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Topics - LadyAmalthea
1
« on: January 11, 2023, 06:50:13 AM »
Hi all! I haven't been on much lately...kids and school are keeping me busy. But as I was perusing the aisles of clearance Christmas items, I realized that I completely forgot to look for this year's MLP ornament! When I got home, I tried to Google it, but the only thing I could find for 2022 was Zipp, and a really hideous Pinkie Pie one. Did Hallmark not release a G1 ornament this year?
I bought the Zipp ornament for 75% off. I'm not really into G5, but if I had to like one of the characters, it would be Zipp.
2
« on: January 04, 2023, 09:22:56 AM »
Sorry this is so long...I'm not good at condensing my words! But anyway...I can't believe I was so dumb. I responded to a marketplace posting on Christmas Eve. I asked if the seller was willing to ship the item. She responded the next day when I was right in the middle of my family's Christmas celebration, so I was admittedly distracted. She asked for my zip so she could quote shipping, and she did. I didn't really have a chance to respond yay or nay until later that evening when I got home, and when I tried to reply that I did want the item, the message wouldn't send. I tried several times, but kept getting the same error message. I couldn't even seem to get back to the original posting or view the seller's profile. I finally gave up, figuring maybe she had sold it to someone who responded quicker than I did, and had deleted the post. So I went to bed.
The next morning, I had an idea; my phone has been really full and I had taken lots of pics at my parents' house of the kids. So I thought maybe that was the problem, and cleared a bunch of stuff out. It then let me send a message...I apologized for the delay and said I was still interested if the item was still available. I didn't hear back for several days. Wednesday she messaged back and said that HER messenger had been screwy for a couple of days and apologized, and said yes, the item was available. I asked if she took PayPal, and she said no, she doesn't have PayPal, but I should be able to pay through FB messenger and use PayPal. I went in and figured it out, however when it gave me the option to use PayPal it said there would be fees, so since it just let me pay with a debit card without going through PayPal, I did. (Apparently, this is called MetaPay?) I probably would have been more circumspect about this, but during this conversation, I was running errands and driving around, and I just wanted the transaction over with. Stupid!! She said she would most likely mail it out the following day at lunchtime.
That would have been Thursday. I know it hasn't even been a week, but I just got a nagging bad feeling even the next day about the transaction. She never messaged to say she had sent the item out, or gave a tracking number or anything. I figured I'd give her a couple of days; it was a holiday week. But then yesterday I decided to message her asking if there was a tracking number, and I just got an error message again, just like I did on Christmas night.
I'm a little freaked out that I can't get ahold of this person. I'm not really buying the 'my phone is messed up' excuse a second time. I admit that I'm completely new to buying and selling online, and I probably should have vetted this person out a little more before blindly buying from her. I'm also very inexperienced on the workings of Facebook, as I do not use it on a regular basis as a social network, only the occasional marketplace transaction (up until now, only local cash transactions), and I don't even have the Facebook app; I only access it through my phone's browser. I'm also a little worried, because I gave this person my address...not sure if she could use that as a verification somewhere to get more money out of my account...I did check my bank account and while the amount for the transaction came out as expected, there is no other suspicious activity.
Do I have any recourse at all, through MetaPay? If there is in fact a way to file a claim, how long should I wait? I'm not sure 6 days is a fair amount of time to give someone before filing, but I don't want to give her any extra time to obliterate her account or, basically find a way to 'disappear', if she hasn't already. I did take screenshots of my entire conversation with her, as well as of the original post. Any help is appreciated!
3
« on: June 26, 2022, 10:47:42 AM »
Has anyone tried Dharma acid dye for dyeing ponies? After having the page saved in my browser for over a year, I finally sucked it up and ordered 2 different neon colors to try in the hopes of getting the color right for a custom I've been working on forever. Spent $20 between the 2 colors and the shipping...man, between the cost of the HQG1C blank, the several different colors of Rit dye I've already tried that didn't work, and the cost of the hair, I might as well have just found the pony I'm after and bought it outright, but if it works, I'll consider it a cost well-spent for, you know...pony science. 
4
« on: May 24, 2022, 09:15:41 AM »
Hi guys! I haven't been here on much lately. But I found these clear plastic risers at Target and thought I'd share...I know there have been threads before asking what people use to display their ponies on shelves to make the back row more visible, and when I saw these, this was the first use that came to mind! They were $5 for a 2-pack in the Target Dollar Spot up near the front of the store. Hope this helps somebody! Edit: sorry for the crappy picture, hope you can see it okay. visitors can't see pics , please register or login
5
« on: March 13, 2022, 02:32:55 PM »
visitors can't see pics , please register or loginvisitors can't see pics , please register or loginMy kids, like most people's kids, are constantly being asked to pick up their things. And probably like most people's kids, they usually fail to do it. So that it is that poor Lickety came to be in this predicament! The playroom door got left open while I ran the Roomba. Usually, the Roomba, named 'Mrs. Doubtfire', usually can't completely jump the transition strip between the kitchen and the playroom. However, my son apparently left his Basic Fun Lickety Split close enough to the strip that when Mrs. Doubtfire went in for her viscous attack, she succeeded in sucking up Lickety's forelock and some of her mane.  I'm going to try to pick through this mess of lint all twirled up with pony hair. However, should it not be salvageable, does anyone know of a hair color that would match her? Her hair is lighter (a 'whiter' pink) than her vintage counterpart, and not even the same as other Basic Fun ponies that have 'fading pink'. I compared her to Fizzy's pink and Lickety's is lighter and more matte. Untangling this rat's nest was not how I hoped to spend my afternoon, but seeing as no one else is gonna do it...  Any help is appreciated! **Updated with a (hopefully) better picture!
6
« on: February 21, 2022, 06:32:32 AM »
Hey everyone! It's been a while since I've been on here, much less made a post. But about a year ago, I started trying to make a custom Mimic out of an HQG1C base. I tried several different color combinations to get her color right...she eventually came out the color of G1 Minty. I put her in my sunfading window, and then eventually she spent the whole summer on the dashboard trying to fade the blue tinted out of her in the hopes that she might be more yellow-green. It worked to a point, and I think I'm getting closer, but I'm pretty sure she's going to have to have a quick dunk in a yellow dye bath before she's the right shade. Problem is, I don't have a real Mimic to compare her to. So...I'm wondering if someone could do me a couple of favors. First off, would anyone who has a Mimic be able to photograph her with some other green ponies for comparison? I realize she won't match any of them, but I think even trying to see how she compares to other ponies I do own would be helpful. Tootsie (standard version if possible, not a Nirvana variant), Minty, Baby Frosting, are ones that come to mind. The other thing someone could help with is to find a common household object or product that has packaging that matches her exactly. Preferably something that is sold in a common chain store that is pretty universal; I have my Mimic-in-progress pictured here with this Johnson's Baby Oil Lotion, which is about the exact color my test subject is currently. (If anyone has access to this lotion package and photograph their Mimic with it, that would be helpful too so I can see how far off I am!) Also paint samples! If anyone 'just happens' to be in the paint department with their Mimic and can find a sample that is an exact match, that's probably the best comparison, provided that it's a pretty universal paint store I can find in the midwest US (Home Depot, Lowes, Menards, Walmart, possibly even Sherwin Williams are ones I know we have). My photo doesn't really capture the color very well. It shows up still more 'aqua' than she really is: visitors can't see pics , please register or loginThanks so much in advance to anyone who can help!
7
« on: November 12, 2021, 08:27:15 AM »
Sorry it took me an extra day to get to them, but I unboxed the rest of the Basic Fun Twinkle-Eyed set. I added Gingerbread's photos to the Fizzy thread, and here I will post Sweet Stuff and Sky Rocket. visitors can't see pics , please register or loginHere is Sweet Stuff! She's so pretty! visitors can't see pics , please register or loginvisitors can't see pics , please register or loginvisitors can't see pics , please register or loginHere are some comparison photos of her with my original girl, who is, unfortunately, not that lovely. I thought I had sunfaded her head/body mismatch to an acceptable level, but pulling her out from a couple of months in storage, I see she has gone back to the way she was. She has a scraped eye and some unfortunate chew marks, but I believe that despite her slight discoloration, she is an accurate enough specimen to determine that the new Sweet Stuff is probably spot-on as far as matching the original color. Obviously the new one is brighter, but she looks to be the same shade that old SS might have been. Her eyes are pretty close as well. visitors can't see pics , please register or loginNow introducing...Sky Rocket! visitors can't see pics , please register or loginvisitors can't see pics , please register or loginMy original SR is really nice, as far as Sky Rockets go. Minimal discoloration, and decent eyes. But...this is interesting...the eyes on my original have more of a green or aqua tinge to them, where the new ones are blue with a slight purple iridescence to them. I compared them to Gingerbread's eyes, and they aren't quite the same-Gingy's are straight up blue. So maybe they just couldn't match the odd shade of her original eyes. visitors can't see pics , please register or loginMy Sky Rocket had these silver marks in between the rows of mane plugs...also one more on the outside of her mane. Not sure if they are guide marks from production or what. It looks like silver Sharpie. It doesn't really bother me too much, and maybe it will come off. visitors can't see pics , please register or loginAnother interesting observation: Sky Rocket's mane is rooted backwards compared to Gingy's and Sweet Stuff's-the long side of plugs is on the right (as you look at her head-on), where the long side is on the left on the other 2. I need to dig out the other set I bought to see if they are consistent with this, but I already put them away at the back of a basement closet for Christmas! visitors can't see pics , please register or loginStickers and combs! visitors can't see pics , please register or loginvisitors can't see pics , please register or loginvisitors can't see pics , please register or loginI should have added these to the Fizzy post, but I'm lazy, so I'll just add them here. To say that my original Fizzy is just 'not lovely' is the understatement of the year. Let's face it: she got in a fight with a dragon and lost. I was planning on rehairing her when I got sick, and she got packed up with all my other restoration projects. I'll get to her someday when I get some arm strength back again for reroots, I promise! But I pulled her out of convalescence to put her horn-to-horn with my new girl...pretty close in body and eye color, really! Even under all that dirt (or is it char and bits of cinders from her hair after that dragon attack?) One major observation is that the eyes on the new ponies are a bit bigger than the originals. Perhaps this was just the size of jewels that were available, and they just rolled with it. It doesn't detract from their cuteness, though! I hope you all enjoyed these posts and love the new TEs as much as I do!
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« on: November 11, 2021, 10:31:30 AM »
Hey all!  I haven't been on here much lately...I was dealing with some health concerns and I was not feeling too great about my collections for a while there. But the search for the Basic Fun Twinkle Eye ponies has gotten me a little excited again, and I finally found them this morning at Meijer! I made the trip solely for the purpose of looking for these, because I had a sort-of free morning, and the first store I tried was a bust. I did pick up Lickety and Cherries Jubilee there, so it wasn't a complete waste, and I almost didn't try the second store because it involved crossing town in the pouring rain and I figured both stores would have the same stock, but I figured I'd gone this far, so I schlepped out there and wasn't sorry I did! I know some people on here were curious about their eyes and how they compared to the originals, so I thought I'd post some pics for you! I opened Fizzy first. She is beautiful!! visitors can't see pics , please register or loginShe comes with a sticker! A welcome surprise, since the last set does not appear to have had them. visitors can't see pics , please register or loginThe box art is lovely! visitors can't see pics , please register or loginThis was annoying. I hate that they package the hair this way, but I've never seen product or glue put in the hair to secure it before, and I had to really work to get the ends free. I'll have to wash her hair to get it out. visitors can't see pics , please register or loginClose up of her eyes. They look really good! I think you guys are really going to be happy with these. Basic Fun didn't let us down! visitors can't see pics , please register or loginA front few of the eyes...I was hoping to be able to capture the sheen of them, but I'm not sure how well these will show up on here...I always seem to lose picture quality once I run them through the 3rd party site. visitors can't see pics , please register or loginAs you can see, I couldn't even wait to get them out of the car and into the house before tearing into one of them! I think she is just so stunning, and I hope they make the rest of the TE set. They did a really good job on these, I think; the colors seem more accurate than previous sets, and I can tell BF really wanted to get these right. This is my favorite set yet!! If anyone wants to see up close photos of the others, let me know, and I'll add them to this post...I didn't want to overwhelm the thread though. **Update** visitors can't see pics , please register or loginHere is Gingerbread!! I'll post a few more of her, and then maybe I'll start a separate thread for Sweet Stuff and Sky Rocket so no one has problems with the photos loading. visitors can't see pics , please register or loginvisitors can't see pics , please register or loginvisitors can't see pics , please register or loginShe is bright white and beautiful!! She doesn't have a forelock, which I have noticed some of the Basic Fun ponies do and others don't, regardless of their original design. I don't have an original Gingerbread to compare her to, as I never found a decent white one at a price I wanted to pay. Again, her hair had some sort of product in the ends to keep it from sliding out of that packaging strip, but it seemed easier to remove than Fizzy's. I hope her white isn't prone to discoloration; I've seen several BF Gustys online lately that are already yellowing or getting head/body mismatch.
9
« on: August 16, 2021, 05:14:19 PM »
So, I won an auction a few weeks ago. The item sold for about half of what it usually goes for, and shipping was under $5, when typically this item is at least $12 to ship within my country. I paid within a few hours of the auction's end.
For 4 days, there was no action from the seller. No notification of it having been shipped, no message, no acknowledgment that I had paid. Finally, on a Tuesday (auction ended on the previous Friday), I receive a message saying that they are unable to ship my item, due to a family emergency and they would be out of state; they would perhaps relist the item in the future. No talk of a refund yet.
I wanted to give them the benefit of the doubt, but the low selling price combined with their 4-day lapse in communication really raised my suspicion-hackles, and I wondered if perhaps they didn't get as much as they had hoped, and thought they'd try relisting it later to see if they could get more. They had 100% feedback, so I hadn't batted an eye at bidding when I did, but upon closer inspection after the fact, I realized that they only have ONE feedback, and that transaction seems to have gone well.
I replied, saying I would be willing to wait for the item, and they took 2 more days to respond, saying that they didn't know how long their family member would be unstable, and they finally refunded my money. I started to reply with a request that if and when they decided to relist, would they mind giving me the opportunity to buy the item first at the price I originally won it for, but then decided to just let it go; if they genuinely had a family member in the hospital, I didn't want to bring more grief upon them by badgering them about something trivial.
Well, now the item has been relisted. The starting bid is higher than the starting bid it had before, but is not higher than what I won it for. There are no bids on it yet, actually. The shipping has been raised to a more accurate-sounding $12. There is now a new 'make offer' option, but it's a 'best offer starting bid' auction, so if I made an offer, it would have to be higher than the current bid.
I thought about making an offer for the same amount I originally won the item for (obviously I'd have to eat it on the shipping; a snarky part of me wanted to make the offer less the $7 shipping difference, but I didn't want to jeopardize my chances of getting the item over a piddly 7 bucks...obviously their original quoted amount was a mistake...hopefully that's not what the refunded transaction was all about!). If they reject my offer, then I guess I'll know they are just wanting more money...why they don't just put a reserve on it, I don't know...but if they only have one feedback, maybe they are new to Ebay and don't know that's an option.
I was about to do just that...and then on a whim, I poked around a bit more and decided to check out the one transaction they did have. I noticed that the shipping location was from Florida on that one, yet it was Connecticut on the current auction. I looked back at the first auction for that item (the one I 'won'), and it was also listed as Connecticut. The auction for the positive-feedback transaction only took place 4 weeks ago (one week prior to my 'winning' their other auction). Does something sound not right about this whole thing?
Would you trust this seller? The 2 different ship-from locations just seems really strange to me. I'm genuinely curious to know whether they were telling the truth about why they wouldn't ship my item or not, and making an offer would answer that, but I don't think my wanting an answer is worth getting screwed over if they pull another stunt and don't refund my money this time.
Fyi, I haven't left feedback on the original transaction yet...it does give me the option to, despite it being refunded.
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« on: June 25, 2021, 09:54:41 PM »
I didn't think I would ever find any! I found an ad for a garage sale that was supposedly selling a bunch of Star Wars legos, since my son is really into them right now. My husband had a slow work day and he agreed to go check it out with me. So we get there, and my twin girls were instantly drawn to a bin that was on the floor. My husband peers in and says, 'oh boy...you'd better show Mama what's in there!' It was a TON of ponies. No G1s, but I was just so happy to see them, and for 50 cents apiece! It was mostly G3s, of which I'm not really looking for too many, as I have most of the ones I want, but I told my girls they could each pick one, and I picked out a few (okay, as many as I could carry without having a bag!) Sadly, I mostly grabbed white ponies because they will be useful for conducting dye experiments upon them...or upgrading ones in my collection that I might pillage to conduct dye experiments upon...but now in retrospect I wish I just bought the whole bin full; I could probably find homes for them! I'm tempted to go back tomorrow to see if they're still there. Oh, and then they had a G1 nursery! I left it behind, because I already have 3 of them in varying conditions...if I knew for sure I could find a buyer for it I would have grabbed it, but I see them sit on Ebay for quite a while, so I figure people aren't really that into playsets. Still, it was cool.to see! The Star Wars legos must have all sold when the sale first opened up. So what do you think...did I get anyone good? I don't even know all these ponies' names...guess I'll have to look them.up. visitors can't see pics , please register or login(Click on the pic of it's blurry...it will show it more clearly.)
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« on: June 18, 2021, 04:22:38 PM »
Not sure where to put this, but was just excited to share my progress on this rehab Cherries Jubilee. I got her in a bait lot of about 5 ponies for 2 or 3 dollars. She was dirty and had what looked to be Sharpie marker on her display side front flank area. visitors can't see pics , please register or loginShe cleaned up beautifully, except for that marker! I wasn't sure what to do with her for the longest time, and even gave her to my son to play with because I didn't think she could ever be display-worthy. There were 2 other ponies in this lot with the same markings on them, and I tossed one of them (a gross ole' Peachy) in my sunfading window just to see if I could lighten it any. When I saw it was actually slowly fading, I snagged Cherries J back from my kid to see if I could get similar results, and months and months later, I dare say the marker is GONE!! visitors can't see pics , please register or login Her fellow lot-mates have not had as good of luck as she has; Peachy's 'prison tat' is only about 50% faded and she's been in the window twice as long, and the Bowtie also has a ways to go, but for some reason hers just got lighter and lighter consistently until I determined she was 'healed'. I'm so glad to have given her a new lease on life!
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« on: May 25, 2021, 04:06:36 PM »
So I should have been cleaning. I should have folded some laundry. I reeeeally needed to sweep my deck after potting some flowers over the weekend. But...maybe it was because I was bummed that my plans with a friend fell through today, or feeling ripped off because my girls refused to nap yesterday and I didn't get any down-time, but today I squandered my half-hour of free time by taking my new super cute Sweet Stuff for a walk in our backyard while my girls (mercifully!) napped. She came in a lot I purchased recently, along with a few rainbow ponies (all duplicates to ones I have, but one might be an upgrade and the others will be gifts for my niece), some baits, and another Sweet Stuff. This one has the better body of the 2, but the other one had better hair. I'm not sure if I will rehair her or not; it's a little dry and her pink is faded. Her mane has kind of a weird plug anomaly where her mane isn't rooted straight: visitors can't see pics , please register or loginIf I rerooted her I could fix that. I haven't decided yet. She's still cute the way she is! visitors can't see pics , please register or loginvisitors can't see pics , please register or loginvisitors can't see pics , please register or loginPeek-a-boo...I see you! visitors can't see pics , please register or loginvisitors can't see pics , please register or loginHey...who lives in there? visitors can't see pics , please register or loginvisitors can't see pics , please register or loginIn the 2 years I've lived here, this is the lowest I've seen the river. Last year at this time, the place Sweet Stuff was standing was underwater! visitors can't see pics , please register or login
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« on: April 08, 2021, 03:39:17 PM »
Has anyone used both of these products for pony customs and liked one better than the other? I've researched this online a bit, and it's pretty evenly split on which people prefer, but nowhere did I find anyone using it on plastics similar to MLPs. I would be using it to repair the horn of a bait Baby Moondancer that I purchased without realizing it was broken off before she arrived, and for redoing the eyes of a de-BBE'd baby pony who I managed to crack the inferior material I originally used during a rehair I did on her.
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« on: March 10, 2021, 10:33:05 AM »
I acquired my first Happy Tails pony in a bait lot recently. After cleaning her up, I realized she is really in good shape, other than her tail being a bit dry and possibly having had a trim, since it seems a little short.
One thing I've noticed, though...she is really extra squishy! Almost like she's made of silicone or something rather than the regular plastic ponies are made of. I don't have any others from this set to compare her to--does anyone know if these ponies were made out of something different? Maybe because of her mechanism or something? I'm just curious!
15
« on: February 20, 2021, 01:17:26 PM »
I'm not sure if the Corral is the proper place for this post, sorry if I put it in the wrong place! I ordered the clear glittery cowboy hat so that Tex would have one. It was super clear and glittery when it arrived. I read about how it was designed to be dyed whatever color you wanted to make it, and I thought I would try to get it as close to Tex's aqua as I could get it. I suppose I should have just bought some aqua dye, but I like to use what I have on hand (especially when it's negative temperatures out!), so I used RIT Dyemore Kentucky Sky with a little bit of custom green dye I had mixed for another project last night. The color came out awful and dull, but even worse than that, the boiling water made the clear plastic turn cloudy! It happened within seconds of dipping the hat in the dye bath, so it's not a matter of leaving it in too long. Has anyone tried dyeing one of these hats? How did it turn out? Is there something I can do to get it to clear back up, or am I stuck with it this way? I'm so sad and disappointed...I bought this hat specifically because it said it was meant to be dyed with RIT Dyemore. Did I do something wrong? visitors can't see pics , please register or loginvisitors can't see pics , please register or loginUpdate: Well, interestingly enough, after sitting overnight, some of the cloudiness seems to have cleared up! Perhaps there was humidity that was trapped in it, and it has dissipated over time, especially with as much as my heat is running right now. I'm feeling a little better about it now. visitors can't see pics , please register or login
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