Posts Tagged by #elaynewatrus

BreyerWest 2017 Part I

March 25, 2017

Posted by aidanstoytrove under Model Horse

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BreyerWest 2017 Part I

BreyerWest 2017 is now in full swing. We had a rather rough start to the trip. We had a hard time cramming everything into the trailer. We hit the road around 8:30am on Thursday. Less than a half mile into the trip we heard a large BANG and SCREEEEEEECH coming from the cargo trailer. It sounded like a tire had blown. Luckily, we were in a spot that we could easily pull over at. It ended up being the tow stand. We forgot to put the locking pin in place, phew!

We drove the trailer for the very first time on Highway 199 which is a very narrow windy road which drops off a cliff into the Smith River. Driving parts of that road can be rather nail biting. Once we hit Interstate 5 it was clear sailing. We stopped for a quick lunch in Roseburg and arrived at the Linn County Fairgrounds around 2:30pm. I quickly ran into the Expo to meet my new friend, Elayne Watrus who is vending beside us. That was quite exciting but then the real work began.

In order to fit all of our model horse inventory inside of the trailer, the shelves had to be assembled inside of it. This meant that we had to pull ALL the inventory off the shelves before we could unload the shelves from the trailer and begin setting up our booth. We checked the weather and it was supposed to start raining at 6pm and I kept checking the time. Moving the shelves inside the Expo and tweaking them was quite the chore. Then the banner refused to connect where we wanted it. We were finally starting to load inventory onto the shelves when it proceeded to dump rain outside, right on top of all of the inventory that we had just dragged to the side of the trailer in order to unload the shelves. We all darted outside to drag the inventory back into the trailer but the boxes still got pretty wet and we were positively drenched.

We worked on the booth until 11pm on Thursday evening. We were the last people in the building and still had setting up to do in the morning. Exhausted, we dragged ourselves to the car and unhitched the trailer, or rather TRIED to unhitch the trailer. It seemed to be stuck on the tow ball. We eventually got it off after a lot of prying and fiddling and even a few choice words. Even more frustrating, the trailer is not hitching correctly now but is a problem that we will have to solve before we leave on Sunday.

We opted to stay in a hotel in Salem as it was considerably cheaper than staying close to the Fairgrounds. We drove to the hotel and checked in. We had FOUR big boxes waiting for us when we arrived. 3 were full of Copperfox Horses and one had some customs that were being returned after having been repaired. We filled up a hotel cart with all the boxes and our laptops and lugged our suitcases behind us as the cart was completely full. We went up to the fourth floor where our room was. When we opened the door to our room, SURPRISE, the bed was unmade and there were empty bottles on the counter. We trooped on back down to the front desk to request a new room. The second room worked out just fine but gosh we were all so grumpy! We hadn’t eaten in 12 hours and the only open food place we could find was Dennys but hey, it was food!

We finished eating and went back to the hotel where I dove into the contents of the Copperfox boxes. Hubby typed away at some pricing sheets for our sales booth. When we were finished (or finished enough to finish in the morning, LOL) it was creeping up on 3am. Our alarm was set for 7am. I had a hard time getting out of bed but we arrived back and the Horse Fair and Expo center right around setup time at 8am. I helped finish what I could in the booth until 9am when I needed to switch over to BreyerWest show mode. Last year, the BreyerWest Open Show ended fairly early and we scheduled the Copperfox Horses to go on sale at 3pm. I was hoping that this would give everyone a chance to take a good look at the horses and that the show would be nearing the end around 3pm. WRONG. The show ran until closer to 6pm. My hubby, the trooper that he is, dealt with a whole MOB of people wanting to purchase Copperfox horses. We were happily able to rehome 10 of the horses and ponies on Friday. We will have more horses available on Saturday and hopefully some on Sunday as well.

I’ll try to write a bit more about the BreyerWest Open show tomorrow and I will take some more pictures tomorrow too. Goodnight everyone!

BreyerWest 2017 YouTube Video Playlist

BreyerWest 2017 Part 1 Blog Post

BreyerWest 2017 Part 3 Blog Post

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BreyerWest 2017 Here We Come!

March 18, 2017

Posted by aidanstoytrove under Model Horse

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BreyerWest 2017 Here We Come!

Oh my goodness how time FLIES. Where on earth did the entire beginning to the year 2017 go??? This year, Aidan’s Toy Trove will be vending for the first time at BreyerWest 2017! We had grand plans of running advertisements so people would know to look for us but guess what? That never happened and BreyerWest is now officially less than 1 week away! We are currently winding down on online sales to give us time to prepare for BreyerWest. We will be bringing HUNDREDS of model horses to sell, new and used.

BreyerWest takes place at the Northwest Horse Fair and Expo in Albany Oregon. BreyerWest will be inside the Santiam building at the Horse Expo and runs for 3 days, March 24^th – 26^th. You can see the schedule for all 3 days of the Horse Expo (including that of BreyerWest ) at this link:

http://equinepromotions.net/northwest-horse-fair/attend/schedule/

There are lot of real horse events going on the entire time and TONS of shopping, for everything horse! And this of course includes shopping for model horses! Our booth is number is V8 within the Santiam building and will be diagonal from BreyerWest. We will be vending alongside Elayne Watrus who will have a large selection of her Breyer Custom Steampunk Horses for sale!

BreyerWest will be hosting the Open Model Horse Show on Friday and the Youth Model Horse Show on Saturday. On top of this, there will be workshops run by top hobbyists. These will be both free and paid. And of course, there will be free Stablemate Painting all 3 days!

If you are lucky enough to be attending the Northwest Horse Fair and Expo, please stop by our booth and say hi!

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Breyer Custom Steampunk Horses by Elayne Watrus Ending Saturday

March 3, 2017

Posted by aidanstoytrove under Model Horse

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Breyer Custom Steampunk Horses by Elayne Watrus Ending Saturday

Elayne Watrus has 2 new Breyer Custom Steampunk Horse creations ending on eBay Saturday morning. Please check them out 🙂

The first is a beautiful Big Ben in steampunk attire.

His auction ends Saturday at 10:19am PST.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/162409393691

Here is what Elayne has to say about him:

Custom Traditional Breyer horse “Big Ben” OOAK

Big Ben has got to be my favorite Breyer mold! This gorgeous customized version is sure to be a prized addition to your collection. This is truly a one of a kind work of art that you will be able to treasure and display for years to come.

The second is a very cool Silver in steampunk style.

His auction ends on Saturday at 10:30am PST.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/162409405216

Here is what Elayne has to say about him:

OOAK Custom Breyer Traditional Horse “Silver”

I am offering one of my custom Breyer horses. Adorned with gears, wire, nuts and bolts, this stunning version of the rearing stallion, Silver, will be a unique work of art that you will treasure for years.

Elayne will be selling a whole herd of her steampunk creations at BreyerWest 2017. Elayne’s booth will be next to our Aidan’s Toy Trove Breyer booth! We will be bringing hundreds of Breyer horses to sell. If you are attending BreyerWest, please stop by and say hi! Our booths will be within eye shot of the actual BreyerWest Event inside the Santiam building.

You can read more about Elayne Watrus and see more of her artwork in my original blog post which is linked below:

https://aidanstoytrove.com/theres-new-artist-town-dont-miss-auctions-elayne-watrus/

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There’s a New Artist In Town – Don’t Miss These Auctions by Elayne Watrus!

February 1, 2017

Posted by aidanstoytrove under Model Horse

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There’s a New Artist In Town – Don’t Miss These Auctions by Elayne Watrus!

I very rarely make this type of post, but I feel this particular artist is very deserving. Her name is Elayne Watrus and she has been customizing Breyer horses that have been geared towards the art community. Elayne has sold hundreds of her custom horses without having ever heard about the model horse hobby.

I am a huge fan of custom Breyer horses and I was utterly shocked when Elayne contacted me to ask about the model horse hobby. How had I MISSED such a unique and brilliant artist? I have collected custom Breyer horses for over a dozen years and I keep a close eye on up and coming artists. I took one look at Elayne’s creative steampunk horse sculpture creations and I was hooked.

Elayne and I have been chatting about the hobby off and on and she is beginning to dip her toes into the model horse hobby. I am beyond excited to announce that Aidan’s Toy Trove will be officially vending at BreyerWest 2017 alongside Elayne Watrus.

I will be making another post about BreyerWest 2017 but Elayne has some magnificent auctions ending on eBay tonight. I wanted to share them before it was too late. Please have a look at Elayne’s eBay auctions!

Elayne’s eBay handle is rrpowbaby and she has THREE (technically four if you count the Susecion and Le Fire as two 🙂 steampunk horses to feast your eyes upon!