Update

 GREETINGS!

Man, has it been a while and has it been a time.

When I first started this blog, I had tried dedicating some time every month to writing and drafting different posts. Believe it or not, I have quite a few drafts but never got around to finishing them...so apologies to my Ma, whom I believe is the only one who checks my blog.

If you follow me on social media, you may have noticed that the past 18 months have been eerily silent with the exception of me sharing the work of my friends or those I admire. Since shortly after the Vastarian event in November of 2024, I experienced massive burnout with the hobby. Towards the run up to hosting the event with the Wiers, Eli and Jonny, I viewed making the last terrain board more as a second job and not a fulfilling prospect (hence why the 'trench board' was a bit lackluster and rushed). While we all experience various highs and lows with the creative process from time to time, mine was so severe that I could not even stand to go into the garage anymore and look at my tools. Bit extreme, perhaps, but the truth nonetheless.

To add seasoning to this, shortly after the event I began the interview process for a different position in my company that would potentially require us to move overseas to Norway. "Surely..." I thought, "there are many qualified native-born Norwegians who will apply, and the costs to relocate me would not be worth it." Lo and behold, I was offered the position in 2025 anyway. This caused no small amount of havoc in my personal life grappling with the decision in dialogue with my wife and family, and was one of the most difficult choices I had to make in mine and my wife's life. She had to put her career on hold, and it would be a massive change for our children and ourselves. Plenty of arguments, dialogues, therapy etc but eventually...

Norway won out for the sake of our kids. We had planned on moving out of Texas to Connecticut around summer of 2026 regardless; so I had to spend the next year selling all of our household belongings, rehoming our family dog, selling our houses, poring through immigration paperwork and, almost the most daunting part, selling 28 years worth of hobby material...

On the hobby side, I had accepted a commission from a local competitive 40k player and finished it just in time prior to moving in June...but more excitingly I made a larger version of the Mordheim clocktower board I had made years earlier for some dear friends of mine. This was a brief spark of joy in the past 1.5 years, as I knew it would be going to a good home - and I had tons of terrain making material and bits I needed to get rid of anyway!

Anyway here are, in no particular order, pictures of everything that's happened in my absence:

Only half of what was 28 years of hobby to sell...

In March '26, the family came with me to Norway for a work trip

The local hobby store in Tønsberg has a lot of what I need!

Family trip to Honduras

A local Mordheim campaign kicked off early last year, and it was awesome to use my boards. They'll be missed!

More Mordheim with Jim, Luke, Tony and Shaheen

Manny eying up his next move on my clocktower board

Disney was a blast for our daughter's 4th birthday!

Excited for Disney...

We celebrated our 10th anniversary at the TX Rennaisance festival and had a hobbit-themed party!

Lima was beautiful! Was only there for work, sadly.

Manny pondering his next move in Mordheim

In March of last year I had to visit Rio de Janeiro again for work. It was good be there not on a ship this time!

The starting Mordheim crew! Miss these guys.

Sam Lotfi running a game of HeroQuest for us at the end of GrimTex26! What a treat!

Colt running a game of The Doomed in his Salvatore28 setting, in all of its glory, at GrimTex26!

We spent far too many days at the beach in Texas before the move

I was only in Amsterdam for 30 hours for work, but a local nerd reached out to me and he showed me the town.

I got to get not one but two games of Vastarian in over the course of two separate visits to Baltimore with the Wiers!

In typical fashion, I lost. I'm not good at gaming...just ask the Wiers

Our shipping crate prior to departure

What a whirlwind of a year and a half its been. I really love my new job and our family is slowly adjusting to Norway. Kids start school in August, and we will be travelling to Denmark next week to LegoLand for our son's birthday. My wife and I will start Norsk language classes at night as well, which is something else to look forward to. 

We had shipped over quite a lot of things, mostly for the kids and me. While I had paired down to just 3 or 4 totes of hobby supplies/games etc, I was very careful to take with me all of the minis and gifts I had received from friends and acquaintances over the years. They now sit on a shelf next to my home office :). 

Another American couple live not too far from us, and we have clicked really well. The husband, Ryan, had been out of Magic: the Gathering for a decade, but I introduced him to the Commander format and he is hooked! So we have been playing quite a lot of Magic this past month. I hope to introduce him gradually to skirmish games eventually...

I hope to slowly begin hobbying again, and at least finish my Vastarian terrain board blogpost - but the sunshine is fleeting here, so I likely will not check back in until September or October. 

Some projects I am looking at resuming is the Rot of Hondious and finishing up a retinue that was gifted to me by an artist in Australia, hobbyordie (he has since deactivated his account sadly), and maybe creating some more zone mortalis tiles that I had gifted to the Wiers...

Another interesting project that is appealing to me is the new Battle March system. With limited space (and money) I think it would be a good starting point for me, and perhaps to introduce Ryan to Warhammer. 

All in all, what a time to be alive.

Until next time

Bill