Showmanship revisited

When I decided I was going to make more of an effort with the blog I figured I would do some posts on live show classes. Anything that uses dolls is a good excuse and we can pretend to be on track. My first idea was of coarse therapeutic riding. That is a real horse area that I am very knowledgeable about because my son is in therapeutic riding and I volunteer with the program as well. The other real horse class I am fairly well versed in is Western showmanship. Liesl Dalpe, who is known for her precise set-ups (especially showmanship) and also had a lot of real horse experience with showmanship and she taught me what to do. I still think that a model that is standing square is the easiest horse to use in a showmanship set-up but if you think about it it may be the hardest. Your horse has to be perfect to the pattern and your handler doll and judge need to be in the proper place as well. I did post back in January about Western showmanship and it is an interesting entry. If anyone is interested here is a link to the post http://fieldofdolls.blogspot.com/2009/01/western-showmanship.html that was written before I had any judging experience and I was pretty nervous. Now I have judged at several shows (not always performance) and am much more comfortable judging. I am even thinking of taking several shows off from showing next year and just judging. I do have a great time judging and it is easier to work without wondering if you are missing a class in another division.

Western showmanship is not a hard class to set up for live showing but it can be easily messed up. I have messed up several times on things myself. But with good attention to detail you can do a great job. The equipment you need is very simple. You just need a horse with a halter and a handler doll. Some people may say that the doll is optional but you can probably only get away with that in photo showing and it still doesn't work all that well then. Today we will be discussing the judges inspection portion of the class. This is the pattern I have been using recently for my set-up.

I usually have step 5 highlighted (It says walk until horse's shoulder is even with judge. Stop and set up for inspection). I also have a note on my documentation that says the horse is finished being set up and the judge is just starting his inspection.

The halter the horse wears is very important as it is the only piece of equipment used in showmanship. Ideally the halter for Western showmanship should be a fancy show halter. Any halter can be used as long as it fits well but the nicer your set-up the better it may do. The lead and how it is attached is very important. The snap should be attached to the left side of the halter up near the throat latch. Like this

Then it goes from the outside, through the left cheek piece, under the chin and out the right side cheek piece. The chain on a real showmanship halter should only be about 4-6 inches long. The extra chain on this halter is too long to be correct. On a model halter it should be only about a half inch long. The handler should hold the chain right at the end of the chain but on the leather of the lead. If your chain is too short or too long the handler will not be holding the horse in the correct way.The next thing to learn about showmanship is the quadrants of the horse. From a top view the quadrants are the four different sections of the horse. As long as you know them you will always know where the handler should be in relation to the judge. The handler should always be looking at the judge and not blocking the judges view. Also the handler and judge should not be in the same quadrant at the same time. As you can imagine there is a lot of quick movement from the handler as they try to stay in the proper quadrant. The quadrants look like thisI use a Breyer Lady Phase for my showmanship because she is standing squarely and that makes for the best looking (standing) showmanship set-up. Make sure when you set up your entry to check and make sure the halter is straight, the doll is holding the lead correctly (*note: for 4-H shows the extra part of the lead should be scrunched in the hand. For breed shows a large loop is the usual way of holding the extra) The doll should be standing straight, with her legs together and her body angled towards the opposite rear hoof of the horse. The doll and the judge should never be in the same quadrant but they should be in the quadrants next to each other (ex: the judge is in Q2 the doll should be in Q1. The judge is in Q3 the doll should be in Q4. The judge is in Q4 the doll should be in Q1). It is a nice touch to have the doll looking at the judge and the judge holding a clipboard and pencil. Make sure you have a pattern for this set-up as well.

This last photo was my showmanship set-up at region X regionals this year. I got OF Champion for the second year in a row and I'm very happy about that. Maybe next year I will change things up a bit. Or perhaps I will also try CM showmanship and see how I do in that.

Therapeutic riding as a live show entry

I thought I would shake things up and write two days in a row and also write about interesting live show entries from real horse events. Today is therapeutic riding day. I know quite a bit about therapeutic riding since I volunteer as a side-walker and leader and my son takes therapeutic riding. Mostly today I am going to focus on how you would set up a therapeutic riding scene as a live show entry. You can make it as simple or as elaborate as you want though I think details add to any set-up. I have some photos from 2 of my son's horse shows as well as a couple of my live show photos.
This first picture is a wide view of the trail coarse. There were 4 riders in the ring with several obstacles. They needed to weave in and out of cones, walk over trot poles, take things out of the mailbox and bring them to another location, etc. This was a fun show on Halloween so the kids didn't need to dress for a formal show and some of the volunteers wore costumes or face paint.


This photo is of my son Travis walking around the edge of the arena to warm up his horse. All of the people that work with special needs riders have a different purpose. The leader is not really to guide the horse (except in the case of the youngest riders) but as a just-in-case person. If the rider says whoa the leader stops so the horse stops and so one. The side walkers are there as a safety measure and as paraprofessionals. They help the riders carry out the instructions of the instructors.
This is another warm up photo

Here Travis is coming around the markers to start the coarse.


and another shot of the same

The riders went over the trot poles in jump position.

Here another student finished the trot poles


I was told by a live show judge that therapeutic riding is always done at a walk. I imagine like anything else, different schools do things in different ways. At my son's school they do trot. They almost always trot only on the long side of the arena and not over any obstacles. It is a favorite part of the class for most of the riders and they also get a chance to practice posting. The side walkers hold the riders ankles to help keep them on the horse and their feet in the proper position in the stirrups. The volunteers get some great exercise as well (who needs the gym). :)

Another part of a safe therapeutic riding set-up is the reins. The riders do not hold the bridle reins though the horses do wear bridles. The reins are looped around the horse's necks to be out of the way but give a bit of extra control to the leaders if the horses get a bit frisky. The therapeutic riding horses wear halters over their bridles with reins attached to the sides. These reins are pretty easy to see since they are blue.

This is a really good shot of the reins on the horses neck.

Here Travis is getting his stirrups adjusted. At this show only 2 horses came and the kids had to take turns in the ring.

Here is Travis with his ribbon. He doesn't look like he knows quite what to think of it. The last show (the Halloween one) he got a gold medal. They awarded fun prizes because it was a "fun show" so Travis got his medal for having the best posture of anyone in the ring. He came home and hung his medal on the wall with his rosettes.

Here is one of the ways I have set up my therapeutic riding scene for a live show. I have the bridle reins looped around the horse's neck, a halter with side pull reins, a leader and a side-walker. I also use a photo of Travis riding as reference for the tack set-up.

This is another way I set up the same scene. This time I used a youth doll I had just finished for my friend Marisa Evans. This was her show so I asked if I could debut her doll in my riding scene. I believe we got first that day as well. (the tweazers didn't stay in the scene for the judging)
This is a closer shot of the dolls. The leader has a pinny that has the pioneer valley therapeutic riding association logo on it. That is where my son rides. I set this scene up at the region x regionals and used 2 side-walkers. I can't find a photo of it so I must have forgotten to take one. Too bad really as it came out pretty well.
In all of my rambling today I wanted to share a bit more about therapeutic riding and why certain things are set up the way they are. When I first did this as a live show entry it was more basic than it is now with a rider holding the bridle reins (which CAN be correct for more advanced riders in some schools) with just one side-walker. There are lots of ways to set this scene up and lots of ways that the real classes can be done at shows. I happen to use my Strapless models for this class because she is my favorite English horse. Every student I have worked with and watched loves the trot part of the class the best so it is fun to set up as a live show scene. I will probably change my show entry up a bit more at some point. I always like to add to it to make it more accurate to the real shows I have been to with my son. And it just happens to be a wonderful class for the live show ring that uses several dolls :)

RXR

I am aware that I am a huge slacker when it comes to blogging. Usually I can't think of things to write about and I don't want to post about the craziness of my life, I don't think anyone really wants to hear it. Region X Regionals was last weekend and it didn't occur to me to write about it until yesterday. And then I could not get my computer to cooperate and load pictures. And blogs are not as much fun without photos in my opinion. So lets get to the fun!
Anyone that knows me knows I am a performance junkie. When I remember (or have time to) take pictures I take almost only performance pictures. I do love certain halter horses and may take pictures but I love the action of performance photos. And mostly I take photos of horses with dolls. I get a kick out of seeing my dolls out at shows but I admire any nicely done dolls and take lots of pictures if there is something I really admire. So onto some performance photos and doll fun!
First we have the start of the day. Last year the dolls "played" a lot and everyone had a good time playing with them. So this year I got this lovely swing set for the dolls to play on. At the start of the day they were mostly well behaved.

This next doll belongs to my friend Joan Fauteux. Joan has more of my dolls than anyone else and always comes up with more that she wants. This cross country lady is the newest in her collection. I can't remember the horse's name but I believe the tack was made by Jana Skybova. Joan made the awesome cross country jump herself.

This doll was made for me by my good friend and doll maker buddy, Joan Yount. This was one of the first hunt seat dolls that Joan made. The only thing I did to this doll was remake her boots when we were working out how to make the leather hunt boots. This was my OF dressage entry. I got reserve champion in the patterned performance stakes this year. I was pretty excited about that one. The horse is Lady Intrigue and the tack was made by Cari (Godwin) Chaney.

Joan Yount made this lovely Western pleasure doll as well. Joan sent me a photo and said she was for sale and it was love at first site, I had to buy her. The horse is Skippa Latte (I "borrowed" the name from Joan as well) which is a Breyer Party Girl. The tack was made by Kirsteen Haley and the lovely saddle pad was made by Elise Patisan. She makes beautiful saddle pads and they are super affordable. It made coordinating the set incredibly easy and her turn-around time is super quick.

I did actually make this cowboy. He is another one belonging to Joan Fauteux. I think she named him Jack but that is the only thing I know about the set-up. I don't know the tack maker, the horses name or anything. I do know I took the photo through the trees on someone elses entry because I thought it looked cool.
These 2 western ladies also belong to Joan Fauteux. I think she has at least 3 western dolls I made. The doll in black and pink was one of the first western dolls I made. The pink doll was one of the sales dolls at regionals last year. The funny part of Joan's doll collection is she has more of my dolls than I do. I should work on that :)

This was my natural western trail entry. This doll (I think her name is Mary) was cleaning up the trash on the trail. Her horse, Lady Liberty, is waiting patiently. The saddle was made by Pam Perkins and I can't remember where the bridle is from. We had some trouble with the doll falling over but several of us worked on it and she stayed up long enough to get first. I also made the diorama.

This nest western doll was a custom order from Lauren Upton. I don't know anything else about the photo really. Lauren has been doing an awesome job with her performance set-up.

This doll is Muffy. She is owned by Marisa Evans. The horse is Electric Mayhem who is a stone pony customized by Liesl Dalpe. The tack was make by Cari Chaney. Muffy is a very versatile doll and has a removable hunt coat.

The dolls seemed to have fun with the swing set but they did not do as much as they did last year. Maybe the lack of toys inspires more silliness. They did get a bit silly throughout the day...

...and so did this cow. He thought he was a jumper (he needs tack and a doll!)

This lovely lady belongs to Linda White however the entry was by Corrie McDermott. All I know about the rest of the set-up is that the horse is a CM ISH that Corrie won in the raffle at last year's regionals. I love the tack though, perhaps I should ask about it one of these days.

This is That 70's Godiva owned by Morgen Kilbourn. Morgen just started performance showing and has done extremely well. She asks questions of everyone and had gotten her stuff down. She won several large rosettes at regionals this year. The doll is one of mine and was a custom order. She has removable chaps as well as a removable collar and cuffs. This doll and the cowboy that went with him was the reason I decided to no longer to anything removable, lol. They made me crazy. They turned out nicely though.

This next doll was done by Darla Curtis. I took several photos of her from many different angles. She is a wonderful doll full of amazing detail. One day I may make dolls of this caliber but today is not that day, lol.This last entry is another one of mine. It is my OF showmanship entry. I made the handler and the judge as well as the horse's halter and the little judges kit (that you can't see). This set-up got champion for the second year in a row. I was really excited about this one and hope to keep the title next year as well.
I took a ton of photos this year but couldn't load them all here. The show was a lot of fun and the weekend was nice. Regionals is always a very interesting show and unlike any other. In my opinion it is a great way to end the show season and gives everyone something to look forward to next year.

Back to Real Life

This past Saturday I got married. Ethan and I have been together for a bit over 10 years so we have a somewhat different relationship than a lot of newlyweds. It was a small wedding and I can't say that everything went smoothly because it didn't. But overall the day itself was wonderful, great weather a beautiful spot for the ceremony and close family and friends. Both sets of parents have been very supportive and since we have all known each other for years there was none of the awkward meeting of the parents. I'm thinking of writing a book with advice for brides-to-be. 10:00 in the morning is probably too early for a wedding unless you enjoy stress and rushing. Have someone the day-of that knows the plans for the ceremony/reception so you can enjoy for of the day. And there are lots of other little things I picked up as well.

You also find out who your real friends are. We lost a couple of friends for something so tiny we think they were looking for a way out. It's sad but good that it happened weeks ago and not the day of the wedding. But we also found out the friends we do have are very generous. My good friend, Liesl Dalpe, took all of the official wedding photos. A lot of the pictures in this post came from her, she sent a handful so I had something to look at while she put the other (several hundred) photos on CD for us. Another large group of photos was taken my my friend Crystal's boyfriend, Peter. He is not the easiest person to warm up to as he seems to be a very shy reserved person. But when you do get to know him you will find a very friendly and caring person. And also someone that loves to tease. He showed me a horrible photo that he got of me at the wedding (no, I am not posting it, lol) and said it was the only one he got all day.

On to pictures! We all know that we look at blogs for photos so I have several to share. This first one is of our 2 kids, Elecktra and Travis, starting down the isle. Travis looks very cute in his little tux and Elecktra is looking almost grown up at this point.

This next one is of Ethan and his brother Adam. Ethan loves it because from the neck up the look the way they might look on any Saturday morning. I just think it's a great photo. We are not entirely sure when it was taken but probably before the ceremony. I think this photo might end up on the wall as soon as I find some wall to put pictures on.

The next photo is also a picture of the extreme generosity of the people we know. Ethan's Dad borrowed this car from his friend, George. I have only met George and his wife once or twice but they were both very friendly. It was funny when John, Ethan's Dad, called me to ask if he should call George and see if he could borrow the Rolls I said, "what am I going to say? No?" When someone offers to loan you a vintage, superbly maintained Rolls Royce for your wedding you don't say no. Blog photos are just not as nice as the originals :(

This next one is Elecktra and I after the wedding. She is almost as tall as I am! She was very emotional during parts of the ceremony and may still have been at this point. We included the kids (though Travis didn't come up with us during the words) in part of the actual ceremony and then in the unity sand ceremony. I don't have any of those pictures yet but when I get some I might share some more.

Before the wedding I made lots of jokes that I fully expected Travis to try to roll down the big hill at Enfield Lookout Point. I mentioned that again to a couple of people at the reception and they told me he DID go down the hill! I didn't see it but I still laughed about it. In this picture he looks like he is getting ready to go down the hill. But he likes to be a little mountain goat on the boulders so he may just have been playing.

This is Cathy and Crystal and I. Cathy is my real sister. She's the one in the black dress. Crystal is one of my best friends and I consider her one of my sisters. I really like the original of this photo but wanted to share it. We all look pretty good I think.

Ethan and I were planning on going on a honeymoon next year. That way we could save up for something really nice and not have to worry too much. But Ethan's brother Adam and his wife Shannon, sent us on a trip. We went to Newport, R.I. for the weekend and it was amazing. Not only is Newport a wonderful community that is heavily art influenced, the people there are very nice, the Inn we stayed at was great and Ethan and I have never, not even once in our 10+ years together, been anywhere alone. That was a huge treat in itself. We spent lots of time just walking around the town, did souvenir shopping, we saw a movie in an old converted opera house, ate at 3 different sushi restaurants (and there are still more for us to try, lol) and had a great time. Sunday morning we were out walking before anything was open and passed an art gallery (one of many). There was a gorgeous painting of the sea at night under a full moon. It appealed to both of us (not something that happens all the time) so we decided we had to come back as soon as they opened and buy it so we wouldn't lose it. They held the painting at the gallery for us so we didn't have to leave it in the hotel room and we talked about it for the rest of the trip. I think that was our favorite purchase of the trip. This picture was taken on the steps of the Jail House Inn where we stayed. It's a really interesting place.

Also included in our honeymoon trip was a sailboat tour of the harbor. That was very cool. Neither of us had ever been on a sailboat though boats of any kind are fun. We sat next to a really nice couple, Carl and Laurie, from Pennsylvania and chatted with them most of the trip. They got pictures of us, we got pictures of them, etc. If we hadn't been leaving right after the boat trip we probably would have gone to dinner with them. We talked with them about tattoos and art (they were going to go check out the gallery where we got our painting) and neither Ethan or I had any business cards on us so Carl and Laurie were trying to memorize the name of Ethan's tattoo shop. Hopefully they remembered and they look it up, it would be nice to see them again or at least share some photos from the trip.

All in all we had a great wedding and a great honeymoon. There are still so many things in Newport we haven't done we are thinking of going back next year for our anniversary. I hope we can, it was a great place to visit. I didn't want to come home.

So here is the part where we have to get back to real life. Ethan went back to work and I am working on getting the house to look like a house again. Soon I will have to get back into my doll making as well. I have so much less stress now that the wedding is past that I probably will be able to sit down and work. Just as soon as my house is neater. And now my studio name makes sense.

-Anne Field (St.Onge)

The art of rehairing dolls

Awhile back someone mentioned it would be cool to see a blog about the rehairing process. So that is what I am going to talk about today. The process is not particularly hard, it just takes time. And of coarse learning to do it quickly and neatly takes more time. Still, no matter how much you do it it will never be a super fast process. But let me explain the process, with lots of pictures!
First you take the head off the doll. People think a lot of strange things about me because of the horrible things I do to dolls. But a lot of people think I am strange because I make dolls at all. I can't win so I don't try. It may be possible to rehair a doll without taking the head off but I have never tried it that way and I imagine it would take longer. So we'll just talk about my way. After you get the head off next you have to cut all the original hair off very close to the head. The closer the better because you want as much of it gone before you get to the next step.
Because the next step is to pull the tiny leftover tufts of hair out of the doll head. This is by far the most annoying and tedious part of rehairing. And part of the problem I had with this one was not having the proper tweezers. You'd think a good pair of tweezers would be just the thing, but they were horrible and more trouble than not. I usually work from the inside of the head...

...but the awful tweezers made me have to do things the hard way. So I had to pull out the tiny tufts of hair from the outside, one at a time. This took a very long time, much longer than it should have and resulted in sore fingers. I'll survive though. It did prompt me to go out and buy the proper tweezers. I wish I knew what happened to the old ones. And for anyone curious the right tweezers for the job are the scissor style with the flat angled tips.

Once the hair is gone you have a tiny bald doll head to work with. Now time for new hair!
The best hair I have found is viscose hair. Mohair is OK but you will never get super smooth, super shiny hairstyles with mohair. The viscose hair can be bought on many dollhouse and doll making websites as well as eBay. You can get an ounce, a pound or small sample sizes. I usually get a ounce because that is still a LOT of doll hair and then I split the shanks with my doll buddy, Joan Yount. And she does the same so it all works out nicely. I wonder if she has any platinum blond....

...The other thing you need to rehair the dolls is a hairing tool or a rooting tool. I got mine from a woman who sells them on eBay for the reborn dolls. Joan found this amazing tool and it has really helped bring added realism to the dolls. The rooting tool comes in several sizes but the perfect size for 1:9 scale dolls is the micro tool. It is normally used for rooting eye lashes on larger dolls. The tricky part of rerooting hair is making sure it stays in. You already have preexisting holes so you need to make sure they have the same amount of hair in them so the hair doesn't fall right out. Not always an easy task.

This next photo is of the hair on the tool ready for rooting. It is not easy to see. You need to separate a tiny amount of the viscose hair, smooth it out and slide it into the center of the twin needles on the rooting tool.

Then you stick the hair on the tool into the holes in the doll head. You have to make sure both of the needles go into the hole or you are likely to break the needle. Keep going until you have the hair all over the head.
I don't hair the entire head because the more hair you have, the more out of scale it will get. You don't want your newly haired doll to look like an out-of-the box factory doll do you? I usually hair from the side of the forehead all the way around the head (lowering the hairline in back) and then I hair a strip across the back of the head. After that I take a small doll brush (I think the one I use came from a My Little Pony) and I brush the hair out. This removes any loose bits of hair as well as making it neater. After that the hair can be styled any way you want. For this doll I just twisted it into a bun. I could have made a smaller bun but I liked the look of this one. I trimmed the tip of the hair and glued the end down on top of the head. I have also done braids, braided buns and other styles as well.
The last step is to glue the hat on and (in this case) add a hatband. Things are a little more involved when putting on a helmet for an English doll because you need to make the safety harness as well. But I didn't have one of those to do today.The process of rehairing is not complex and you don't need expensive tools (my rooting tool was $10, replacement needles are $1 each and my tweezers were $4) and the results can be very nice. It also opens up the option of changing the look of a doll. It's amazing how different a doll can look just by having a different hair color and a new hairstyle. That can be a very big thing when most of the dolls in the show rings come from the same basic doll bodies.

I also had a request for a blog about the fitted boots. Western boots are not as interesting as English boots so I will have to wait for a day when I have English boots I need to make and time to take the pictures. But the boot blog is coming. If there are topics you would like discussed please let me know. I love letting people into my strange and occasionally twisted world of doll making.