Stablemate Sunday: BreyerFest Online Exclusives

I can't believe we're at the end of June already! BreyerFest is approaching so fast - are you ready? If not, let's get you in the BreyerFest mood. This month, we're looking at the Online Exclusive Stablemates from BreyerFest. I'm not including Eire or Kaleidoscope in this post, just the online Stablemates since BreyerFest introduced the hybrid model in 2022. Don't worry, they'll get their time to shine eventually (when I make a post about BreyerFest Limited Edition Stablemates!) 

The first Online Stablemate was in 2022, the first year BreyerFest had both an online and in-person event. This little guy is Torlinie, known to the hobby as the soccer ball Stablemate. It's safe to say that the poor guy was not the most popular - decorators are already kind of a hard sell (people either love them or hate them), and the G2 Clydesdale was facing serious fatigue from the hobby. He's not a super popular mold, and he'd had about 13 uses since 2019 thanks to Breyer using him in just about every unicorn blind bag release. I think he's a cute idea, but I understand why people weren't drawn to him. 

After 2022, Breyer introduced a new fun twist to the online Stablemate, and with that stopped including an in-person Limited Edition Stablemate in the Breyer Store. Starting in 2023, the Stablemate has had some kind of split in the run, though the numbers vary from year to year. 

The first split run Online Stablemate was Buggy in 2023. The variation came as a surprise, revealed on the BreyerFest livestream. While Buggy had been advertised as a glossy bay roan appaloosa, part of the run was the same pattern in a rosy gold. The entire 2,000 piece run sold out on Friday. This was my first year at the live show, and I wasn't anticipating a sell-out so I didn't try to buy one on my phone. I want to say I got the regular version late 2023 from either eBay or a Facebook seller, and I got the gold through Kelly M. who ended up with an extra somehow. The split ended up at 1,800 bay roan and 200 gold. It's important to note that for some reason, most of the gold variation ended up with flaws in the gloss, almost like it wasn't cured long enough before being packaged, so that's something to be aware of when buying one. 

The second split run was Wild Things from 2024. Like Buggy, the variation was revealed on the livestream, though I don't believe the numbers were stated until after BreyerFest. This year, the split was more equitable - the advertised realistic variation of Wild Things, a glossy flaxen chestnut sabino, was a run of 1,950. The variation was the same pattern but in a green to gold color shift in a run of 1,050. I wised up this year and had a friend who wasn't showing at the Open Show order two for me. Between the two of us, we ended up with both variations. 

Finally, we have last year's Online Stablemate - Shindig! As was typical, the variation was announced on the BreyerFest livestream but the numbers weren't. I was dreading that the split would be another micro run like Buggy - and I was correct. The decorator variation of Shindig was a run of 75, while the realistic matte gray sabino ended up as a run of 2,925. I bought two (again through my friend who bought my Wild Things in 2024), and ended up with two of the realistic. I ended up putting out an ISO for the decorator version last fall and paid him off over the course of several months. 

Breyer threw us for a loop this year by revealing the variation splits for BreyerFest early. They revealed the Online Exclusive Stablemate Hygge on the Icelandic mold would have a split - one-third of the run would be a pink decorator color instead of the chestnut dun tobiano advertised. I was anticipating this, since in 2024 the split was more equitable as well. I don't mind alternating between smaller and larger splits! 

Which BreyerFest Online Exclusive Stablemate is your favorite? Are you partial to the decorators or the realistic colors? Personally, I love the shifty colors they've been using on the decorators lately! 

It's Friday, I'm a Judge! Breed: European Pony

Happy Friday judging clinic! We're back in breed land today. 

As always, my personal judging history and credentials can be found on my About Me page. 

This week, we're looking at a Traditional European Pony class today. Like my last breed clinic, we've got a couple of horses on the same mold in this class, as a fun treat. Before we look at our entries, let's familiarize ourselves with the breeds that will be appearing in this class today.  

Norwegian Fjord

• Strongly built, hardy, well-proportioned, and athletic
• Proportional head, not long, has a slight dish and is not convex. Large, dark and bright eyes, short and wide set ears with a refined point at the tip
• High set neck with a convex topline, gently sloping shoulder, withers are not prominent and blend smoothly into the back
• Long, broad, well-muscled and sloping croup; tail carried freely and naturally
• Accepted colors: brown dun, white dun, grey (black dun), red dun, yellow dun

Information courtesy the Norwegian Fjord Horse Registry https://www.nfhr.com/catalog/breedstandard.pdf 

German Riding Pony

• More elegant and refined than a typical pony type
• Big framed and harmonious
• Small, well-defined and noble head
• Well-muscled, clean and correct limbs

Information courtesy Westfalen Verband NA https://westfalenverband.com/documents/GRPbylaws.pdf

Let's take a look at our entries! 

Norwegian Fjord mare

Horse A: Astrid

Norwegian Fjord mare

Horse B: Sweetwater's Zorah Belle

German Riding Pony mare

Horse C: Rowan

Take a minute, evaluate each horse against their assigned breed standard. Think about what make one entry stand out from another. When you're ready, my placings are under the jump. ↓

Plastic Pony Field Trips

One thing about me is I love to take my hobby in the wild. I talk about my models to everyone I know. I describe it as my "weird little niche hobby" to new people (and then subsequently feel validated when people say collecting and showing model horses isn't weird!) I keep an extra blind bag Stablemate on my desk at work. 

But one of my all time favorite things to do is take my model horses on field trips. 

My mascot The Original Gay Prancer obviously travels with me to every show. Sometimes when traveling he only makes it out of the car on lunch break...

Sometimes he's out the whole time and poses with my coffee...

And sometimes he's out for fun stops, like when I stopped at a library while waiting to meet a hobby friend for lunch! But he's far from the only model I've taken with me places. I love being able to take my models on themed field trips. 

When I went to a Halsey concert last year, I was tickled to bring Suddenly I Was a Lilac Sky from BreyerFest 2024 with me. The model is, of course, named after a lyric from a Halsey song. 

More recently, I saw a production of Macbeth. You may already know this, but I have a degree in English, and my focus was in British literature specifically. I have a lot of love for the Bard, and Macbeth is one of my favorites. Stone's Literature series last year was Shakespeare themed, and I knew I'd be wanting one of the Macbeth Chips when the time came. And of course, I brought her along with me when I went to the Scottish play!

Do you take your plastic ponies on field trips with you? 

It's Friday, I'm a Guest Judge! Performance Workmanship by Lauren Byun

 It's time for another guest judging clinic, and we're really expanding outside of our typical breed and collectability niche this month. NAMHSA announced in February that performance workmanship was a new division eligible to earn NAN cards. I'm not much of a performance shower, but I was intrigued by the new division and how to judge it, and I felt other people would be curious too! NAMHSA does have an archived webinar on the subject, but as a person who prefers the written word, I reached out to NAMHSA President Lauren Byun to create a guest judging clinic to point out what aspiring performance workmanship judges should look for.  

Performance Workmanship

by Lauren Byun

NAMHSA’s new Performance Workmanship division has brought up a ton of great questions on how to judge performance from this perspective! I’m here to give a demonstration of how I would do so for a class of Western Pleasure Saddles. My name is Lauren Byun and I’ve been in the model horse hobby, focusing on performance for… well lets just say I’m counting now by decades rather than years now, lol. I’ve been a tack maker, a vehicle and prop maker, a painter and sculptor. My work has placed, won, and champed at such notable shows as BreyerFest Live, North American Nationals, and even the BreyerFest Best Customs Contest. I’ve also judged performance for more than 20 years (also at NAN and BFL), and had the privilege to learn and show alongside some of our hobby’s biggest names.

I’m running through this class as I would in a live show, so I’m not looking at the quality of lighting, angles, etc. that I would in a photo show. To be fair, I’m also only judging on what I can see here, I’m not guessing on other sides or views.

Big thanks to the members of the Model Horse Performance Shower’s Facebook group who provided a ton of demo photos for me to choose from. All of these were randomly grabbed and anonymized, so I have no idea who the owner or artist is of any of them. In a live show, this is exactly how we should have it as well! Just like a CM or AR workmanship division, do not provide any artist or owner information, to prevent any unintentional bias in judging.

That brings us to: what DO you document in performance workmanship? Just like in AR or CM Workmanship, document the REAL item your entry is modeled after. You might choose to use a picture of the whole item, or even just a portion that matches your entry well. For example, I might whip up something simple like this for entry D in this class.

 

One important thing to remember in Performance Workmanship: we are not judging the horse. The horse is essentially just a display stand, and is not required! Whether it’s a body quality OF, an expensive resin, or a wooden stand has absolutely no bearing on the placing. The only time the horse might matter is if the saddle is wildly out of scale to the horse being used for display. If you’re running into that as a shower - just put your saddle on a display stand instead and list the scale that your saddle best fits on your documentation.

We’re also not judging adjustment or breed appropriateness in this class. That means I’m not looking at if the girth is tight, whether the saddle is positioned correctly on the horse, or whether the tack style suits that particular breed or type of horse. All those should be considered in your regular performance classes. This is strictly about the workmanship and realism of the tack, prop, or doll itself.

Because this is specifically a saddle class in this example, I’m also not evaluating pads or other tack pieces. Some shows may instead offer “Western Set” classes where the entire setup is judged together, but today we’re focusing only on the saddle. A quick reminder to show holders: the recommended class list is flexible! You can combine or split divisions however works best for your show, and judges can always split classes further if entry numbers justify it.

Since we get this question a lot: performance workmanship classes can not be double judged from your regular performance division! In order to see and properly judge the tack, there can not be a rider in the saddle or other pieces of tack obstructing the item you’re trying to view. Judging should also not be unintentionally influenced by how the item is used in relation to other items. We’re judging strictly the quality and craftsmanship of the item labeled for that class, be it a saddle, a cow, a carriage, or a rider.

So lets get to it! Here are our 4 entries:

Entry A

Entry B

Entry C

Entry D

Find Lauren's placings and explanations under the jump!

Conga Time! Mini Croi

Croi is one of those molds where I collect the Stablemates mold but not so much the Traditional sized one. I have the Sable Island Pony, and I have a handful on my want list, but I only need ALL of the minis. Currently, I'm only missing the purple clearware from the Gems of the Ocean set. 

Mini Croi is pretty equally divided into realistic...

...and unrealistic colors.

My favorite on the mold is Müller, from the 2022 Best of BreyerFest set. My copy went top 10 at NAN 2024 - her show name is Slow Disco!

This girl is the chase from the Chasing Rainbows blind bag. I was fortunate enough to pull her at a store. Her show name is Smol Gay Bean. 

I bought the blue Dahlia from a friend while at her house the night before a show. For this reason, her show name is No Self Control. 

Dear Breyer, More unicorns in realistic horse colors please. Love, Macie

Honestly I just like this girl because someone once said this set looked like Trix Yogurt and it reminds me of my childhood every time I see her. 

Regular Runs (Unrealistic)
Bottom Row (L-R): Chasing Rainbows Blind Bag Purple, Chasing Rainbows Blind Bag Rainbow Chase
Middle Row (L-R): Sparkling Splendor Deluxe Set/Mystery Unicorn Foal Surprise, Unicorn Swirl Set
Top Row (L-R): Both are from Mystery Unicorn Foal Surprise sets

Regular Runs (Realistic) L-R: 70th Anniversary Blind Bag, Mystery Horse Surprise Series 4, Deluxe Horse Collection

BreyerFest Special Runs (L-R): Arran, Müller

Other Special Runs: 
Bottom Row: Stablemates Club Dahlia (all four)
Top Row: Festive Filigree

It's Friday, I'm a Judge! Mini Collectability #6

Welcome back to another Friday judging clinic! We're in mini collectability land again today, which as we all know is my personal favorite place to be. 

As always, my personal judging history and credentials can be found on my About Me page. 

This week, we're looking at a class of regular run Stablemate models. Like Kelly's guest judging post, these are all models with tie-ins to other properties, be it an event, an estate, or a franchise. Let's look at our class!

Horse A: Saddle Club 4-Piece Set - Regular Run 2008-2011

Horse B: Bandit - Regular Run 2010-2012 - Elvis Collection

Horse C: World Equestrian Games: Reining - Regular Run 2010 

How would you pin these three? How much do you weigh the popularity of the molds against the popularity of the licensed property they're attached to? How much is condition a factor? When you're ready, you can find my placings under the jump. ↓

Show Report: Big Orange Bash 2026

🧡 Big Orange Bash 2026🧡

So, this ended up being a bit of an unusual show for me (and this is also why this blog post is coming out a day later than usual). When I volunteered to judge, I had every intention of showing - BOB is a two-day show, with OF Halter and CM/AR Performance on Saturday and CM/AR Halter and OF Performance on Sunday. It's nice because I can concentrate fully on showing one day and fully judging the other, since I only collect and show OF halter horses. I had plans of bringing a full string of both OF Breyer and OF Mini, trying some new ponies out before BreyerFest, and replacing some of the NAN cards I used for my NAN entry. 

The thing is late May and early June is a time of the year where I have a little bit of a mental struggle - mostly depression and anxiety flare ups. Combine that with attending seven other shows this spring, several projects due at work, and an off-site work training the day before I was scheduled to leave for Knoxville, and you have the recipe for one burnt out meltdown (which is what happened). I felt stressed and overwhelmed every time I started show prep, and I finalized my show string the Wednesday before the show - which left me with a single day to put together everything. My brain said no, and I listened to it. 

Having a cat in the AirBnb made the whole trip so much more relaxing

I had still volunteered to judge, and I had plans to carpool to Knoxville with Sarah, so at 4am on Friday I threw clothes into a bag and drove south. My anxiety wasn't being triggered by going to the show, just actually showing, and I'm not one to flake out on a commitment last minute - it's not fair to the showers, and it's especially not fair to the host who would have to scramble to find a replacement. 

The drive down was lovely, although we left Ohio stupid early - we had plans to meet up with our friends Angela and Cindy in Kentucky for lunch, since we would cross paths with them. We met at Angela's favorite chain restaurant, Slim Chickens, known for their jar desserts. We had a wonderful lunch, and then continued on down to Tennessee. 

We had a large group in the AirBnb - in addition to me, Sarah, Angela, and Cindy, we also had our friends Jordan, Kelly and Ken. It was a full house, but a fun one! Jordan also had her cat Marshmallow with her, which made the AirBnb feel a little more like home. I always miss my cats something fierce when I'm traveling. We ate at Olive Garden once the whole crew was safely in town, and then chatted at the AirBnb until it was time to get some rest before the show. 

A dream judging team
Photo courtesy SelectArcane

Even though I didn't bring anything for myself to show, I still ended up with models to run. Kelly was judging Saturday, so I ran her mini string for her. It was honestly the most relaxed I've been at a show for a while. I even had time to snack between classes, and drink enough water! Not only that, but I had so much time to catch up with my friends at the show in between classes. It was nice to get to talk to my southern Region 7 friends, since I usually only get to see them at a handful of shows a year. After the show, we went to the fabulous Mexican place we went to last year, and I got the vegetable quesadilla I got the last time (it was as good as I remembered!). 

We interviewed as a group for SelectArcane's Globe Trotter video
Photo courtesy Sheila B.

Sunday was judging day. I was judging Custom Traditional with Jordan (I was on Workmanship, she was on Breed). It's always nice to judge with a friend, because you're often on the same wavelength with when to call classes and how quickly you're moving. It made for some fun memories too - our ring was slightly out of the eyeline of the announcers, so we were often waiting a little extra for our class calls - cue us waving and dancing to get attention! On one occasion, I made it through a full rotation of the Macarena before we were noticed. 

Like at Are You Kitten Me, the YouTuber SelectArcane was at the show filming for her Globe Trotter series. This time, with the extra time I had from not showing, I gave an interview with my friends. It may have been slightly chaotic with the four of us in a single interview, but I think we gave Andrea some good footage to work with. A group of us went to Texas Roadhouse for dinner, and we introduced Andrea (a Canadian) to the concept of a Midwest goodbye as we chatted in the parking lot after dinner. I think that fourth goodbye without actually trying to leave may have broken her brain a little! 🤣

A trip south is incomplete without a stop at Buc-ee's
Photo courtesy Sarah P.

With an eight-plus hour drive back home, it would be madness to attempt to leave Sunday night, so on Monday morning (at a slightly more reasonable time than we did Friday!). We stopped at Buc-ee's on our way home to load up on snacks, and made it back to Ohio at a reasonable 5:30pm. 

Overall, the trip was a much-needed mental reset, and a reminder to listen to the limits your body needs - physically as well as mentally! I could have pushed myself to pack a few models to bring, but it would have caused additional stress. With the exception of this blog post and a small project for the NAMHSA booth at BreyerFest, I'm taking a mental break from plastic ponies this week (tomorrow's post was pre-written and scheduled in advance). I have lots to do before July, but I need to make sure my brain is back to normal before diving back into NAN and BreyerFest prep.