A Horse Is A Horse, Of Course

Hello Everyone,

I hope you all had a great holiday!

I have a new project to share with you!

You won’t believe the before and after on this one.

Little back story:

Years ago, maybe 25, my mom had moved to Baker City. My sister and I had gone to visit and mom wanted to take us to a few Antique and thrift stores. I found this little stick horse in the basement of this antique store and loved it so I bought it.

Fast forward to today. I have been rearranging stuff downstairs and came across this little horse. I have never really found a place for it once I had brought it home all those years ago. So, little by little it got pushed to a corner and forgotten about.

I had decided to sell it on Marketplace but no one wanted it!

On a side note, I follow this woman on Youtube (Terresa @ Our Green Acres) she and I have the same tastes, and one night while watching her, I had an idea to transform this little stick horse into something pretty! Check her out, you will like her! She gives you lots of ideas and inspiration!

So here is my vision and how I carried it out.

I envisioned the horse white.

I left the eyes and halter on, later to remove them 1. I could not paint around them easily and 2. I decided I would replace them with something else.

Begin by spraying water on the fabric before you paint. Then add your watered down paint in thin layers. They say that by doing it this way the fabric will stay soft. However, mine did not and it hardened to the touch. Maybe I didn’t saturate it enough with water. Honestly, it didn’t matter if the fabric was soft or not because the intended use will be for decoration only and not a toy.

By the time I started adding the second coat of paint, I decided to take the halter and eyes off.

After letting the paint dry, I glued on lace from an old tablecloth I had hanging around. I would cut a basic shape, glue it down with Elmer’s and continue until the face was covered with the lace. Using a blow dryer helps a ton with this project. By adding paint, glue and lace, the droopy ears were gone, lol. I also glued lace on top of the ears but not inside.

I tried to paint the mane, which was made of looped yarn. The paint made it stiff and I couldn’t get the paint into all of the loops, it just didn’t look good. White paint, yellowed mane = not a good combination. I cut the mane off! Bye-bye, already made it look better.

I have to mention that I was winging this project the whole time I was working on her. I had a vision in mind but pieced it together as I went, so don’t be afraid to try something.

I had already decided to NOT add a halter. She didn’t need it.

Now for the mane. Teresa @ Our Green Acres, had a rocking horse she made over and on the mane of this horse, she added strips of fabric. LOVED IT!!

I had a fabric (banner) don’t know what to call it), I had made years ago. I put it away because I had made it to long to use around our house. (Yes, I could have cut it to the length I needed but I didn’t think of that, lol). It has torn pieces of fabric in different colors and lace and ribbon. Always loved it, and just like that, there was the mane for the horse!

After measuring and cutting off the amount I needed, hot glue it into place. Having it attached to the string made it easy to glue to the head. I knew I wanted the mane to stay on one side of it’s head, this solved the mystery of what to do with the old mane. With all that fabric, it hides it well.

And how good does she look?

I trimmed her bangs and mane until I liked it and added a blingy button for an eyeball. I didn’t add an eye to the other side of her head because it will be covered plus I only had one button.

Painting the stick made it much more cohesive with the rest of the horse. I knew it would bleed through so I used Dixie Belle Boss in white, then used Dixie Belle Mineral Chalk Paint in Buttercream. The buttercream paint matches better with the lace I used, she is beautiful!

I also added a messy bow around the top of the stick. To much?