H is for How They Come In - Chris - May - 1

Just before the May show I received a big parcel from Chris, which was lovely,  but I explained to him that while I was trying to keep up to date with the H is for's, I would probably do the show reports first, and with Sandown immediately after PW, and a few other things to hand, a month has gone by! So, let's see what the blog got . . . around the date of my birthday, as it happens!

Sorting, left of two; I tend to go through Chris's parcel picking out all sorts of treasures and quirks until I've no room round me (I sometimes a take a shot at that point, but forgot this time!), then I realise I need A) some order and B) to empty the box, so I pile by theme, which doesn't take long.

Here we have from top left to bottom right - paratroopers, 20th century military, historical/colonial/ceremonial, Wild West and part of the civilian pile, then, below, small-scale Wild West/Giant/Giant like, cake decorations & premiums, cartoon/TV & movie related and finally animals, birds & fish . . .

. . . while, starting with that part civilian pile we have; civilan/sports, aircraft & water vessels, fantasy & Sci-Fi and a bag of Hungarian stuff which will feature in future posts, so only a tantalisation today!

The bottom row is civil vehicles, biblical, military vehicles, odds & sods/scenics and a bag of Toltoys figures, which again, we will look at another day, in fact I think both bags have gone to storage now, so it will be a while! And a small toffee hammer we will look at properly in the next post!

Then I used to photograph the highlights, however traffic-stats say you like these posts, so most of the more recent ones (and the show reports) have taken to showing most items, even if we've seen them before, there's something fascinating about the breakdown of a mixed lot, isn't there?

This time the animals got enough shots to provide a post/fill this post, and were shot first so here we go. Very pleased with the mouse, we HAD this mouse when we were kids, I'd recognise those relief-flat whiskers anywhere, despite many similar mice being issued by the former Crown Colony. Ours discoloured after a lengthy sojourn in the garden, lost his tail and went the way of all flesh, I’ll look after this one!

The other three are similar silicon 'rubber jigglers' with one of my favourite Chinasaurs, a seal and a snake which also - along with the Dimetrodon - has childhood familiarity!

Polyethylene and polyvinyl here with another snake, an unusual (in age and subject) Narwhal whale and a dolphin apparently from the same set, a ladybird ('ladybug' if you have to!), a per'terra'dacktill and a Natural History Museum dino' from Invicta Plastics.

Two Torres wine-bottle tag/mascots above and three deer below, I don't know if they are Preiser or Merten, but it will be one of them, and they might have been home painted which makes it harder to decide without pouring through the catalogues which are all in storage! I think Preiser, purely from the smoothness of the finish?

A santa sleigh deer here, which will be useful, as mixed lots of cake decorations of the sort I get occasionally are often missing one end of the team or the other! Three Quaker horses, very useful, and a Tupperware alphabet animal make-up the rest of the shot.

Domestic[ish] animals and a zebra! The highlight here being the dog, which is clearly another of those cracker animals, but in a larger size than the wild/farm ones, and like the dinosaurs (also discovered by Chris) points to a set of dogs? Cats? More to come on them anyway, I suspect!

Tacked the Biblical's on at the end as a make-weight! The two on the outsides have probably been seen before although there are variations, the two in the middle will add to a growing collection and fill gaps which will complete future posts, I think the smaller one in from ART out of Hong Kong, who we have looked at in the past, but he might be a better finished original 'donor' for the subsequent copied ART ones . . . and - in which case - like the larger one, possibly Italian?

Often in the background but rarely interfering helping like his Mum, although he has a habit of wanting to help, with his teeth, if really valuable stuff is being looked at! Many thanks to Chris for another cracker of a 'red-cross' parcel and part two will be Wild West and bits.