Julip Live 2018!

 -Photos without my waffling here-

As mentioned in the previous post, I travelled down to Tetbury last week to stay with my friends Tomas and Rory and the three of us drove to Oxford for the show. We had intended to arrive super early so we could nab all the good spares and get set up, but alas, the best laid plans and all that. We did get to drive through some seriously spooky mist though...

We were waylaid by some incredibly slow traffic, took a wrong turning that added several long minutes onto our journey and had a slight spook when we spotted a sign for a toll bridge, despite the directions not saying anything about one! Luckily it was only a 5p charge, something we later learned about and found rather hilarious!

Despite getting up at 6:30am, we still managed to arrive late and just after the feeding frenzy at the spares table and so were left disappointingly horseless, though Tom managed to snaffle one later on, and we all got some pets!

(I'm just going to apologise in advance for the exceedingly boring storytelling that goes with this post - I'm super tired and my brain doesn't want to use its words as I've been sorting out over 1600 photos for the last two days. 😔)

The first few classes were for the scenes, and in true Julip show fashion, none disappointed!

I think the topic of this next one was something to do with Internet Shopping and its perils...

A good sense of humour is vital for a Julip collector...and rider, it would appear.

I have serious cob and horsebox envy with this collection!

I'm usually the furthest travelled when it comes to these shows but Janneke certainly beat me in that regard this year as she brought her little herd all the way from the Netherlands!

I've been ogling her ponies on Jclub and Instagram for months so it was fantastic to finally meet her!
(and ogle the ponies in person!)

I didn't stand much of a chance with the scene classes as I rushed everything as usual, though I did manage to cobble together some semblance of a harness for Paddy, and a scene to go along with him.

The fossils he's pulling along are real, and were found the day before by myself at Sedbury!

 

'Mary' here used to be this absolutely terrifying old man that I used as a scale reference for my roombox diorama at college. He's been needing a makeover for years!

I wish I'd put the sea the other way round as I think most people missed it at the back. Still, it nabbed me a fifth so I'm not too disappointed!

True to form, Stacey and Nicky stole the show with their amazing 'U for Unsound' entry, complete with portable X-Ray machine!

They also made the 3D printed tack box and sweat scraper!

I entered the same class but went for the totally normal choice of 'U for UFOs'

One class was simply titled 'Groom's Day Off' and as you might imagine, the possibilities for interpretation were endless!

This one honestly made me think of my own bedroom only a few years ago - I really did have that many posters!

Julip debuted some lovely new flying pheasants at this show and one was used perfectly in this entry!

Ridden classes were next.

Having my own personal assistants to voluntarily tack up was greatly appreciated! 😆😁

Performance is always great fun.

I haven't seen the lovely Des since I rehaired him for his owner Em a few years ago so it was a nice surprise to see him again. I always thought he had a really lovely expression.

This was one of my favourite horses from the whole show!

Mould classes were up next.

This was one of Janneke's newbies and oohhhh my god, it's just as well our tables were quite far apart or he might have *accidentally* ended up packed away with my lot! Such a gorgeous horse!

One of the things I love most about Julips is that due to the nature of their construction, no Julip is ever exactly the same as another, even in the same mould or colour - the moulds wear out over time which changes the look of the final models, and as every single one is painted by hand (with what up until recently was an incredibly limiting number of paint colours) there's a huge level of variety.

I definitely prefer the Donkey mould with a haired mane!

A grey Welsh Cob is in my want list and this one pushed it right to the top!

My only first place of the day went to my beloved Byron, one of my favourite cobs!

Paddington is just Too Cute to be allowed, seriously.

 Lunch was its usual relaxed affair, mostly spent chatting and catching up, though the sales table was a flurry of activity for a while. I managed to sell a handful of rugs (I'll put the rest up for sale in a couple of weeks) and picked up a couple of Stone Chips that were free to a good home! I also won a bag of Celebrations in the raffle, though I didn't actually manage to eat many of them at all in the end!

Manda also gave Max and Juno a new toy befitting their maturity level (and ours tbh XD)

The majority of the classes are judged by one person, but the Fun division after lunch. is judged by popular vote and it's really difficult to pick just ONE favourite out of such a huge selection!

The pet classes are especially difficult!

Tom and Rory had managed to find lookalikes on the spares table of their own moggies; Tyg and Amy...

...and Tyg did pretty well!

George's chicken coop was the best thing ever though - you'd never know it was made entirely from cardboard!

'Julip and Friend' was another of the classes, and something that could be taken in a variety of different directions...

The Pairs class is a great excuse to have a poke around other people's collections as you try to find horses that match in one way or another. George and I both had horses named after poets but decided it was a little convoluted to explain such otherwise wildly different looking models being in the class!

 

'Best Dressed' is another of my favourites!

As with most Julip classes, it's very much open to interpretation!

One of the final classes of the day was the 'Upcycled' one - for all those props and dioramas that were constructed from recycled materials. Some of the before and afters were pretty dramatic!

Before we knew it, the Championship had arrived and all very deserving winners they were too!

It was a fantastic show as always, and it was really great to catch up with folk I haven't seen in ages and finally meet some in person that I'd known for years online!  Roll on next year!

Caitlin went round all the tables at lunchtime and tried to work out how many Julips there were there that day and I think the final total was around 615 which is pretty impressive, especially considering most people didn’t take their entire collections!