CHEERIO TERRY.... AND THANKS.

I had to post briefly about the sad death of my favourite Python, Terry Jones

Hilarious chap and brilliant medieval historian and of course screenwriter of Labyrinth. Obviously there are the well known Monty Python sketches which spring to mind, but for me the scene that captured his humour and medieval interest was from his TV series Crusades, in which he attempts to interview the descendant of a goose which led one of the pilgrimages to the Holy Land. RIP Mr. Jones.  

CREEPY CRITTERS

I'm a keen follower of Ana Polancsak's Garden of Hecate blogspot and over Christmas she posted about an offer on her sculpts which are produced by Harwood Hobbies in Canada. I took the opportunity to grab a few of the curious creatures that have emerged from the Gardens and they arrived in record time.

A couple of signposts , a demon snail, a 2 legged demi- buer, a custodian (  I see this as a helpful undead entity), a woodwose (which will be featuring in a D & D adventure), a Bosch style imp, a horse headed bloodfiend and another imp. Also some animal skulls.

These are the sort of creatures I wished were available when I was in my early teens and spent hours poring over books of paintings by Hieronymous Bosch and the like. If you like weird, support Ana by buying some of her figures.

MORE SHINY TOYS

I managed to get a few more units done for the Toyhammer army.

The Knights of the Purple Pim. I started these about 10 years ago, Citadel Bretonnian knights converted to become Swan Knights of Dol Amroth, and they languished unfinished in a box until a couple of weeks ago. I hope they have a successful career in King Lodwick's Toyhammer army.

Some spearmen. These are playing pieces from an old board game called Lionheart. I bought 3 copies at next to nothing (check European ebay sites for good deals). Very basic detail which suits the feel of the army.

More Lionheart pieces. Some serfs to act as a speedbump.

I hope to introduce King Lodwick himself soon.

TOYHAMMER AND MERRY CHRISTMAS

Another sort of " ... hammer" to get me sidetracked, but this has been a fairly swift (for me) , force to get this far. Inspiration comes from the wonderful Sword in the Sprue blog, so much, that I have even copied a lot of the paint schemes shown there. I wanted to do a small army with minimal expense, effort and planning, simple painting and GLOSSY.

 First we have  The Plum Pudding Gnomes, finished in time for Christmas.

Next up some archers, painted in the same colour schemes as Britains Deetail Longbowmen.

The Royal Griffin Martin

2 units of Sky Dwarves (just realised I forgot the second coat of Ironbreaker on the weapons).

Brother Clavicle and Merkin the Magician

That's the army so far, although I have almost finished a unit of mounted knights. All these figures were dirt cheap and the 2 characters were metal chaps I've had for a long time. As I mentioned before I hated the chunky Citadel plastics when they came out, but now I love them. Easy to paint with no deep undercuts, they lend themselves well to block painting. All these were primed white first and were fairly quick to do, although each colour had to have about 3 coats to be completely solid which was rather annoying. I have a few more units planned.

It's been a busy year with toy soldiers taking if not a back seat, at least a passenger seat. Family duties and a new hobby have been filling up a lot of spare time. Hopefully next year I will find more time and energy to post more on this blog.

HAVE A VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS ONE AND ALL.

F

BLUE PETER HAMMER

One of my favourite blogspots at the moment is bluepeterhammer.blogspot.com written by the talented artist Joe McLaren. . I really like his approach to gaming and modelling and all his blogs are well worth a look.  One of the little projects on Blue Peter Hammer was to make some Warhammer 40k style tanks out of nobbut card wrapped round a cork sanding block.  This we duly did yesterday and have been sent to the Imperial workshops for painting by youngest son.

Check out Joe's original blog post for instructions.

TWO COOL CARDS

Yes gentle reader, your host enters his 51st year today with some trepidation and puzzlement to where the last 25 years went. My 2 youngest sons each made me a Fantasy related card, first some Wheelies by Arthur from The Citadel of Chaos ( we have just backed the Kickstarter to get figures of these).

Secondly by George is a picture of Brag from The Trigan Empire. We are all huge fans in our house and are delighted to hear that the stories are going to be reprinted next year. Phrases from the one book we have already are frequently bandied around.  Such as "silence his lying tongue", " throw him to the nobras" and " cease your idle chatter" ( my favourite).

I'll post pictures of my gift when I've made it.

WISTMAN'S WOOD

Managed to get back to one of my favourite places yesterday, WISTMAN'S WOOD on Dartmoor. Last time I was there was 20 years ago.  I took a few pictures for terrain reference.