Ah, the pleasures of the holidays: painting, painting and more painting.

In ten days I've finished platoons of Bersaglieri Anti-Tank Guns; Fucilieri 65/17 guns; M11/39 Tanks; M14/41 Tanks; Semovente 75 SP guns; 6-ton Lorries; and Renault R-35 Tanks kindly donated by our German allies.

Okay, so I haven't got round to doing the rest of the Vietnam range: been too busy painting Italians for the Western Desert for my forthcoming Operation Compass scenario pack. Here are some of the Italians I've finished so far...and the Operation Compass scenario pack will be available in the early new year.

Whether you're into things Lardy or not, I recommend you buy the TFL Xmas Special 2009: packed full of wargaming information and scenarios, and incredibly good value as well: 123 pages for a mere £5.

I have three pieces in the special:

Get Your Frickin' Tentacle Out Of My Face is a sci-fi variant for I Ain't Been Shot, Mum! that allows you to use all those weird and wonderful alien figures you have hidden at the back of the cupboard for some super sci-fi gaming.

The Defence Of Crap Island  is an early war Pacific theatre scenario featuring US Marines defending an atoll against Japanese invasion. Rumours that it was written purely to make Terry shut up are exaggerated!

Tottensontag is a 1942 Western Desert scenario featuring the Afrika Korps in action against the South Africans.

Available now from www.toofatlardies.co.uk.

With Battlefront/FOW moving into Vietnam with their new Once We Were Warriors range, I thought it was about time I started uploading my Vietnam collection into a gallery. Here is the US Rifle Company for starters, NVA and VC to follow in due course.

Four new AAR's added, all from the All American 82nd Airborne scenario pack. Inspired by Martin 981463's fantastic 20mm game, I went back and loaded up the three playtest battle reports from the Durham boys.

I've also added links to all Kev (Fat Wally)'s battle reports to make your browsing even easier.

"My God! It's A Monster!" Richard Clarke with a report on the latest play-test for IABSM III.

John Wimbush provides a battle report covering action from Scenario 10 of the All American supplement: Dog Company of the 2nd/505th PIR holds the northern flank of the landing zone.

This brings the number of AARs on the site up to fifty: crackingly good reads with lots of inspiring photographs!

Battle report and photographs from Scenario 8 of the Sealion scenario pack.

Loads added over the last few months, just haven't bothered to update "New & Updated"! The list includes:

Japanese 105mm guns

British Paras Support Weapons & Recon Troops

Soviet Partisans (lovely figures from Eureka)

British Pioneers

The "Sicilian Weekend" scenario pack is now available!

Fancy a weekend at Bernito's?

Hit the beaches or counter-attack from the hills with Robert Avery's latest pdf scenario booklet for "I Ain't Been Shot, Mum!"

An extensive history of the first two days of Operation Husky, the Allied invasion of Sicily, covering the 10th and 11th July 1943, and accompanied by seventeen unique scenarios for "I Ain't Been Shot, Mum!" including attacks, counter-attacks, encounter battles, desperate defences, fighting retreats, and ambushes!

From the initial and largely disastrous airborne assault through to the immediate aftermath of the main landings, you'll encounter British and US Paratroopers; regular British and American infantry and armour; Italians of all shapes and sizes; and maybe the odd German or two as well!

Each scenario contains a background history, maps, a full game briefing, and a full briefing for each player. Simply print out the pages you need, unpack your figures, set up the table, and away you go!

Available from www.toofatlardies.co.uk along with Robert's previous booklets The Defence of Calais; Vyazma or Bust; Fall of the Lion Gate; Bloody Burma; and Anzio - Wildcat to Whale.

Sicilian Weekend contains the following scenarios: The Ponte Grande Bridge; The Piano Lupo 1; North of the Pachino Airfield; Gela 1; The Piano Lupo 2; The Piano Lupo 3; The Road to Scoglitti; South-East of Butera; Gela 2; The Abbio Priolo; The Gela Plain; The Biazzo Ridge; Palma di Montechiaro; Canicatti; Favarotta; Campobello & South of Priolo.  

German line infantry completed; and the tank element of the Panzer Company done. Just the Schutzen infantry to go now.

Most of the German line infantry are now up. Only the engineers and then the panzer company to do now!

Soviets are finished for now!

More Soviets added. Almost all done now...well, at least until that package arrives from Eureka! Their new partisan figures are well worth a look: especially the accordian player.

I have now added the French from 1940 to the gallery, and begun adding the Soviets.

I've also increased the size of the thumbnails for the other armies.

Still to come:  the German Wehrmacht units (a big job) ; the rest of the Soviets (that might also take some time) ; British Airborne forces; and the Americans (another huge job) . Keep checking back for regular updates!  

One of my New Year Resolutions is to finally get pictures of all my WW2 figures up on the site. 

As a good start, therefore, I've revamped the galleries of my BEF, Fallschirmjager and Japanese figure; and added pictures of my British troops for early war Malaya, Singapore or Burma. 

All the existing pictures have been re-shot, and there are a lot of new pictures showing more kit that I've painted over the last year or so.

Still to come:  the German Wehrmacht units (a big job) ; early war French; the Soviets (that might also take some time) ; British Airborne forces; and the Americans (another huge job) . Keep checking back for regular updates!