A Day Late

Well, I'm sorry to report that Bethany did not find any amazing wild horses on her birthday last Sunday. Instead, it was a long streak of unremarkable, low stat wilds. We've found a few fun wilds since then, though:

One of the most oddly-shaped Mediterranean wilds we've seen... 

and there have been some doozies. XD

Wow, brindle, pearl, and pinto all on the same pony!

One of those perfectly-auto-named wilds

A cute, speckly cream pearl sabino pony

Ooh, amber champagne silver with sky blue eyes!

Flaxen brindle pearl tobiano. So fancy!

Yesterday was Friday the 13th! It would've been highly appropriate to find our 13th lucky find... but we didn't catch any wilds that day... just came on long enough to feed and water the horses and craft some (wrong type) saddle pads. Whoops, our bad.

I guess the game really wanted us to have that 13th lucky find anyway, though, because it gave us one today!

Thanks to random wonderland and jungle wilds, we were at our horse max at the time. Trondheim and I had just finished delivering a letter and were about to head back to Twixie Twills Village to unload when more sparkles appeared. We're so glad I decided to follow them, even if it did tick all our horses off to briefly go over our max.

This one stood out like a sore thumb from typical jungle wilds!

 

My guess was Noriker, but he's a Gypsy Vanner! I didn't even know Gypsy Vanners came in leopard appaloosa, but it's awesome that they do! <3 Appropriately, both of his eyes are indeed blue.

His performance metrics and personality aren't stellar, but he should be fine under saddle as long as we don't ask him to do anything scary!

We're all thrilled to finally have a leopard appaloosa in the herd, and a lucky find with tons of hair and feathers to boot! Felicity is the most thrilled, obviously, and called dibs on him immediately.

In case you are having trouble handling the excitement like Felicity is, before I go, enjoy these nice, calming summery photos from Mom's recent visits to the lakeshore:

Queen Anne's Lace closeup

This trail was scorching in the sun and swarming with mosquitoes in the shade... but pretty!

A much happier monarch than that windblown one on the beach

This friendly little guy spent a good 20 minutes crawling on Mom and her phone while she was watching the sunset from the pier.

The sunset: serene and pastel

Boats heading back in, including a cool replica of an early 1800's sailing ship 

The afterglow, complete with Dreamworks moon

Nice work, whoever made this!

Until next time, Lake Michigan!

Zorse Collection Complete!

Welcome to August! My birthday is only a week away! =)

Eleanor and Kite's fourth and final foal came on the scene in late July! 

Here is the special little filly as a newborn:

I think big brother was hoping for another colt to even things out, but he will have no shortage of colt-at-heart stallions to hang out with, including his dad. <3

We decided that each of us would get to keep the foal that corresponded to our "birth order," or more accurately the order in which we joined the family. Whatever, you know what I mean.

Anyway, that means Julie is the proud owner of the silver colt with blue eyes! She has named him Merlin, more after the small falcon than the mythological wizard, though I do think he has a magical quality to him. :)

Appropriately, the filly with the most extensive pinto spotting goes to Felicity. She went for alliteration with her name. Meet Zara the zorse!

The second pinto filly, who has the highest genetic stat total of the bunch, goes to Lily. Again, highly appropriate! In honor of mom Eleanor, Lily chose another pretty name beginning with "El," Elodie.

That means the 4th foal, the silver filly with flashy white markings, is all mine! <3 <3 I know I'm sort of copying Julie, but since the other two fillies have more feminine names like their mom, I figured she ought to be named after another bird of prey like their dad. She's already grown loads - here she is at just a year old!

We are so pleased with all 4 of these guys! They look like siblings, yet they all are so uniquely cool that there is no way we could've parted with any of them. I find it super cute that all 3 of the fillies have manes that lay flat like mom, while the one colt has a mohawk like dad. =)

To Felicity's delight, we did not find any wilds in July that outshine "Spring" the spotted stallion, so he gets to stay along with zorses. Part of it is that we've been too engrossed in the Olympics to spend much time looking. (Watch out come mid-August, though, wilds! We're coming for you!) Felicity has renamed him "Springboard," which makes more sense for a stallion caught shortly before the beginning of the Olympics.

The other recent additions to the herd finally have names as well. "Skyla" the jumper is now "Waterspout." We couldn't resist. 

"Timeout," our beautiful lucky find Waler, is now "Adelaide." 

Whew, now at least everybody who's staying has a name! We have a ton of work ahead of us crafting and dyeing saddle pads and polos, though. We're so far behind! *Sighs.* If only there was a guide out there for HI3 dye colors... but I guess most players want to keep their dye recipes private.

One more aside that has nothing to do with HI3: Mom treated us to a few new items from American Girl in July! No new dolls - I think I truly am the last one, though Mom did recently have a dream about being gifted an AG doll with blue eyes and light blond hair in a pixie cut...

But anyway, here are the clearance items she could not resist.

Here are Lily and I modeling them for you. 

Thanks, Mom! Obviously, the pj's are going to have to wait a few months to get much use, but the coconut tee is already in high demand.

We can now all wear puppy-themed t-shirts at the same time! =)