hello

[Sapling]

Hi everyone

So here's my story and I wonder if anyone is similar? I loved mlp as a child and I collected well over 100 by hunting around in boot fairs and asking for them at every birthday and christmas and saving up tokens for all the mail order ponies.  But when I got to be a teenager my parents gave the ponies away to a neighbour WITHOUT ASKING ME!! I kept 30 of the best ones but then when I was an adult they gave them away too!!! 

My niece has grown to love the new FIM ponies and I have one of the old file of faxes of G1 ponies still (and a lot of newsletters - strange my parents kept these and got rid of the ponies!) and she loves looking through it and printing copies of the blank ponies and colouring them in.  So after a hunt around their attic thinking I still had at least 30 ponies the only things that were kept are the buildings that are now in significant disrepair and discoloured, lullaby nursery, the baby ballet studio and dream castle (to be fair the castle was already broken as I loved it too much!).  There was one lone survivor who now of course is my very fave pony as the only original from my collection, Baby Glider. 

I wanted to give my niece some G1 ponies to play with so I went on ebay and bid for a few auctions... and quickly discovered its very hard to win!  In the end I bid on loads and accidentally won a load of ponies who need tlc.  I did win some nice ones I could give to my niece straight away to play with but I have a box of ponies I want to fix up and found links to this website when searching how to do this.  With the expensive prices of ponies I'm thinking my best approach is going to be restoring ponies as I can't afford mint ones, and besides I want them to be played with so it doesn't make sense buying mint.

I often think about my huge collection and I have decided to start collecting again with the intention of rebuilding it.  I love ponies that I remember being in my original collection, all G1s.  Skydancer was my first pony and Baby Applejack a close second.  I had a lot of the UK ponies, baby ponies and big brothers.  Hey this is making me think of writing a list of everyone I remember owning.  I've got a few already from my random bidding, including three tootsies.  But I am starting to realise this is going to be a long slow and expensive process, a real labour of love, and would like to join a community of like minded crazy mlp lovers  

[Spinky69er]

Welcome to the Arena

You will be bitten by the "buy all the ponies bug" in 5, 4, 3, 2......

Enjoy going nuts and helping your niece own some lovely ponies.

[Bekuno]

Hello, Sapling! Welcome to the Arena!

Many members are brought back to ponies because of their parents selling or throwing out their toys before they were ready to part with them. You'll certainly be with like-minded collectors here! We also have loads of ponies for sale that aren't on ebay to help you with your search. Enjoy the forums!

[achab1984]

Welcome to the arena Happy that you are back in the pony world!

[Sapling]

Reading a few of the other intros I can see losing your ponies as a youngster is a common theme.  I'm now thinking actually I'm quite lucky, I have alot of the accessories and a fairly large petite pony collection still left over from my original collection.  Can't wait to get a Tracks and unite him with his hat! I've got Princess Serena's hat and wand and Nibbles and Dibbles basket and loads of brushes and ribbons and whatnots I don't even know what they are.  My pride and joy is my care bear collection though, I have a nearly mint Nobleheart !  I don't know how best to store him though I guess I should ask in the other collectors bit.  Also I think I will start a thread of my restoration attempts when I get started on resurrecting my collection.

[lostpony]

Hi and welcome to the arena!

You are actually very lucky in that a lot of the accessories are harder to find than the ponies so you have a great head start!  Also you are in the right place to learn about fixing up ponies.

I saw from a reply you made in another intro that you love Masquerade.  The person who introduced me to the Arena, WingsofMasquerade, also loves masquerade and he has coached me through how to repair and restore damaged ponies.  He knows a lot and is a great person.  I too like ponys to have been played with, and not just to save money...played with ponys have been embued with love like I am sure yours were.  If you PM WoM for advice on fixing up your ponies make sure to tell him lostpony sent you...or just read the forums.  Lots of great information is there or you can post your questions and lots of people will reply with suggestions.

Making that list is a very good idea especially right now when you don't have that many ponies because now is the time to get big lots of ponies when you need most of them.  Watch the eBay lots closely because you can get an idea how high they will go and make sure to be ready to bid in the last seconds because a lot of people steal them from you in the last seconds.  That list will also help you buy ponies here and a lot of the ponies you find on eBay are available here for less money and the condition will usually be better described.  Finally some of those accessories are sought-after and you might be able to trade the ones you don't care about (if any) here for ponies.

Now as for those "buildings" in "significant disrepair" I find that interesting because I am about to be struck by the need to collect them in 5...4...3...2... so if you want to move those along you can probably find homes for them in exchange for ponies here too.

Good luck and have fun re-acquiring and learning how to restore all your ponies!

[Sapling]

Thanks LostPony, yes as I am getting more into collecting I'm realising that actually I am quite lucky and have more pony stuff from my childhood than I realised.  I bought a lovely Rosedust on ebay who nobody else wanted the other day and went to my parents house and found a Rosedust puffy sticker just sitting on the mantelpiece! I've still got my full collection of Petites left too and a much loved Bowtie plushy.  Its going to take me an absolute age to sort through all my accessories, but I expect I will be trading ponies on here as when I buy lots I get ones that weren't in my original collection that I don't fancy keeping.  I've started my restorations small by trying to clean pin dot from an otherwise very nice Confetti.  I'm enjoying my new journey so much already

[lostpony]

The petites are very popular!  and those puffy stickers might be quite a find! 

Rosedust seems pretty available, I have accumulated a few, but as with all flutterponies I assume yours has no wings?  Somewhere around here is a link to instructions for making a set of flutterpony wings from 2-liter bottle plastic, and there are modern-made replacement wings on eBay for some $11 (if you want her to have wings again that is).  My Yum Yum has been sitting in my work area for a couple weeks looking at a plastic bottle I haven't cut up for her yet...

If I might clog up your thread here with a link to one of my latest brag posts, I got a Bowtie plush in rough shape pretty cheap and put a lot of hours into her, she is here among a whole bunch of other ponies I scooped up:  http://mlparena.com/index.php/topic,380126.msg1555913.html#msg1555913

Once you get restoring it can be very rewarding....not only the pleasure of fixing them up but the person I got Bowtie from saw my after pics was impressed by the results and asked me how I did it!  Very great feeling.  Pindot is a great place to start!  I just soaked my Sugarberry for weeks in bleach to get rid of it and other people have other solutions.  How did your pindot come out? 

It's great having you here.  Enjoy reacquiring your ponies and don't forget to share on the brag forum if you feel like it, thanks!