Ready, set, go!

By the time I've finished typing this post it will be around midnight. The official start of NaMoPaiMo 2019 and the moment I can start painting my model. She is not quite ready, but almost. During the prepping phase I felt like I started to develop a bond with my Pepto. She's been sanded quite thoroughly and I feel like I know all her nooks and crannies and muscles and wrinkles. Over the course of two weeks I grew very fond of her.

Then came the priming and the love was gone. Her tail is in the way, her hind legs are in the way, her nose is in the way, her forelock is in the way. How do people do this?? The underside of her butt is so hard to reach if you don't want a triple layer of primer on her tail and legs. I'm honestly worried about fixating the pastel layers. From what I understood it's not a good idea to put the spray on too thick, otherwise it will become grainy, if I remember correctly. Ugh, I guess I'll just have to develop some fancy wrist movements to spray around the tail and the legs and still hit the buttocks.

Above is my official entry selfie with my nude horse. I waited to take the selfie until she had some primer on her. She still has a few crevices that are not fully primed, but I think I will just prime those by hand since they are hard to reach with spray primer. By the way, don't you think Pepto looks like a shampoo model in this photo? Makes me think of the L'Oreal commercials "Because you're worth it". Some more name ideas: Worth It Pepto or Sheza Painted Pepto.

After my last post I thought long and hard and after more than a week of hemming and hawing I finally decided to make a new facebook account solely so I could join the NaMoPaiMo facebook group. I've been in the group for a day now and it is awesome! Since it's now past midnight I should really go to bed. I've got work in the morning and after that I need to finish Pepto's primer so that I can put the first layer of pastel on her on Saturday.

Still alive! ... also Namopaimo, whoop whoop!!

Soooo... I've managed to neglect my blog for eight (!!) full years. Needless to say I've been busy and a lot has happened in the past eight years. Some of it good, some of it not so much, but I'm back! I got my degree (yay!), I have a job and we just sort of finished moving into our new house. All of this means that my life is finally stabilizing and that I can start spending my time and energy doing things I like doing instead of only trying to hold everything together. This also means that this year I finally signed myself up for Namopaimo. The past two years I followed Namopaimo closely on Jennifer Buxton's blog but couldn't participate and I really felt like I was missing out. So when January came around again and the first Namopaimo announcement was posted, I decided that this year I was not going to live vicariously through Jennifer's blogposts. I hunted down a body, decided on a color, paid the optional $2 entry fee and sent in my submission. It's happening!

This my victim: a Breyer Paint Me A Pepto. Funny side story here. There is a webshop in the Netherlands that sells Breyers. I suspect they did some automated translating on some of their products, because they sell this horse as "Verf een Pepto", which is Dutch for Paint a Pepto. I'm now actually going to paint a Pepto and that made me chuckle. If her paintjob turns out somewhat showable (I can have high hopes, right?) she needs a show name along the lines of Pepto Has Been Painted. But let's not gallop too far ahead.

She will be buckskin. I envision her as a slightly sooty buckskin with faint dappling, three white socks with ermine spots and a tiny star. We'll see how that goes. I'm not exactly an accomplished painter. As far as model horses go I've only painted a stablemate once and it still hasn't got its eyes or hooves painted. My medium will be pastels for the coat and acrylics for the details. I entered as a 'beginner' and my personal goal is to actually finish my model this time. These photos will be my main reference for everything but the markings.

I'm not the only hobbyist in the Netherlands who is participating in Namopaimo this year. Anna Dobrowolska-Oczko of Horse and Bird studio hosted a prepping party yesterday and the turnout was good. In the photo you can see Marjolein, Marchella, Niels (Marchella's boyfriend), Anna and myself. Anna is a great sculptor and had some helpful tips, tricks and advice for us. There was some seam removal, some hoof adjusting, some airhole relocation, but mostly there was a whole lot of sanding. The black paint on my Pepto was very rough and I've been sanding for hours. Good company made that so much more bearable. I'm very grateful to Anna for inviting us!

Since I deleted my facebook account 2 years ago I'll be posting my Namopaimo progress here. I'm sad to miss out on the tutorials and the awesome community in the facebook group, but hey, at least I'm finally participating.

Namopaimo will certainly not be the only thing I'm going to talk to you about, although it will be my main focus for the next month and a half. There will also be posts about tack and props that I made and that I'm currently working on. Most notably a bridle to go with my western pleasure saddle (the one with 165 flowers carved and tooled into it (yes, I counted them)) and two in progress Crow women's ceremonial horse costumes. Because of course it makes sense to start a second one before the first one is even finished. But that's for another time.

Ground poles

The above picture shows the ground poles I made for my friend. I really like the color scheme and I think they stand out from other ground poles. It was hard to give them away, haha! The next picture shows my donation for Hearts n Horses Live Show on February 12, in Leeuwarden. They were originally intended for the ChocoTastic Live Show last month but because there were only four entrants Erin decided to keep them for the big show. The Christmas theme is a little out of place in February but I think they're nice regardless of the time of the year :)

On the workbench

This is only part of what I've been working on. In the past two months I've made two sets of ground poles. One set as a donation to Hearts N Horses Live Show and one set as a gift to my friend and live show buddy Marcelino. I do have pictures of them but I'll have to see where exaclte they are. On this picture you see the arena wall that I'm building, a barrel and a headless horsewoman. The arena wall and the barrel need more paint and the doll is in need of some plastic surgery (haha!) and new clothes.

Jump!

Can you guess what jump I'm building? The flash washed out the color; it's really a darker blue. Please excuse the mess in the background, I just snapped a quick pic ;)

Almost wordless Sunday

My mini Fabrizio is currently being prepped and will then be painted a yummy chestnut with four white socks and a blaze. He'll be painted by the Dutch painter Birgitte Konings :)

Current state of affairs

There's still a lot to do but it looks like I'll be able to finish my saddle in time for the show. I haven't got much time to write so for now you'll have to do with these two photos I took earlier today. Only six days left before we leave for Leeuwarden! Now back to tooling the upper skirt ;)