hopefully I'll be able to move back into my room before class starts on the 22nd!

Friday of Few Words

Not much time to write today, but the owner of the Secretariat racing set kindly sent me photos!  Here they are, courtesy of Jessica.

And, to flesh this post out, here are a few other unique projects I've worked on over the years!

Circa 2008

Sometime in 2010

2009 or 2010, I think...

2008 or 2009

2009, I think.

I Think I'm In Love

This stuff was recommended to me highly.  I was curious, so when I happened across it at Michaels a few weeks ago I picked it up.  I didn't have time or a project to try it on at the time, but I tested it today.

I don't think I will EVER go back to sticky wax for boots.  This stuff is just as easy to find as sticky wax, and yeah, it's not reusable and you will have to reapply eventually, but the headaches it saves are SO worth it.  I threw some of it on the sport medicine boots I made this morning, and my eyes got big when I actually started tacking up.  It's amazing! The little tabs just stuck and I didn't have to worry about them popping off or anything.  Definitely worth the $4 or $5 a bottle, and I'll be using this stuff as often as possible.

Oh, here are the boots! They sit SO well with the Tack-It glue.

I've got a few other things I love, too, like my craft knives.  I use a small snap-blade knife for skiving and a regular exacto for everything else.  I can't imagine living without them.  The body of the snap-blade knife is old old old, from Walmart.  They no longer sell these knives or the blades, but you can pick them up near the paint/wall paper supplies at stores like Lowes and Home Depot.  I think the Exacto brand has one too, but I found the home improvement stores to be far less expensive than buying the name brand knife or blades at a craft store.

It's far easier to make your own buckles and most of your own bits when working in Stablemate scale.  I use 26g, 28g, and 32g wire.  26g is reserved for bits, western saddle rigging, or reinforcing various parts, like the swells and horn of a western saddle.  I also used it for stirrups, but less so now. 28g wire is often used for buckles or smaller D and O rings and as tongues for buckles made out of 26g wire.  32g is used to create the mouthpiece on bits (which is why I also have copper; it looks spiffy on western bits), and fixed buckles.  It's too thin to do anything else with, really.  Also in the photo is a spool of nylon upholstery & home decor thread.  It's thicker than the usual cotton stuff.  I use it in raise nose and brow bands, since wire can sometimes poke through the lower lining.  It can be very useful on english saddles, as you'll see when the english saddle tutorial is finished!

Back: 26g.  L to R middle: 28g, 32g silver, 32g copper. Front: upholstery thread. 

I only use two pairs of pliers, and one kind of snip.  I do have two pairs of the snips, though.  The tips get worn down and pitted eventually, so the worn pair is retired and used on rough stuff like straight pins.

If I could find a smaller tip on the round and needle nose pliers, I'd love it.  I haven't seen any at Hobby Lobby or Michaels, so I should probably do a little hunting online.  What I have works, though.

So, there's another look at the stuff I use.  Questions and comments, especially suggestions for walk-throughs and tutorials, are always welcome! 

Don't forget, everyone, 19 more days to enter the raffle! Every post is another entry into the raffle.

Rough-out Gaming Saddle

Another project started before the remodel! This goes with the gag bit I showed you last time.

I love the way it turned out! There's more to do, of course.  The cinch is drying right now, and I still need to do the breastcollar, finish the bridle, and make the sport medicine boots.  I had forgotten just how much I love working on projects that don't involve deposits, deadlines, or customer expectations! Not that I don't love my customers, too, there's just a wonderful freedom in doing things for myself.  It's a great way to let out some creativity.

Be Kind to Your Brushes

And don't leave them out without cleaning them, or you get this:

Poor paintbrush got left out after a couple coats of sealer on a saddle.  It's a lost cause, but at least it was a cheap brush.  Still, I like to get a little more mileage out of them first.

In other news, I still don't have the room to work on much.  I'm experimenting with some projects I've had lying around, though, including a barrel racing set.  This afternoon I tested out a gag bit.

And here's where I'm doing the work:

Western Pleasure Saddle

Way back in May I posted some in progress shots of a western pleasure saddle.  Well, it's done!

I had a lot of fun with this saddle.  The carving is more detailed than any other saddle to date, and the silver is a new pattern.  So..more pictures!

This saddle was intended to be part of my personal collection, but unfortunately tuition hit a little hard this semester.  I'll be putting it up for sale to help out with the cost of school.  I don't show, anyway, so a personal collection is a little useless. It's on MH$P and can be found here. Update - It's sold! Good luck to the new owner!

In a general model horse sense, for those wanting a good shot in OF and CM/AR performance classes with as little tack as possible, I strongly recommend a Working Girl and a G4 Driving Horse.  They can trade tack very nicely, and despite some chunky legs the driving horse can be a very nice performance prospect.