This week I interviewed long time member Snapdragon! Thanks so much!
Where did you get your user name? It’s funny, because ‘snapdragon’ was kind of a random pick! When I joined the MLPArena I hadn’t been on any other pony forums, so I didn’t have a persona or anything to use. I tried to think of a cool name, and I started going through flower names - and a snapdragon is cool because it has ‘dragon’ in it, and dragons are definitely pony-ish! And it just stuck!
How old are you? 36!
Do you go to school or work? Work!
What are your hobbies? I collect MLP (obviously!) but I also customize them, and I just love art/crafty stuff in general! I also love to play video games and write. Sometimes it feels like I have too many hobbies for hours in the day!
Do you have any pets? I live with several silly kitties!
What do you like/dislike about yourself? I like my sense of humor, I’m good at coming up with jokes on the fly!I wish I was a little better about procrastination though - everything tends to get left to the last second!
If you could live anywhere in the world, where would it be? I’d love to be somewhere warm like Hawai’i, but I’d also really enjoy Ireland!
Do you collect anything other than ponies? I used to joke as a kid that I had a collection of collections, and I still kind of do! As a kid it was Beanie Babies, but now I collect Breyer horses as well as Monster High and random other toylines that catch my eye! I try to grab only the dolls I really like, so I have a handful of Rainbow High dolls, Creatable World, Strawberry Shortcake and Moondreamers! I also tend to pick up Pokemon figures whenever they make new Eeveelutions. And to be totally clear - I still grab the occasional Beanie Baby!
Ponies-
How long have you been collecting ponies? I collected G1 as a kid, although I was born not long before the G1 line ended. I shifted to Beanie Babies as I became a preteen and playing with ponies seemed ‘uncool’. When G2 came around my mom commented, ‘hey, don’t you have some of the older ones? Let’s get one!’ and I was sucked back in! By G3 I was a full blown collector, although I hadn’t joined any online forums yet. Luckily I never got rid of any of them, and when I got on eBay I thought I’d just pick up the ponies I had never found as a kid and complete my childhood pony families. Years later, here I am! I loved scrolling through the Ring of Rainbows, but I spent most of my time on Aikarin’s custom pony website and Kimberly Shirner’s Dream Valley page! I printed all of Dream Valley out, and I put it in a 3-ring binder and would pour over it to improve my pony knowledge.
Why did you start collecting ponies? Since I received my first pony when I was really small, it’s hard to know exactly what drew me in! But as I grew up I always had that sort of collecting impulse, and I liked having collections of things! Sometimes it was rocks or sticks, but it graduated to toys. It’s hard to say why MLP, exactly. It makes me happy to look at them! I’ve always loved animals (especially horses), and I have many nostalgic memories of them from my childhood. As a kid I played more with Barbie, and that’s what most of my friends wanted to play with. But as I became more of a ‘collector’ I found myself drawn to MLP!
Who is your favorite pony and why? Ooh, the impossible choice!! This is so tough, because I feel like my tastes fluctuate on a weekly if not daily basis. I keep coming back to Glory, though; that classic white unicorn base with the dark purple mane, and the blue eyes? The glittery shooting star? She’s amazing! She was one of my favorites as a kid too! But honorable mention goes to TAF Milky Way and Nightglider, both stunning spacey ponies!
Who is your least favorite pony and why? Oh no! It’s sad, because with her colors she has the potential to be another Mimic… but I just hate the Tootsie pose so much, and as a pony, she just doesn’t wow me. I also feel like Dance N Prance Twirler takes an honorable mention on my Most Hated list, only because I ended up with like five of them from various eBay lots, and nobody wants them! And it’s such a muddy pink for her body color, she looks perpetually grungy… who did this to poor Twirler!?! At least Tootsie is a green pony in a line with very few green ponies, what does Twirler have going for her?!
Who is your favorite pony from another country? I really want a Takara pony, but in terms of beauty, I keep coming back to the Argentinian ponies! I own a Baby Posey, and she was gifted to me in such a sweet way that she really stands out to me. I love that so many ponies who didn’t have babies got them in foreign markets! So one of my collector goals is to someday get an Argentinian Baby Sparkler, or one of the Brillitos! I love them! (Plus, hello, Glory pose!)
Who is your favorite fakie? Concerned Pony!! Or Señor Fakiepants! But to be fair, I love fakies like a WHOLE LOT, and I have a million of them! So Totsy gets a close second place, with their evil little menacing faces! I had two as a kid, and they were the kindly aunties! How did that happen?? OH I almost forgot the new Hairdorables unicorns! They’re so cute and affordable - I keep buying more and more! (Can you tell I’m bad at picking just one favorite anything?)
Who was your first pony? G1 Dancing Butterflies!
What pony did you get recently? Probably a G5 pony! Wait, no! I just bought a G1 Mail Order Birthflower December Holly off of eBay! She’s so cute!
What is your favorite generation? It’s gotta be G1! It’s probably mostly nostalgia, but I love how they feel in your hand, and their squishiness. They have so much hair too!
What is your favorite part about collecting? The thrill of the hunt is probably the addictive part of collecting, but I also just love to look at them and admire them on my shelf. It’s funny, but when I think about what I do most often with my ponies, it’s restoring them! There’s just something so satisfying about taking a sad, grimy pony with tangled hair, and restoring her to beauty.
How big is your collection? I did a ‘full count’ in 2016 that had me at 3200 ponies, but that was before G5 hit… so I’ve gotten a lot more since then, LOL! I’d assume I’m probably around 5000 now? Maybe I’m due for another count!
What do your friends and family think about your collection? My family has varying levels of acceptance, LOL! But they help me hunt for ponies! And my friends are very supportive, we help each other collect our toys of choice!
Do you still play with your ponies? It depends on the use of the word play! Do I get down on the floor and act out little scenes? Not so much anymore! But I do write fanfiction, including backstories for the custom ponies I make. I still have the same creativity of play with my ponies, it just has a different outlet now!
What rare or popular pony makes you ask why!? Maybe the South African ponies! On an intellectual level, I totally understand that they’re super rare. But the paint application is just so bad, they kind of look like fakies! It’s not a pony I could see spending $1300+ on, which I suppose is very lucky for my pocketbook!
If you had to have a pony symbol tattooed on your butt, which would you pick and why? LOL!! Umm, my heart wants to say Glory (my beloved!) but maybe I’d go for Milky Way, simply because a simple cluster of stars would be really pretty!
If you could have any pony remade in a different generation, who would you choose and why? Hear me out: Mail Order Mommy and Baby Kitty. They are SO unique with that dark purple color, and they were probably some of the top favorites in my childhood herd! Everybody loves cats, and collectors would love getting another shot at them! Alternatively, Baby Chuck E Cheese, because she’s so weird and fun! I’d love to see them all in G3 form, but any re-release would be great!
What has been the worst part about collecting? This is a toughie… I hate to sound too cynical, but both the best and worst part is probably other people. I won’t go into details, but I have seen some very nasty and shady real life effects from people in this community. That said, I’ve made a lot of friends through collecting, and there’s a huge amount of really kind, friendly people who also love ponies! You just gotta stick around long enough to find your people.
What is your ultimate collecting goal? To have ALL THE PONIES! Well, not ALL; but I would like to own the entire US and European G1 releases! Ditto for G2, G3, and so on. I don’t need every single variant every country has ever made, but I’d like the ‘main’ lines! Plus, someday, I want at least one Piggy Pony and Takara!
What is your biggest collecting accomplishment? A toughie!! Part of me wants to say the sheer size of my collection is my biggest accomplishment, since it’s taken decades to build. But I’m also really proud of my giant custom G3 pony that I won from the MLP Fair! She’s a stunner, and she’s huge! She uses the same giant base as the My Little Pony Project ponies!
What is your biggest collecting regret? Luckily my memory isn’t good enough to hold onto every regret, LOL! One of them might be not bidding up a prototype G3 I saw on eBay; at the time I thought, that’s just a weird looking pony, I won’t bid too much, she’s probably just faded. Then someone outbid me and posted on the MLPArena about what a cool prototype they won! And they got her for so cheap, because I didn’t bid higher!
Who is your grail pony and why?
Do you have it? I thought a grail pony had to be one you didn’t own yet! So I generally say that my grail is the giant G3 blankie pony, because someday I’d love to own one that’s all-white and unpainted! I just love how cool the G3 blanks look, and a giant one would be awesome to own. But my grail (if I didn’t own them) would probably be MO Mommy and Baby Pony, because of their rarity and my love of purple and cats! And my grail up until last year was Mountain Boy Tornado, but I finally found one, and now my Mountain Boys are complete!
Do you prefer loose or MIP ponies? Loose! I love to handle them and set them up for photos!
Quick! Close your eyes and grab a pony! Who did you get? A G1 Peachy that I rehaired in several different pinks! (I only have a few ponies near my computer right now, so odds were even that it would be her, baity Baby Glory, or a custom Baby Blue Belle!)
Are you a customizer? Yes!
Would you ever be? I am even planning to branch out into customizing other toys, like dolls! So I think it was really just a matter of time for me to start customizing ponies, because clearly I just gotta put paint on toys! I love art, and my first custom pony was back when I was a teenager - using nail polish on a fakie!
What do you think of custom ponies? I love them! I think it’s a great way to give a sad pony new life.
What are acceptable and unacceptable pony flaws, in your opinion? Unacceptable would be head-body mismatch; I just can’t stand it. It gives Frankenstein vibes! (And yet one of my most beloved eBay finds this year was a mismatched Peachy body/Moonstone head, go figure!) I don’t really love plastic breakdown either, like age spots or mold spots, but I genuinely loathe the head-body mismatch and sticky ponies. Acceptable would be hair trims (I can usually look past it or just plan for a rehair), but the only flaw I truly don’t care about is writing under the hooves. I won’t be seeing it! And usually it’s something really sweet, like the name of the pony or the owner. It makes me feel like I’ve adopted someone’s beloved childhood friend, like the Velveteen Rabbit!
Would you rather have a bait pony or a fakie? Tough question for sure! It would also depend on the pony; is it a clunky glass-eyed CPK fakie that I have ten of already? Is it a sticky brown Starshine? For the sake of the question, I’ll say bait pony, just because I’d probably be more inclined to do something with it (customizing/restore), whereas the fakie may just get added to the ever growing mountain of fakies in my room!
Do you watch pony shows/movies? Yes!
Which ones? All of them! I even watched the Newborn Cuties shorts, LOL! I have huge nostalgia for the original Firefly’s Adventure and the MLP Movie for G1, but I really loved the G4 movie a lot! Tempest Shadow was such an interesting character, we haven’t seen a lot of villain ponies who were so dangerous.
Do you read pony comics? Somewhat!
Which ones? I picked up the first few issues of the G4 comic when they first came out, and quickly realized that my interest was rapidly outpaced by how often they came out. But I did enjoy the ones I read, and I picked up the issues about the Pillars of Harmony last year!
What is the worst thing you've ever done to a pony? Does dropping them into a pot of boiling-hot dye count? The thing I feel most guilty about is probably ripping off neck plugs accidentally. Pink Dreams’ neck plug will live in my nightmares forever!
Fill in the blank!
"I wish Hasbro would
make more unique pony characters for the toys! They don’t need to have a big appearance on the show, just make cute designs!"
"When I was new to ponies I didn't know
that you aren’t supposed to brush the curls once they’re dry! Hellooooooo frizz!"
"I think the most underappreciated pony is
Princess Royal Pink because
SHE’S SERVING GLAMOROUS LOOKS OKAY"
"I think more ponies should have
appropriate amounts of hair in their mane AND tail - it’s called ‘hair play’ for a reason, how can a child style a tail thinner than a pencil!?"
"I don't like
gimmicky ponies because
as a child I really preferred the ‘regular’ ponies, and I can’t explain exactly why! Maybe because they stood out from the other ponies, and often had clunky knobs or buttons sticking out of them."
"I love
My Little Pony because
collecting them makes me happy! The thrill of the hunt means I’m always looking for them, and even just seeing them makes me smile."
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