A lucky trip down Nostalgia Lane...(slightly pic heavy!)

[Ninox]

Every now and then, I take a trip to Lompoc, CA to visit thrift stores. A few weeks ago, right outside one of the stores I usually start at was a bunch of large cardboard boxes and plasic bins being taken out the back of a large moving van in the parking lot. When I took a closer look, I found that these boxes were full of toys, books and memorabilia from the last four decades. Rainbow Brite dolls, E.T. plushies, Polly Pocket compacts, Trolls, He-Man figurines, Happy Meal toys, old Disney stuff...it was a veritable tsunami of nostalgia. (As I eventually found out, all of this had belonged to a man who had died a couple of months ago, whose passion had been collecting stuff like this. I didn't know the particulars of what had happened, but it looked as if this thrift store had eventually ended up with his inventory.)

Naturally, I started digging through these bins immediately, feeling that there had to be ponies somewhere in this collection. Imagine my astonishment when I discovered that the first pony I discovered while digging through the bins was Merriweather -- one of my childhood ponies! A little more looking around revealed several more: Skyflier, Skydancer, Bonnie Bonnets, Moondancer, Applejack, Bowtie, Firefly, Tootsie, Baby Bright Bouquet and Sprinkles. I ended up coming away with just Merriweather, Medley, Baby Ember (pink), Baby Surprise and Glow, which I got for $6.
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Glow's got frizzy, faded hair, creased wings and a tail cut, but she's still adorable. I also find it interesting that a pony with a firefly symbol has a color scheme that's almost the reverse of Firefly's color scheme (Glow: blue body, [initially] pink mane and symbol; Firefly: pink body, blue mane and symbol).

After a few days, however, I couldn't help returning to that store to see if there was anything else that I had missed. The boxes weren't in the parking lot this time, and when I asked one of the employees what was going on, he said that most of the boxes had been loaded back into the truck, but if I really wanted to look through them, he could open up the truck and let me rummage through the boxes on my own.

Long story short, I spent nearly two hours in a truck packed with stacks of boxes, rummaging through containers and trying to clear a way towards the back without boxing myself in. This time, I came away with Baby Sparkle Firefly (who I hadn't noticed before), Skyflier, Bowtie, Applejack, Moondancer, Bonnie Bonnets, Medley, and Tex's hat (no sign of Tex himself, though). I also found SS North Star and Lofty in a bin inside the store, and even though I didn't want them for myself, I had to buy them as well (I figured that their flocking was just going to get even more scuffed up if I didn't).
The price for this whole lot was just $5!
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They were all a bit grungy, but it was nothing that a bit of soap, water and conditioner can't solve, although Moondancer was in pretty bad shape compared to the others. She was dirty both outside and inside, and her washer was starting to deterioriate into a mess of rusty flakes that made her rattle like a maraca.
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It took a lot of time, experimentation and scrubbing with Q-tips, but I've finally got her looking decent:
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Here's everyone all cleaned up (well, mostly -- Glow's tail still has conditioner in it in this photo):
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Now that I have North Star and Baby Sparkle Firefly, I can do this:
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And G1 Applejack can dress up as G4 Applejack:
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And coincidentally, the store where I bought all these ponies was the first (and so far, only) thrift store where I've seen a My Pretty Pony (small pictures because all I had with me at the time was my outdated flip-phone):
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[ponybanker]

awww I grew up in Lompoc til I was 9, there were  ponies everywhere

[achab1984]

Congrats on all of your new ponies

[minercia]

Awesome ponies, great job cleaning them!

[kiwimlp]

Oh wow.  That is such an exciting story. I bet the old couple would be pleased to know their ponies have gone to a collecting home

Congrats on your lovely new ponies

[Shy Violet]

Great finds!! Congrats!

[Diamond]

Congrats on rescuing those ponies, digging though boxes can be so rewarding.  Dang I want that pretty pony!

[HoustonCollector72]

Awesome rescue story they look amazing now

[Ninox]

Thanks, everyone!

Congrats on rescuing those ponies, digging though boxes can be so rewarding.  Dang I want that pretty pony!

I was a bit tempted to get her myself, but I decided that I just didn't have enough space in my apartment. When I visited that shop a couple weeks later, that pony was gone.

It was an interesting adventure, since some of those boxes were full of random hardware, with a toy or two mixed in among the various fasteners, hinges, light bulbs, pipes, faucets, tools, etc. Most of the ponies were confined to one or two boxes of toys, but Mondancer was all alone in a box mostly full of rusty bolts. Baby Sparkle Firefly was in another box of hardware, and I'm honestly surpised I didn't find any more ponies hiding in boxes where they didn't belong when I visited the shop a third time.

One of the highlights of the whole experience was seeing a Dragonflyz figure being launched. Remember those things? They were action figures with helicopter blades sticking out of their necks that could be "launched" into the air from a dragon-shaped base, then spin around for a few seconds before gravity kicked in. After seeing one of these things in action for myself, I wouldn't be surprised if these things were recalled by one too many kids being hit in the face by these things.

[Hervoyel]

Congrats on the great find - and great work on the cleanup! 

[Carcina]

Wow! I hope I have this much luck one day!


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[invaderhorizongreen]

Nice streak of pony luck you had there congrats to you!

[BabiChuld]

Wow thi was a real pony hunting adventure, Indiana Jones style lol battling through caves and such almost Very awesome lot of ponies <3

[doxiechic16]

Congrats on your new ponies!  I love the "are you my mother"-type photo and captions with the North Stars and Fireflys!   

[GreyBird1881]

awesome! I would have spent hours digging too! It is so much fun to treasure hunt!