Happy New Year from the Grand Duchy of Stollen!

A final vintage image for the 2017-2018 Christmas season.

Happy New Year from all of us here in The Grand Duchy of Stollen! May 2018 see you enjoy more hobby-related reading, painting, gaming, and socializing. It's still frigid and snowy here in Totleigh-in-the-Wold, so following a special breakfast of Swedish waffles made for us by The Grand Duchess, the three of us are heading out for some more cross-country skiing shortly -- The Grand Duchess discovered a local place with groomed trails and even a warming hut with a wood-burning stove yesterday -- before returning home to clean up and take down the Christmas trees and the related decorations before enjoying another helping of New Year's dinner this evening. And the perhaps some toy soldiering of some kind this evening following the Young Master's bedtime.

-- Stokes

And some suitably 18th century themed dancing.

Finally, the three of us enjoyed two hours of special New Year's Day skiing through the woods of Mid-Michigan just outside Haslett. Loads of fun, but the best part has to be seeing the eight-year-old Young Master herringbone up hills and schuss down the other side. At some point, I expect he'll be a better skier than yours truly since we first put him on skis at five, while I did not begin in the sport until I was 33! The Grand Duchess snapped this neat photograph, by the way, on her phone during our tour today.

Comments

Wellington Man said…

Happy New Year, Stokes!
WM

1:03 PM

Norm said…

Thanks for a year of interesting blogging, Best Wishes for the New Year.

3:28 PM

Steve-the-Wargamer said…

Happy New Year, Stokes

6:53 AM

Anonymous said…

Stokes, Thank you and a Happy New Year to you all.
Best regards,
Simon

8:27 AM

otto schmidt said…

Dear Stokes
Can you tell me about the theory you use in forming your Imagi-Nations or direct me to a place where I can read bout this.

Otto

1:44 PM

otto schmidt said…

Dear Stokes

By the way for the past 12 years I have published a 16 page quarterly newsletter called Saxe N' Violets devoted to humor and whimsy in war games. Are you interested in seeing a few samples? If so send me your snail-makl, (postal delivery address) to sigurd@eclipse.net, or to MY postal snail-mail address

Otto Schmidt
1031 Stillwater Rd.
Newton N.J. 07860

We have book reviews, battle reports, pictures, and lots of articles on imagi-Nations including whole games and campaigns.

Otto

9:29 AM

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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