I’m Over Here Now!

 We have successfully moved to Illinois! The last two weeks have felt like two months, but I should be reaching normalcy again soon. We move into our house this weekend, and from there I’ll get to enjoy my own workbench in the garage, as well as a larger hobby space in my own BASEMENT! 

I’ve never had a basement before, growing up in Florida we didn’t have them (the dirt is sand, after all) and Californian homes don’t usually have them either, due to earthquakes and a lack of tornadoes. What’s really great about this basement is that it’s “finished”, so it’s got all the fixings of an actual room of the house.

(A rare selfie with the house far in the background, taken from the rear of the property)

My wife is in love with the house, and the girls are in love with the backyard. It’s like our own personal forest, complete with a creek at the end of the property. It’s absolutely fantastic, and we are so blessed to have found it for a reasonable price (unreasonable prices are far too common and we’d almost given up on the dream of buying a home).

We’ve spent two weekends exploring the area and getting familiar, and I’ve found a local game store that will most likely be my go to! The Midwest is a hub of gaming in the US, so there’s a lot more opportunity for face-to-face with those others in our hobby. We also visited a church today that featured (along with much more important things) a slide guitar player in the worship band. Not very common, but very neat indeed.

I picked up these figures for a game called “Conquest” today at the shop; as it’s a very popular game there and I’m trying to get involved, the figures look great (these swordsmen match the art on the box), and the rules are free online so I could see if I liked them.

These will be the first in my Hundred Kingdoms army for Conquest, a 38mm scale war game from Para Bellum Games. I’ll be adding archers and eventually some cavalry. My goal is to get into the game on a lower price point and play something fun. I’m thinking I can go with a very HYW style approach and have my bowmen loose their arrows while my men at arms do the fighting. It will probably fail but I mean just look at those knights and their plate mittens!!!

I can’t speak highly enough about the owner of Zeek’s…Zeek, that is, as on my first visit he stopped what he was doing and chatted with me about the area, the store, and gave me a great first impression. He showed me the event he was running next door, with 80 people in it, and the next day he still remembered my name. Good business practices from simple people skills and kindness.

I hope I’ve provided good links, if you’re in central Illinois, check out Zeek’s store. Sorry I’ve been radio silent for so long, moving 2,000 miles is trying; especially when loved ones are left. I also deleted Instagram, as I felt I was spending too much time browsing it before the move. I’ve been trying to keep up reading everyone else’s blogs, but sometimes there’s an enjoyable backlog to catch up on, like a curated magazine of my favorite artists, collectors, and hobbyists!