The MLP Arena

Pony Talk => Pony Corral => Topic started by: dragonfly on June 08, 2016, 01:19:47 PM

Title: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: dragonfly on June 08, 2016, 01:19:47 PM

Family or closest friends. I know it's a sensitive topic for some and we've discussed before. But I'm curious to see in a poll what the results are and this can be a support thread for people whose IRL family isn't supportive or accepting.

My family is and has always been supportive of my pony habit. They don't totally understand it, but whatever floats my boat. I get ponies and pony stuff as gifts; if they see a pony they'll pick it up for me. And of course, they tease.

So I'm lucky.

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: Leave a Whisper on June 08, 2016, 01:51:54 PM

My daughter collects too, most of my family is indifferent. My aunty thinks its cute.

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: DazzleKitty on June 08, 2016, 01:59:41 PM

They are okay with it. My mom and dad don't like how I spend so much money on them but they do understand they are an investment. My brothers are the ones who actually take me to the MLP Fair. If that isn't support, I don't know what is. My boyfriend is very supportive and says if we move in together we can have ponies all over the apartment. My friends and coworkers are always bringing me pony gifts. I often find pony stuff on my desk at work randomly. They know me well. :)

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: northstar3184 on June 08, 2016, 02:19:00 PM

I keep my collection secret. 70+ ponies in two dresser drawers and my family has no clue they exist.  :biggrin:

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: HelloGoodbye on June 08, 2016, 02:22:10 PM

My family is very supportive of my ponies!  I often get ponies for my birthday or Christmas from my parents or my brother, and my Mom once even helped me put together a bookshelf for my ponies to be displayed on!  For a brief time my brother was into G4, mainly the cartoon, but he did buy a couple of toys.  Once he was no longer as into it, he gave me the toys (mostly blind bags) so that was nice.  I feel very lucky that my family not only puts up with my various collections (ponies, Breyer Horses, anime merch/figures, etc.), but encourages them!

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: Miniature Sheep on June 08, 2016, 02:22:52 PM

I tend not to bring up ponies around friends and family because it's not really a topic any of them are interested in, which is fair dues. I just bore them about cartoons instead. XD

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: SpaceButtPonies on June 08, 2016, 02:25:54 PM

They know, they don't care what I get cause honestly its my money in the end lol. What's nice is they don't make fun of me :)

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: NigheanRuadh on June 08, 2016, 03:43:18 PM

My family is very supportive.  My husband has gone with me to get ponies and has gone to get them when I couldn't (the day after our baby was born).  He has bought some wall shelves to display my collection, although we haven't put them up yet.  He also bought me a G4 Rarity brushable just because it made him think of me when he saw it in the store.  (I collect G1, but it was a pony, so it reminded him of me.)  My mom recently brought me the accessories and sets that I had left at her house when I moved out 13 years ago, and she kept an eye out for pony stuff while we were thrifting together.  My sister-in-law has sent me links to pony lots that she's seen on sales sites.  And my midwife (not family, but she's been in our house a lot) loved seeing the ponies in various places and thought it neat that I have a collection of them.  (She's about my mom's age.)  So I have a lot of support.  :good:

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: Artemesia's Garden on June 08, 2016, 04:20:27 PM

They are ok with it. My sister had kept some of her own and will buy me ponies for Christmas and birthdays :heart:

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: shabbychicdee on June 08, 2016, 04:38:52 PM

i clicked the "They would judge so keep it a secret but that is my parents and siblings (i come from a large family)
and im the youngest of six, so some of them would think its odd, weird, juvenile and make fun and laugh at me or think im wasting my time, wasting my money.
my mum knows as she saw them all one day while staying with us, i gave her my G3 Lulabelle which she loved. then when she stayed last time she kept asking about them, where they all went (as i have them stored away) she was kind of giggly, i have a feeling she told either my brother and/or my sister that live by her about my hoard of ponies, my addiction to pastel plastic things.  :lookround:

my family family (husband and 2 kids) are great of course.......they have to be, they live with me :P my hubby is all good as long as they don't come out to the living room or take over or over spend on them which is fine with me, my kids know and yell out when we are out at the shops "DO YOU HAVE THIS ONE MUM, ARE YOU GOING TO BUY IT"  :blush:
I just hope they don't tell their teachers at school. i like to keep it personal. i told 2 close friends once, one thought it was awesome and the other laughed at me. 

btw my husband does have a field day making up silly names for them so kind of making fun of them. ...but he is a funny guy

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: Sukey on June 08, 2016, 05:18:40 PM

My husband is supportive as he also collects toys- just not as much as I do.

My dad makes remarks about my collection sometimes- they are in my living room. Mom is a little bit more accepting. I think at first she thought it was really stupid and a waste of money. Maybe she just doesn't say as much anymore, because I have been collecting for 17 years and probably figures what's the use.

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: zombienixon on June 08, 2016, 05:37:14 PM

I honestly don't know which one to pick. For the most part, this is something I want to keep secret from pretty much anyone else that isn't into MLP.  However, because I had my entire collection (which at the time was around 50 blind bags and a few brushables that fit on the shelves on my computer desk) completely visible in my room, and was kind of hoping that people just wouldn't go in there if I wasn't there, it was seen by my sister when she went in to feed my cat.

I also told my Mom about it when she said she went into my room to see my cat. She didn't seem to mind, and there was a time when I would mention it to her, but that stopped entirely about 2 years ago, mostly because I preferred not to have her know about it.

My sister is the only person in my family that I am okay with knowing about my collection. And also the only person who I would want to get me any kind of pony stuff. She's pretty supportive and it makes getting gifts for me a lot easier for her.

Even so, I try to keep her from seeing my entire collection just because of how big it's gotten. About the only people I want to see that are other collectors.

I doubt the rest of my immediate family would judge, but I still prefer to keep it from them if I can.

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: Shaiyeh on June 09, 2016, 04:07:02 AM

My parents pick up ponies for me if they find them at fleamarkets (and they know the generations, how to tell hasbro from fakie etc and know I'm only interested in g1 and g2), so they're totes supportive. CLose friends are,too. One even recently bought me a g1 retro mug, bless him.
My fiancé is totally fine with it, too, and has a couple ponies of his own, one Muffin pony (what do we call her these days? Bubbles? :muffin: ? haven't been on here since last year) and a BaB Rarity.
The only people who have been rude about it are people that no longer are in my life tbh, if they can't accept me and my interests as is, then they're not really a friend IMO. (especially when they themselves have super geeky interests, like warhammer or action figures, haha)

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: Taxel on June 09, 2016, 05:23:57 AM

This one is a kind of weird question to answer for me because it varies so much. I ended up picking one of the unsupportive answers because it has the most affect on me.

My boyfriend is completely supportive of all my collections (MLP, toys, and dolls). He didn't like when the pony display was a chaotic mess because I had no way to organize them properly, but I didn't like that either. Now that I have actual furniture and not just boxes everything is much nicer so he doesn't mind at all. He doesn't mind any of the stuff I keep around my computer in the living room either, and if we had a say in decor I doubt he'd mind some stuff chilling on display in the living room. He's bought ponies and dolls, including extremely expensive ones, for me as gifts. He even has a couple of his own, like a custom Jack Skellington pony and a SHG Harley.

My basically MIL though.... she's very.... weird. She's supportive in the sense that she'll buy me pony/doll things for holidays, but in general she's extremely unsupportive. Any time I acquire a new possession, even a 1in tall figure, gets a lot of complaints about "omg where will you put it?!?!? there's no room!!!!!!!" when she'd never notice if the figure was on boyfriend and I's bookshelf or not. And she's tried to pressure me to sell them in the past. But with the very expensive doll I got for my birthday, she fawned over all the very expensive clothes and was saying how cute they all were. She was very encouraging about (eventually!) having them all, and she said she'd buy a really really overpriced piece for Christmas so I was stunned. Aside from that, she actively discourages my collections.
She just really really hates actual, tangible objects I guess? She doesn't mind my boyfriend's video game collection (on Steam) in any way and is very encouraging of him buying more so its very weird. Its completely backwards from anyone I've ever known, especially older people.

The rest of the family is mostly supportive!

My boyfriend's uncle buys me pony or doll things, he doesn't even care. He'd buy whatever I put on my Christmas/birthday list as long as it was a reasonable price. He's never said anything about it either way though really? So he's like, very chill supportive.

My aunt is super supportive! One time when I went down to visit we all (aunt, cousin, granny, aunt's friend) went to a flea market and every single person was on the lookout for ponies :D She was really excited when we found some. On another trip she bought me a G4 when we went to Target to pick up some groceries. She probably would've bought all of them but I was too chicken to let her! She sent one of those hand airbrushed t-shirts from like, Fairs and stuff a few years back for my birthday. It has a generic pink G3 and my name on it. This year she found someone locally to paint some fakies for me! And when she found out about my expensive doll she was really excited for me. So she's just amazing.

My granny is also supportive! She's passively collected dolls for basically her whole life and enters an AG-size doll outfit in the Fair most years. She has a small collection, mostly from other countries in traditional outfits, and she seemed really relieved when I ended up liking dolls too so they'd have someone to love them. She's bought me a couple things here and there, but mostly she buys me the practical gifts I need. I talked to her a lot about the expensive doll because I was excited to share it with her, but she thought I was hinting x.x So I can't really gush about them to her I guess cause she took it the wrong way!

My great aunt (granny's sister) is also very supportive, at least of the dolls. She was also really relieved and gave me her childhood doll collection last time we visited. She doesn't buy gifts really, but she collects both dolls and teddy bears so I think she gets it and doesn't mind my ponies either.

For the most part, my close friends are collectors or at least doll/pony admirers too so they get it :) Those that aren't don't really seem to mind, although I wouldn't call all of them supportive really? Mostly they're like, happy, polite neutral.

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: TwistedRiver on June 09, 2016, 08:10:51 AM

For the most part I am very lucky to have a supportive family, but then they've realized by now that it's a part of who I am. I have almost never gotten rid of a pony since I started getting them when I was five and I've continued to get more. My sister Hannah also collects (Hannah66665) on here, and both of my parents used to collect dolls to an extreme so they get my pony/doll collection pretty well I think. My brothers vary between uber-supportive to semi supportive to tease me endlessly about being a woman in her late thirties collecting toys made for little girls but I really don't care much.
I've actually made custom ponies for one of my brothers (the semi-supportive one actually), and both of my sis-in-laws, and thought about ideas for customs for my younger brother (uber-supportive one) and maybe even my parents if I could come up with the right customs for them. My oldest brother will never receive one because if he took the time to think about it he'd appreciate the work and creativity that went into it but I don't think he'd get that far and would just be all 'why'd you give me a toy for little girls?"
I feel really really bad for the people who's families aren't supportive though because it's really hard for me to fathom what that would be like.

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: Bibinettepony on June 09, 2016, 08:16:02 AM

I can say I got a supportive family  ;) My mother understands my love for them and find some of them cute  ^.^. My husband understands my passion and is quite respectful about it  ;) . My sister does NOT love ponies BUT she offers (like my mother and hubby ;o) ) me ponies as gifts for B-day or Xmas and even helps me find new G4 in shops I can not go  :P The rest of my family knows and find this cute as well as the few friends who know about my collection/ passion  :)

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: LadyMoondancer on June 09, 2016, 09:41:14 AM

They don't give me grief about pony collecting, and when I was a young teen my mom drove me around to thrift stores, and my sister once gave me a big box of ponies for Christmas. But it's not something they will ask after if I'm talking to them on the phone, nor have they given me ponies as gifts in recent years.

I guess I'd say they accept my pony collecting more than they're supportive of it.  Like, they're happy I have a hobby, but they don't pretend to be interested in it.  (To be fair, I don't initiate things by talking about ponies either.)  Which I am fine with, I mean I'm not super interested in my sister's collection of Depressionware glass either. ;)

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: Pierlala on June 09, 2016, 10:06:59 AM

Eventhough I'm an adult ans live on my own with my son. My mother thinks it's getting out of hand. She said to me a couple of times that it's becoming an addiction. It's rather annoying to hear it. My sister thinks the same. They sort of approve of it in a way. But they have second thoughts about it. And both of them have no real hobbies or like to collect things like I do. I don't really care. But it's never nice to hear other people "complain" about it. Cause it's something I really enjoy and I'm not bothering anyone with it.

PS: My boyfriend eventhough he lives in a different country, is VERY supportive of my pony collecting. He understands it fully and when we're together he helps me wash their hair and condition them haha. He makes me feel very comfortable. He also keeps an eye out for them and we talk about it often. I even got him so far that he started watching Friendship is Magic recently. I'm not much into G4 myself but I do enjoy the show!

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: CottonTALE on June 09, 2016, 10:34:32 AM

Almost all of my family is indifferent. They see that it's something I like and therefore it makes me happy. Being on the autism spectrum, I have narrowed focusses for my interests, so I try to incorporate ponies subtly into other areas of my life to motivate me. For example, since I started my new job three weeks ago in a hospital, every Friday I buy a blind bag for my locker and keep them in there (so far I have Lily Valley, Nurse Snowheart and Prism Glider of the Wave 9 Blind Bags in there)

My boyfriend however, is majorly supportive of me collecting ponies. I actually met him through the arena a few years ago, and he collects ponies as well :)

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: Tak on June 09, 2016, 10:36:48 AM

If you just count my daughter, she's awesome. She wants all the ponies. If you count the rest they think I'm crazy, but I am so who cares what they have to say about it. You didn't have a crazy option on the checklist.

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: Taffeta on June 09, 2016, 10:40:31 AM

My family are fine with it. My Dad came with me to see Wondermint's collection when it was in Dudley, because he knows Dudley and I can't navigate to save my life (literally). My sister also collects and is very protective of her 350ish ponies. She also kidnaps mine regularly when she's at home. My Mum remembers watching MLP with me when I was a kid and she actually knows still some of the names. She bought me Windy and her memory of what Windy looked like on card was absolutely accurate even before we had any pictures of the UK one MOC. She is very sad BHS is closing because it was the place she bought that first Windy!

My friends are ok with it. I don't hide it. I have one friend at uni who is around the same age as me and she also had MLP as a kid -she still has hers somewhere, stored away in the attic back home. Another of my friends think they're quirky and cool and keeps joking about coming to sleep in a 'pony room' one day if she comes visit (when I FINALLY sort out where I'm living, though I doubt I can afford an extra room at present!). One of my closest RL friends I met through collecting Jem 15 years ago - she is also into MH and she also tells me when she sees pony stuff. Recently she got all excited because she found the little mini Firefly and book in Forbidden Planet. Apparently Firefly is now on her desk at work.

So I'm really lucky. Back when we were kids, Gran and Grandad often bought us ponies, and even when we got older Grandad (my last grandparent) was always interested in what we found at the carboot sale (he died when I was 17).

My parents have a few ponies of their own which they acquired for sentimental reasons. My Mother has a Windy. My Dad, Lucky and Tropical Breeze ;)

My mother's perspective is that MLP has been a positive and important part of my life for a very long time and she sees it as a good thing. When I stopped for a while as a kid, it was my mother who said, put them in the attic and don't sell them, see how you feel later. She was so right to do that :) It was also my parents who first suggested we try carboot sales to find second hand ponies, when they were no longer in stores.

I love my family. They rock.

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: Pokeyonekenobie on June 09, 2016, 10:49:13 AM

My family doesn't care what I decide to collect.  As long as it doesn't expand outside of my space I can buy whatever I want.  But they're also kind of supportive about it.  They know I like to do customs so if they find them at the local thrift store, and they're not overpriced, they'll usually pick them up for me.  I even got my younger brother trained to identify the different generations.  :biggrin:

My older sister didn't want most of her childhood collection but her daughter is currently in a pony stage so she picked which ones she wanted her daughter to have and let me hold onto the rest of them and if her daughter is looking for a particular pony she asks me to try and find it for her.  My nieces and nephews love that I have so many fun toys in my room and that's part of why I'm the favorite aunt.

I have a few close friends that will even pick them up for me if they find one at their thrift store. (They generally get really excited when it's in bad bait condition because they like to see what I do to fix it up.)  And they've even commissioned me to make them customs.

I don't know that my extended family really knows that I collect them, but I don't care if they know or not.  And if they didn't approve, it wouldn't change whether or not I bought them.  In fact, if they gave me a hard time about it I would probably post a picture every day on FB of a piece of my collection just to annoy them.  But then, I'm a little evil that way.

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: Galactica on June 09, 2016, 11:19:32 AM

That is a complicated question. 

My wife is fine that I like ponies- and will even buy me a pony for a holiday if I drop a lot of not-so-subtle hints and possibly a link...

But she is not supportive of the fact that I have too many ponies and in general "too much stuff."  Because I don't just have ponies, I have other things too... 

We have had to compromise and the amount of house space/storage space I get for my "collections" is constantly being negotiated, and is definitely a sore spot for both of us. 

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: BuckinghamAlice on June 09, 2016, 03:22:06 PM

In the house it's just me and my mom.  She knows, she's cool with it.  My extended family doesn't know, they'd judge.  But whatever.  They judge literally everything I do, lol.

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: Pinkandpurplepanda on June 09, 2016, 03:44:51 PM

    All of my friends and family who know I collect ponies are fine with my hobby. I have collected different things like stamps and Pokemon cards my whole life. Although this may be because a lot of my friends and family have collections of other things and at least understand the interest in collecting something. When I first started really collecting in high school my parents thought it was weird but I think they're used to it now. The only concerns they have are making sure ponies come after purchasing more important things, and that they don't take up a huge amount of space.

    As for my two year old sister, she's fully supportive, she loves getting my doubles as random gifts.

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: BlushingBlue on June 09, 2016, 06:07:56 PM

My family is supportive, but not invested. My MIL is good with garage sales and eBay, so she'll often get me a vintage pony item for my birthday or christmas. My mom isn't quite so savvy, but if I specifically point her at something on her city's craigslist, she'll happily pick it up on my behalf. She used to spoil me with G3s when they were in stores, and my brother used to buy me G3s too. It's harder for them now, since I don't collect G4s, and they're not quite willing/able to hunt those elusive G1s.

My husband is a little too supportive sometimes. He'll often encourage me to travel farther or spend more for ponies, and I have to be the voice of reason. :lol: He doesn't collect himself, but he does take pride in knowing a few names here and there, and he has his favorites. He's definitely the one I can talk about ponies with the longest before his eyes glaze over.

Even distant relations and random acquaintances have never given me grief over my interest in ponies. I think I'd be stunned if anyone tried to tease me maliciously about my collection.

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: Aflame on June 10, 2016, 01:52:51 AM

my OH is on here and doesn't mind the ponies he come to pony con with me and watches the cartoon and will buy me ponies from the con as its usually near my birthday my in laws don't mind as i could be spending the money on drugs /drink/smoking or gambling but i would rather spend it on ponies  :)

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: Barnacle_lady on June 10, 2016, 02:30:16 AM

My family and non pony friends are ok with it. They won't buy me ponies but they always want to see the ponyroom when they visit me :) If I went to a meeting or convention they are always interested to hear if I got myself something nice and had a fun time over there. I find that very valuable.

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: Chibiskittles on June 10, 2016, 04:35:46 AM

between supportive (my mom looks for pony fabric for me! and has bought me a pony or two from etsy for Christmas) and sometimes mean (my sister teases me about it ...in only the way sisters can xD)

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: Radiance on June 10, 2016, 09:02:57 AM

Mister Radiance is perfectly ok with my collection, if a little amused. The few friends that know about it think it's fun, and I have one friend who has expressed interest in attending the fair one year. My in laws don't know much about it, as they already think I'm weird and whenever I've worn a MLP shirt around them they've laughed at me a little for being so childish. But who cares what they think; I'm pushing 40 and I look cute as hell in my MLP swag!

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: Leave a Whisper on June 11, 2016, 07:30:09 AM

My boyfriend is good about it. A little TOO good. He's bought me model horses, weapons, mlp and the occasional toy robot. The problem is that he keeps insisting I don't need a Toy  Space Limit, even though I do insist on it. :lol:  He says he'll just add more shelves for space for my stuff.

He's a collector too and he claims I've helped him a lot with his Star Wars Clone collection, as well as his weapons, Transformers etc.

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: NovelNerd on June 11, 2016, 07:48:37 AM

My mom has always been supportive of my collecting hobbies. When I was a kid she would drive me everywhere to buy Breyers and take me to model horse shows. She likes the Breyers more than ponies, and honestly thinking back on it I know she liked buying them for me because she had them too if that makes sense? They were gifts for me but also her horses because she spent s lot of time with me and my models. I've always been horse obsessed and my mom had a horse but wasn't a huge fan of riding. The models were something I could do with her that related to horses. My dad has always thought it was stupid and my sister is in the middle. She teases me about it until I smack her on the head.

Lol, I don't live with them though so they only really see my stuff when they come over and they are good to humor me about them. My girlfriend is super supportive and asks me lots of questions about ponies. I think she might be falling in love with them. :P

Title: Re: What are your family's feelings about your pony obsession?
Post by: bladed on June 11, 2016, 09:23:01 AM

i still live with my parents and even though my collection is small (80 ponies tops) they still get somewhat annoyed when i buy more so i don't really buy any right now (i've bought 1 pony since 2014, that was earlier this year & i got a plush as a gift from my older half brother, he's cool with it and his girlfriend thinks its cute)

when i asked for them they would sort of just sigh, but pay anyway.

sometimes when theres younger cousins around for family barbeques, they'll come upstairs and see my shelves and they love it, they're only allowed to play with ponyville g3s and blindbags though if they really must.