I began collecting MLPs when I was about 5 years old in 1992, which unfortunately, was also the year My Little Pony was discontinued in the United States. Oddly enough it was my cousin, Derek, and his wife Heidi were the ones that got me into My Little Ponies. I remember they got me the Prancing Pretty Carousel for the Petite Ponies for my birthday. To make a long story short, I LOVED it!!

We were soon buying more packs of Petite Ponies to go with it. Seeing how much I loved the petite ponies, my Aunt bought me a full size pony. It was a Remco pony. I liked it and would carry it around the house playing. My mom then decided to buy me a Baby pony [not an off brand], and she bought me Baby Ribbs. I loved him!!! Around this time, she found out the My Little Pony line was being discontinued. Knowing I would be quite heartbroken, my mom drove around to numerous stores only to find 2 ponies, Baby Noddins and Baby Snippy. I did not know of this for some time, but when I found out I was very upset. She gave those last two ponies to me for my birthday the next year.

In our search for My Little Ponies, we discovered thrift stores sometimes had them, and we would buy all we found. I remember when I got 25 ponies, I thought I was really neat! LOL! ;-) So, over the years my herd has gradually grown to a good number. Somewhere along about 1997, my aunt discovered that there were numerous MLP sites on the web. This was, however, before we had a computer, so she printed out the entire Dream Valley thing so I could identify my ponies. :-)

She heard rumors that My Little Pony was coming back, and I was quite excited. But when I saw the new ponies for the first time, I sort of stared at them in horror. They were NOT the ponies I remembered! I did not buy any then. My brother, who was in California right then visiting my aunt and cousins, saw MLP things at McDonald's and bought a Happy Meal just for the toy, because he knew I'd love them! [Aww, wasn't that sweet of him? It's the thought that counts...] I tried to fake excitement when I saw the new little McDonalds pony, but secretly I hated them. Over time, I have grown to accept, even like the new ponies, but I still prefer the originals to them.

When people ask how many ponies I have in my collection, I shrug and say "alot!" The truth is, I'm not really sure how many I do have! I estimate around 200 or 250, not including the new ponies, I don't know.... but many are duplicates.

I bought over the internet once, and never traded over the Internet, so this is all from thrift stores and flea markets.