Years and years ago, when my baby was an actual baby and I didn’t even know how to knit yet, I crocheted her a toy horse.
Her favourite thing at the time was a YouTube channel (…some things have not changed) with animated videos and nursery rhymes. This one happened to have songs in French, which I thought was great fun. One of her favourite songs was Le Cheval Arc-en-Ciel – or, en anglais, The Rainbow Horse.
Le cheval arc-en-ciel, il galope dans mes rêves. | The rainbow horse, he gallops in my dreams.
Awwwwwwwww.
Obviously my petite coquine needed her own cheval arc-en-ciel, so I took up my hook and made her one.
Ohhhhh I was so proud. Look at that majestic beast! Beautiful rainbow mane, just like the video. And she loved it, too.
The first toy I ever made her – so of course it’s so special to me.
Recently the kid has been suuuuuuuper into horses and unicorns, so le cheval has become a favourite toy again. And that’s when disaster struck: the horse was accidentally left outside in the garden – overnight.
The next morning when we realised we had a quick-and-frantic look for it before the school run with no luck. At this point kid knew nothing so we left it that way and I took her in. The whole journey I was thinking… yes, I could make another one, but it wouldn’t be the same. She’d know, and I’d know. It wasn’t about her having a rainbow horse toy – it was about THIS rainbow horse toy being gone. A replacement wouldn’t help.
When I got back, I saw this…
YES! He found it!
…oh. Oh no.
One ear had been chewed off. A front leg was detached (but found!). The mane was a mess and the whole thing was filthy. And let me tell you, it reeked. Utterly stank of something I can only imagine to be fox urine.
Yeah.
But. It had been found. And it was repairable. Of course it was.
First things first: into the washing machine you go.
Thankfully Vanish is a miracle – it came up clean (and delightfully stink-free). Now to inspect the damage: a little more than I’d first thought. Not only is that front leg off, there’s a big hole in the neck. Eek. And that ear has GOT to go.
Just as well I keep all my yarn scraps – I still had all the yarn I used to make it with in the first place. Result.
Don’t worry, horse. I won’t leave you with one ear.
Looking better already!
Next up was the big repair: sorting out that hole in its neck. I’m not gonna lie, this was a little bit intimidating. But by this point I’d decided on two things: 1, that the repairs should be visible; and 2, that I would tell the kid a story about a naughty fox who bit the horse. She’s really into playing vet right now too, so I thought she’d like that story and it would explain why it looks a little different.
This part is a little tricky to explain because I really winged it, but basically what I did was to tug on the stitches around the edge of the hole to work out which ones were stable and which ones were ripped and coming apart. Once I’d identified the “safe edge”, I pulled up a loop of new yarn at the bottom right corner, and single crocheted (US terms) across the round as if it were a row.
When I got to the end of the “row”, I slip stitched into the “row” above, turned as if working flat, and single crocheted my way back along the row until I was back at the start.
Another slip stitch into the “row” above and I did the same thing across again, this time putting in a few decreases.
I kept working like this until the hole was covered. I added some extra stuffing, too.
At the top instead of working a row of single crochet, I used slip stitches to seam the new flap onto the old body.
Then I sewed the front leg back on, and reinforced the other one while I was there so they felt the same.
It’s a bit messy and you can see some of the frayed edges, but that’s okay. It’s a scar, of sorts.
When I was reattaching the front leg I spotted a little hole in the hoof. I did an (intentionally) messy darn job there to close and secure it.
Looking pretty good at this point, but we’re not finished yet!
This is when I spotted that some of the mane had been chewed off, so I pulled out all the extra colours and added 2 more strands of each colour to help cover it up. I also gave the tail a little trim.
One last touch. To commemorate its safe return, I made a little tassel from yarn scraps.
I’ve put the tassel on kid’s school bag. I like to think of it as a symbol of overcoming the shit that life can throw at you, and reassurance that her mum will always be there to pick up the pieces and put her back together. I think she just likes stroking it.
Now, here’s the truly wonderful part. Kid has, as of yet, never named a toy that didn’t come with a name. But after I told her the story of the naughty fox who bit her horse, she told me that the horse’s name is Dasher.
Hi, Dasher. Welcome home.
