A White-washin' Aunt Polly's Fence??!!

Is it really true? Will Stokes be painting a fence like Mark Twain's Tom Sawyer? Not exactly.

For the next few days, I'll actually be a paintin' the future room of "Little Nimbus" as the several gallons of primer and Flaxen yellow paint plus rollers, roller pans, brushes, and the like -- now waiting on the floor of the bedroom next to ours -- will attest.

Yep, I'll just be a paintin' fool through the weekend while the Grand Duchess attends her baby shower on Saturday with her mother and sister, who arrive this evening for a few days. Now, some of you might be thinking to yourselves, "Well, Stokes, that's either plain old dumb luck, or very astute planning!" I'll never tell. ;-)

By the way, for those who might be scratching their heads, Little Nimbus is the name by which we refer to the future heir to the Grand Duchy of Stollen since we are waiting until the baby is born before we learn its sex. We have specific names all picked out whatever the case may be, but "Little Nimbus" is vague enough to work for both a boy or a girl until the big day. And where, prey tell, did we come up with this delightful name?

Well, about three or four years ago, The Grand Duchess was in a particularly dark mood one afternoon when she arrived home. I finally remarked that she was like a looming dark cloud. A Cumulonimbus cloud to be precise. When I slapped the label of Surly Nimbus on her later that evening, it had the desired effect, causing Sonja to break into gales of laughter, and the evil spell was broken. The fair Grand Duchess was restored to a pleasnt mood. Afterwards, whenever we have discussed the future heir to Stollen, we refer jokingly to him/her as "Little Nimbus".

It's Early Days Yet. . .

M aking some early progress with Batch A of the Anhalt-Zerbst Regiment over the last several days/evenings. Nothing terribly exciting just yet, but the basic black, brown, and flesh areas are done as are the green bases, and gray undercoat. The latter two areas needed some careful retouching early in the week. Next up, the neck stocks. I might just do these in red for the enlisted men although some of my source material suggest they were black, but I always look for an excuse to shake things up a bit. Any errant splotches of red (or black) can be covered with another application of light gray before I move onto the next step. "Giddy up!" as one Cosmo Kramer might have said. -- Stokes

And We're Off!!!

Arrrgh! Gotta go back into camera settings on my iPhone to bring all of the frame into focus. Blast! Painting is underway on the 60 or so Minden Austrians, which are slated to become my version of the Anhalt-Zerbst Regiment of AWI renown. More or less indistinguishable from Austrians of the era really, right down to the red facings and turnbacks, but the eventual flags (already in my files) will set them apart. I went ahead and based-coated all of them over a couple of days lthe last week of August, using a mix of light gray and white acrylic gesso, before next applying my usual basic alkyd oil flesh tone to the faces and hands. In a day or two, I'll hit that with Army Painter Flesh Wash to tone things down a bit and bring some definition to the faces and hands. As usual, the plan is to focus on about 20 figures at a time, splitting the regiment roughly into thirds along with the color party and regimental staff. Depending on ...

The Eventual Anhalt-Zerbst Regiment. . .

The Anhalt-Zerbst regiment musters in the drill square to sort themselves into platoons and companies during the coming weeks Fall maneuvers if you will. A large dose of real life the last few days with the start of classes next Monday, various preparatory meetings, and finishing up a few other things this week. But, I managed to sort out 60 or so Minden Austrian infantry from the pile and get 'em stuck to temporary painting bases. Must carefully drill out the hands of several NCOs for flagpoles and pole arms this weekend before the usual basecoat. I'm thinking of mixing the usual white gesso with the usual light gray to kill two birds with one stone so to speak. Applying both base- and undercoat in one fell swoop as my grandmother used to say. In the meantime, the recently finished squadron of Saxon cuirassiers has been placed carefully in one of the clear acrylic boxes on my shelves until I have the suitable flag to affix. -- Sto...

The Grand Duchy of Stollen

Search This Blog