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Tuesday 18 March 2008

Progress and stuff..

Thanks for all the kind words and good wishes either in replies to the previous post or in the emails. Very kind!

Impending daddyhood is a marvellous (if slightly scary) thing...

Anyhoo...back to painting and stuff.

Am pleased to report that I've been allowed out to attend Salute this year. I'll be mostly found hanging around the Newark Irregulars table where apparently some big Dark Age Welshies & Saxons thing will be going on. (@James & Steve: I promise not to drool too much over the wonderful figures or make too much of a nuisance of myself cheering on Cadwallon and his evil Saxon ally, Penda the pagan!!!!!!)

The rest of the day will be spent trying not to buy too much and working out how to get what I do purchase into the house and past the missus!! She's being really brill at the mo, despite the associated tiredness, etc, that come with being preggers. I know that I should not rely on this though and will really try not to purchase too much stuff for fear of unleashing the beast that lurks within...

As for painting, Tony's Saxons are being based and undercoated along with some Welshies and Saxons that I'm doing for me. I can paint those in my sleep and as they are all on foot, that'll cut the painting time down. I can paint horses really well, but they take me a bloody AGE to do, so some 7th C Welsh and a bunch of Saxons will be much easier than El Cid things...and anyway, one can NEVER have enough Arfur figs!!!!

I'm doing a few nifty conversions too. Most of them are GB attacking Teulu that I've...erm...chopped!!!! I love GB figs. The new Saxons are the dogs floppsy bitz, but the 'Welsh Teulu attacking' are a bit crap really...well, no...you see...hmmmm....it's the heads that do it...they just don't look right to me! Not up to El Soapster's usual standards IMHO (sorry Soaps...) So anyway, I've removed the offending heads and replaced them with some suitably 7th Century-ish Saxon and Romano-Brit helmeted heads from West Wind (am going for the idea of a Welsh kingdom that trades with as well as fights with its saxon neighbours, hence the Saxon helmets). They look bloomin' great and fit in BEAUTIFULLY with the GB standing Teulu, (which I've left as they are cos they are fab models all the way!!)

Anyway, those are what I'm gonna be working on now, so expect a few 'in progress' pics soonish after Easter... I've decided to use James Morris' idea of doing spirals on the Welsh shields. I'll let you know how wise that idea is once I've tried a few!!!!

Right. I've an hour til the wife returns from Aqua-natal (???!!!!!) so time for a bit of painting before dinner!

See ya...

Friday 7 March 2008

Sniffer Dogs and search parties....

...are not required! Though I can see why Dave thought it might be so!

Sorry for lack of posts lately. This has been largely due to life handing me a few months where painting has simply not been done at all.

First there is work! As some of you know, I work for a Local Authority Education Team, supporting Primary schools in difficulty. It's always a job that requires many hours per week working at home, just like teaching...Well, this term has seen the workload explode out of all proportion. Which has meant I've lacked time, energy and motivation to paint. Any spare time I have had has been spent making loud noises on my guitar, as that's very therapeutic when one is stressed!!
Then there's the wargames club. Our venue (pub back room) became untenable due to the Council's decision to bulldoze said pub...VERY soon! at the same time, I was elected club secretary, just as we had to move to our new venue (a spanking room at Peterborough Museum - absolutely top notch...am sure that Lord S would approve, as it is in a class above most other wargames club venues, dontcha know!!) This has taken several hours of admin time to sort out...leaving less time for painting!!!!

Then, and this is the good bit, there's the MARVELLOUS news that Mrs Hawes and I are expecting a wee baby Hawesling which is due in September this year. HUZZAH!!!! This has meant a vast re-organisation of the spare rooms upstairs to accomdate Junior's nursery and has prompted the purchasing and building of a vast IKEA storage system in which to gather and store all my wargaming paraphernalia...father-in-law and I are completing the construction this very weekend....

So, that's why no painting updates!!!!

It has meant that I now will not get the El Cid done for Warhammer World in May, which is a bummer. However, that project will simply go back on the backburner while I consolidate my ever growing Arturian collection with more welsh and a mass of saxons (including a bunch more for my very patient commission customer, Tony, who is awaiting the second Gedriht unit for his Sea raider army.) as thereis no timesacle for them and as it's virtually all foot I have to paint, it'll be speedier than the El Cid. Also, I can paint basic Arthurian foot in my sleep, so it's easy....

Anyhoo, as I am reorganising everything, I may drag out the camera and snap some of the stuff you haven't seen... maybe the Caesarian Romans which (all 3000pts worth!) are going to the club for a mega bash on Monday evening against a Pontic type affair done using the Armies of Antiquity Alexander list. So I may snap the best units for you if I get a mo in between IKEA building this weekend...

Laterz....