Chisel Creek: The Adventures of Stripe and Brady

Author's Note

Stripe and Brady are very near and dear to me. My sister and I have grown up with them for years! Stripe is a white tiger beanie plush that my mom had for years, and eventually gave to my sister. He is very likely a TY Beanie Baby toy. However, I do not know what Brady is. He could be a cat or a dog, but at the age of three or four, I decided that he was a cat. I've looked online everywhere for Brady's lookalike stuffed toy, but Brady may very well be the only one of him in existence. I got him from my Nana (my Mom's mom) who has since passed away.
After receiving our beanie plush toys from our family members, they became best friends! Though my sister was younger than me, we agreed that since she got Stripe before I got Brady, Stripe should be older. In our much younger years, they went on many adventures together. Sometimes they'd do something seemingly more mundane, such as going to school or cooking. Sometimes they'd get to go to the pretend-fair. Other times, they'd go into outer space. Maybe one day they'd captain a pirate ship. Our best stuffed friends never knew what they'd be doing the next day!
For years we'd collect stuffed animals. Some name brands like Webkinz, Littlest Pet Shop, and Beanie Babies, (my sister was also incredibly obsessed with FurReal Friends), and some came and gone. To this day we still collect and enjoy stuffed animals, but Stripe and Brady are by far the most loved out of any of them.
For a while, it felt as though Stripe and Brady's adventures had come to an end. They'd gone and explored every planet, all seven seas, and ate cotton candy at every fair and festival in the world. The level-headed and intelligent Stripe had led his adorably dopey little friend through it all. Nonetheless, we still cuddled and loved them like they were worth their weight in gold to us.
I think I was about ten or eleven and my sister was eight or nine when we went on a vacation with our Nana (my Dad's mom) and got to visit Kentucky Horse Park! There, we got to go on a horseback ride, and I think that may have been both of our first time riding a horse. I was very excited! My sister was much more hesitant, almost crying that she would rather go to ride the tiny ponies in a circle than ride the bigger horses on the trail. However, our Nana had already paid for the more expensive ticket for a HORSEback ride, so she wasn't letting my sister back out.
We both ended up really enjoying it! From that day on, we both knew what we wanted: our very own horses. To this day, we are both working toward that goal. Yes, one ride on one slow old trail horse was all it took, and soon after we were begging our parents to look for a house to buy that would have enough land for horses. We all ended up compromising and getting me and my sister riding lessons instead.
Another thing that happened that day at Kentucky Horse Park was us getting to go to the gift shop. It was there that my sister and I found a collection of horsey stuffed animals. We were so excited! We learned so much about horses that day, and we had already decided what our favorite kinds were. I vividly remember us trying to decide which ones we were going to pick, because we were only allowed one each. When my sister saw one with black and white patches, she gasped, snatched it up, and turned to me, saying in her usual full-of-attitude style, "Do NOT fight me on this, I'm GETTING the paint horse!"
I replied with, "I'm not going to fight you," I picked up another plush and shouted, "BECAUSE I FOUND A CLYDESDALE!!"
On our way back home, we named our new stuffies after the trail horses we rode. My sister's paint mare became Pocahontas (we gave her the nickname Pocca after a while), and my bay stallion became Loretto.
Just like that, Stripe and Brady had a new adventure: starting a farm from the ground up. Even though we were at the point where many kids would be growing out of their plush toys, or maybe just sleeping next to them rather than playing with them, my sister and I kept it going for many many years! Don't judge; some teenagers get into some wild and sometimes scary stuff. Me and my sister simply avoided potential peer pressure to misbehave and stayed home with stuffed toys instead!
We kept adding plush horses to our collection, purchasing any new one we came across. Anytime we'd go to Kentucky Horse Park at some point in the summer, we'd buy a new plush horse. Once our parents decided we were old enough to have teen Amazon accounts, we spent all our Amazon gift card money away on plush horses. Since we couldn't have a real horse farm, we got the closest thing to it in our bedrooms with Stripe and Brady! And now, we would like to share our years of adventures with you and your children. We hope you enjoy!
All of the horses and characters illustrated in this book represent a plush that my sister or I own. Many of the plushies we bought are still being sold by their original retailers today, so if you or your child has a favorite character, you can easily find a stuffed toy lookalike for sale online! Or perhaps, you or your child already owns the plush lookalike. Keep an eye out!

Pictured: Stripe riding Pocahontas (Pocca)

Pictured: Brady riding Loretto