The great Pony Room Reorg - volume 3

I'm making progress!   ...I think.

I spent the better part of yesterday down in the Pony Room continuing the reorg that was put on hold for the last several weeks.  The goal of the day was to get the G2 and G3 playsets out and set up, which was nearly completely accomplished.

With less than two months to go before the Holiday Display (Epic Version) needs to be set up, I've got that in mind while setting up the playsets.  The G2 and G3 playsets are, for the most part, fitting nicely on the bookshelves donated by a friend when she moved out of town.  Ideally I'd eventually like to move the G2s onto the floor to have them spaced out a little better.  But I'm really liking the "street view" that I can set up with the G3 stores.  I think that's going to look great once their decorated for the Holidays.  I just hope I can find some appropriately-sized lamp posts.  That would make me insanely happy.

On the top of the shelves we have the larger playsets, the dance studio and the castle.  The castle really is too big for that space, but I think it'll be staying there for the foreseeable future.  I did want to keep the Ponyville town sets all together.  (The larger Butterfly Island and Crystal Rainbow Castle sets will be on the floor.  And I haven't found space for the Rainbow Wishes Amusement Park yet.)

In addition to setting up most of the playsets I also cleared away some of the piles of stuff still sitting in bags and boxes in the centre of the room.  I'm extremely happy to finally have my Pound Puppies and Purries on display again!  The majority of these were from my childhood.  Along with MLP, they were some of my favourite toys, but unlike the MLP I actually kept my childhood collection.  Spot, the worn out white Puppy on the top of the pile was my favourite childhood toy.  I got her when I was five and she went everywhere with me for years.  Now she's enjoying her retirement with the rest of the gang in the Pony Room where they are safe from kitten attacks.

Ultimately, I got a lot done yesterday.  But the room is now at that stage of organization where it's getting messier before it gets cleaner.  At least, that's what I'm telling myself as I look at the mess I made yesterday.

Elf

Customizing Night In Canada

It's Saturday night, sometime between October and April, and that usually means two things: Hockey Night In Canada is on the television and the customizing supplies are out.

Rather stereotypically, I'm a Canadian that is obssessed with hockey.  Even on nights like tonight, when my favourite team isn't playing, I still watch the games as often as I can.  I'm lucky to have an understanding roommate, who pretty much lets me watch as much hockey as I can get (which is alot.)

Customizing Night In Canada

But I rarely just sit and watch tv, I'm usually doing something while the box is on.  On Saturday nights, what I'm doing is usually customizing.  Hockey Night In Canada works as customizing time for me for a few reasons, but the main one is this: it's a three to six hour period where there's something on tv that I'm happy to watch for that long.  There's not break in the customizing action to flip around looking for something interesting.  And to be perfectly honest, a lot of the customizing process just isn't that interesting in and of itself.

Take rehairing, for example.  You've got your colours picked out, you sit down with your bait and your rehairing tool, and you go at it.  It's great to see the pony coming to life under your hand, but the process itself doesn't take much concentration or thought.

Pamplo "helping"

Rehairing, bait prep, sealing, full body repaints, sanding, are all parts of the process that are necessary to the creation of the custom, and they are all things that need to be done well if the finished product is going to have a polished look.  But they don't require the concentration needed for things like sculpting and detail painting.  So when you're doing them it helps to have something interesting to occupy your mind so that you don't get bored during the work and do a sloppy job.  Just make sure it's something that you don't mind only half watching...customizing and hockey playoff games don't mix!

Elf

The great Pony Room Reorg - volume 2

The following day I returned to the new Pony room (once I managed to wobble down the stairs on stiff legs.)  I wanted to set up one display so that I would feel like I had finished something other than just relocating the ponies.  Since all the Ponyville stuff was packed in one box, I set up my Ponyville display.  This is basically a micro version of what I'm envisioning for the whole room, space to display all the playsets, along with the ponies.

 The next weekend I was down in the Pony room Saturday morning anxious to start organizing and unpacking (I actually got up early on a weekend...I'm a little bit ashamed of that.)  My goal for that day was to get the rest of the furniture arranged and the Ponies themselves unpacked.  Since they were only going down two flights of stairs they were packed (read: piled) inside rubbermaid tubs.  (Not the customs, the customs were packed carefully.  We're talking about the Hasbro ponies here.)  I didn't want to leave them in there for longer than necessary just in case anyone should get damaged.

Roomy wandered down shortly after the furniture had been moved, good timing there, ;P and helped me unpack the Ponies.  The G1s I made a half hearted attempt at organizing.  The G2s are more or less in the order I want them.  The G3s I tried to group loosely into sets.  You see, earlier this year I had begun to catalogue my collection, and that meant cleaning and photographing all the sets, as well as recording any flaws that anyone had.  The G1s and G2s are done, but I haven't managed to get to the G3s yet.  That was why I wanted them grouped into sets, so that it was easier to grab a set of ponies without missing anyone.  I didn't do a particularly good job at grouping them, so I'll have to go back with my G3 Guide and re-arrange everyone.

In any case, all the regular release Ponies are out on display now.  More or less.

Elf

The great Pony Room Reorg - volume 1

As an aside from customizing...

What happens when you have 457 Ponies (not counting customs, plushies, Ponyville, or merchandise) and a very small pony room?

Chaos and destruction.  And a lot of dust.

Big pile of Ponies upstairs

This past July at the 2010 MLP Fair, my roommate and I were sitting at my booth.  I was lamenting that I didn't want to buy any playsets because I didn't have space to display them.  She was lamenting that her writing room (she's a published author) was dark and she didn't know what to do with all the space.

And then it slowly dawned on us that if we could switch rooms we'd both be that much happier.  And so it began.

First, we needed to put up some kind of a door on the writing room in the basement.  Kittens may be cute, but they have a taste for Ponies.  This was soon accomplished and then the move could begin.  We asked a couple of friends over to help move the heavier stuff and Roomy and I went up and down stairs for the better part of the morning carrying books up and ponies down.  The next day we whined a lot, because our legs really hurt.  But everything had been relocated.

Big pile of Ponies downstairs

Roomy's new writing room was pretty much set up in a couple of hours.  With the new Pony room I'm planning to have it all set up before Christmas.  Probably not much before, but I am planning to set up my usual Holiday Pony Scene this year (epic version.)

Regular updates to come.

Elf