Coming Soon. . . A Small Christmas Week Game!

Not the more usual Victorian or Edwardian Father Christmas this time, but a young boy on Nordic skis observing the Christmas Star. This reminds me of when I used to set off for night time skiing on the miles of (unlighted after 10pm) trails just outside Trondheim, Norway during the winter of 1999-2000. It was a snowy year that winter, and there was white stuff on the ground from the end of November through almost the end of March that season. You see a lot when you are along in the woods in the middle of a snowy night. A lone wolf was one particularly unnerving encounter. Luckily for me, he was more interested in raiding a trailside garbage can. I began making my daily ski tours during daylight hours after that.

Fairly quiet here at Stollen Central the last few days as we have enjoyed Christmastime with all of its cold and snow this year. We have had considerable upheaval of various kinds the last 2.5 years since our move to Michigan, but I feel as though some calm and normalcy has returned recently. Certainly during the last several weeks. Hopefully, we are finally settled.

In any case, the planned refight, more or less, of Steve Hezzlewood's and John Ray's 'The Boucharde Raid' is slated to take place on Saturday, or New Year's Eve afternoon this weekend. Stay tuned.

-- Stokes

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A Little More Brushwork. . .

A little more brushwork on the first batch of (my version of) the Anhalt-Zerbst Regiment yesterday (Saturday). Taking a different tack this time and addressing many of the details first before the white coats and other larger areas of uniform. The eagle-eyed among you will notice that I've painted the (dark) red stocks of the enlisted men. Always a difficult and frustrating item to paint, it made sense to paint from the inside out as it were and get that particular detail out of the way first rather than try to paint it in later after much other painting has been accomplished. Trying to reduce the need for later retouching of other items on the figures you understand. Hopefully, I will be able to get back to these later today after a second trip back to the Apple Store for help with a couple of new iPad issues and, following the return home, some revision of Google Slides for tomorrow's meetings with my students. -- Stokes P.S. And according t...

Basic Reds Done at Last. . .

S till quite a way to go with the current batch of 20 human figures and a horse (of course), but they're actually starting to look like something after all of the red distinctions. Quite a bit of painting in hour-long sessions the last week as and when time has allowed. Mostly applying the basic dark red to facing areas and turnbacks followed by the inevitable touch-ups to clean up wobbly edges and those misplaced, minute splotches of Citadel Khorne Red. They're looking like so many Austrian infantry regiments of the era at this point, but the eventual flags will turn them magically into the Anhalt-Zerbst Regiment, more or less, of the AWI period. But I'm getting a bit ahead of myself. One frustrating point (ahem) of sad discovery. I've started trying to use those Winsor & Newton 'Series Seven' brushes (#1 rounds) purchased last spring, and the blasted things simply will not keep a point. Very frustrating since I have heard over the y...

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

The Grand Duchy of Stollen

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