Monday, March 18, 2019

Southern New England Winter Round Up... Round Up

Long time no see! I'm doing my best to start reviving some of my hobby social media, including this blog, now that I've officially graduated college (yikes!) and am back home with my horses again. To kick things off, I recently attended my first local model horse show in over three years - Southern New England Winter Round Up in Spencer, MA!

SNEWRU, as we all affectionately refer to it as, has quickly become one of the highest-attended model horse shows in Region 10. Held by Brenda Bednar, SNEWRU began in 2013 and has grown into a two-day show spanning pretty much every division you can think of - OF, custom, performance, china - it's all there. It sells out at least a solid month or two in advance, and rightly so! This is exactly why it took me until 2019 to attend for the first time - I drag my feet.

The drive to Spencer was a tad bit hairy - thankfully I'm only about an hour away, but early morning snow sent my car into a half-spin on one of my last turns and my life flashed before my eyes, thinking of the precious cargo in my back seat and trunk. Ah, New England, where we can have a strangely mild February but the snow comes back with a vengeance once March rolls around.

I certainly was intimidated walking into SNEWRU for my first local show in so long - I've always heard the competition is stiff and I'm a bit rusty after such a long break! I was very pleasantly surprised by my results, though - the day started off with a reserve champ in collectibility by my preproduction sample model of Copperfox's "Loughnatousa Fabio" that I purchased a few months ago from the company's archive liquidation, affectionately dubbed "Dr. Strangelove." Not too bad for his first time out! And those rosettes were KILLER.

"Dr Strangelove" - Reserve Champion of OF Sport Breed Collectibility
I also had a lot of success in the pony breed division, taking away a nice handful of collectibility NAN cards for some of my rarer Newsworthys (Newsworthies?) and glossy Copperfoxes. However, my highlight of the day was taking the champion of pony breed halter with my Copperfox "Celtic Warrior," who was also at his first show ever. His show name is "Swyn Lwcus," which happens to be Welsh for "lucky charm." Coincidence? Probably. But fate works in mysterious ways. My Copperfoxes certainly did me proud!

"Swyn Lwcus" - Champion of OF Pony Breeds Halter

Although that was it for my big titles for the day, I was shocked at just how well my horses did overall. I totaled up 14 NAN cards and a fistful of placings. I'd say roughly 80% of my models received at least one ribbon, which is pretty impressive considering SNEWRU only places to 6th and many of the OF classes have at least a few dozen models in them. I guess my knack didn't quite fade away after all.

"Screamadelica" snagged a 2nd in a HUGE Arabian
class - it's been a while since her last NAN card!
Unfortunately, this year's SNEWRU also had a tinge of sadness to it - this was the last show to be held at what has been long considered the "center of the model horse universe," or at least Region 10's - the Spencer Knights of Columbus hall. As of April 1st, the hall will become... storage space for an appliance store (cue boos here). With that, we're collectively scrambling to find show halls that compare in both space and affordability, but it's already proving to be a difficult task.

One of my earliest model horse memories is wandering into the Spencer hall around 2006 to check out what I now know was a model horse show, but my dad and I figured it was just a place with vendors selling Breyers! I'm almost positive it was one of the many performance shows that were held there, because I vividly remember looking at a performance setup with a Tregoyd Journeyman model. Anywho, there was a single vendor there selling models and that day I purchased Spectacular Bid on the Man O War mold.

He desperately needs a new photo.
The KoC has been with Region 10 for basically as long as I've been alive, and it's a shame to see it go. Here's hoping that we can find a new home for plastic pony fun in southern New England, especially one that won't totally break the bank!

My next show is coming up quickly - Mid-Atlantic Regional on the 31st, which will also be my very first Region 9 show! I'm woefully behind on my show prep, so I think that will be my main project this week. Maybe someday I'll kick the procrastination habit.