HAPPY 10TH BIRTHDAY!!!!!!!!!! - Part 1 (Infographic)

HAPPY 10TH BIRTHDAY TO THE ART OF CAESURA! 

Oh my God you guys! We did it! Ten years! TEN YEARS!!!! A bloody DECADE!!! Double-digits! I can't believe it! How many other one-man blogs or podcasts or any media do you know that have maintained AT LEAST one post per week for a decade? Probably loads, but I don't know many (Vincy V's Warhammer Weekly does come to mind)!

As you can see, if you gaze in to the distant past - or scroll down the righthand side of the landing screen - my first post was January 23rd, 2016. Ten years ago to the day!

Usually I would just about manage to cram the blog's birthday celebrations into one mammoth post, but this year we're going to give the tenth birthday celebrations the space they deserve and we're going to keep the party rolling over an entire month!

This week we'll start things off in the time-honoured celebratory style...that's right, an infographic! We'll start by looking back over the past year, and we'll also extend our gaze back over the past TEN years!

As we always do, let's dig in a little deeper. 

A "caesura" refers to a break or a pause, and that's what I wanted this blog to be - for myself and for you - from the craziness of adult life. 

Back when I started The Art of Caesura, Pokemon GO was a global phenomenon, Stranger Things had just debuted (fitting, as it's just now finished up), Leonardo DiCaprio finally won his Oscar, Bowie and Prince both passed away, The clown epidemic was a thing, folks were wearing chokers and Timberland boots, Vine was still vining, Brexit Brexited and Trump trumped...did I mention the clown epidemic? 

Crazy.

Let's look at how I faired with my hobby goals over the past year. 

1) Gift "The Gift." This is kind of a funny one. I came up with the idea to do this one around this time last year, basically it is a secret, gigantic printing and painting project that I wanted to work on to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the blog that will then be gifted to...someone or something...on a particular date. I actually got about half way through the entire project when I realized that I was completing it in the wrong year - I wanted to gift it in the tenth year, not the 9th year! So this one was an accidental addition to my hobby goals from last year and it will remain cryptic for now, with a target completion date of summer this year...

2) Paint 700 Ducats of Trench Crusade: I have painted EXACTLY 700 ducats of Trench Crusade, they were so much fun to paint and I can't wait to show them to you over the course of this year!

3) Run 10km. Nope. Maybe this year. Maybe not. 

As I have said in the past, it's always funny to see what my priorities were at this time last year. Although it appears that I only completed one of my three hobby goals, little did I know that in 2025 I would sign up for a Warhammer 40k league, learn more about the nuances of the rules of 40k and play more games of 40k than I ever have in my life. Not to mention getting multiple versions of 2000 point lists of Black Templars up to Battle Ready painting standard. Not too shabby after all!

Let us now look ahead to 2026.

1) Gift the Gift - well, we've cryptically covered this one already.

2) Play 3 Games of Malediction. 

Malediction is going to be my new hobby love, alongside Trench Crusade this year. I've only had the chance to print a few of the models so far, but I've bought all of the STLs. I love the models, I love the cards, I love the art, I love that this is finally the game that scratches both itches of Magic the Gathering, and miniatures games. I've poured through the rulebook and read all the cards and am already planning decks, lists and synergies. 

But I want to push myself further than simply loving Malediction and printing and painting the minis for it. I want to actually play some games of it. I've set myself a goal of 3 games (for Malediction and for Trench Crusade below) because the maximum number of games that I could ever play would be one every other week. So this goal would mean playing 6 weeks of Malediction. No small feat. 

3) Play 3 Games of Trench Crusade.

Same as my goal above for Malediction, but with Trench Crusade. At least I have a Trench Crusade warband already painted up and I know of two other people in my local area with painted warbands...we'll see how I get on. 

4) Run another painting competition. 

Wait, did you say another painting competition. Yes, yes I did. More on that in a few weeks.

Before we move on, because this is the Tenth Birthday Bonanza, let's just take a quick minute to look back on all of my hobby goals from previous years:

2016

1) Complete one miniature per week.

2) Memorize one new song per month.

3) Appreciate life.

2017

1) Write one blog entry per week.

2) Paint one mini per week.

3) Get super svelte for my wedding.

2018

1) Learn 3 new hobby techniques.

2) One big hike per month.

3) Learn 4 new songs on guitar.

2019

1) Enter a painting competition.

2) submit a photo to White Dwarf Magazine.

3) One blog post per week.

2020

1) One blog post per week.

2) Play a game against someone I don't know.

3) Enter a "live" painting competition.

2021

1) One blog post per week.

2) Completely paint one full miniatures board game.

3) Submit my work to a magazine / e-zine

2022

1) One blog post per week.

2) Create an awesome office / hobby space.

3) Dedicated workout (at least) once per week.

4) Play guitar (at least) once per week.

2023

1) One blog post per week.

2) Live like the kind of person who is making the most of their life.

2024

1) Paint the Gallowdark!

2) Play a 2k game of 40k.

2025

Well, you can see those ones above. 

When I'm writing the blog birthday posts I often refer back to the previous year, but I've never really looked at all the years combined before. It's amazing to see how often my goal was to write "one blog post per week", I'm extremely proud to have attained that for an entire ten years. 

Looking at other trends, fitness goals have (unsurprisingly) cropped up about half of the time, as have ambitions to play more guitar. 

When I see these ten years worth of hobby goals laid out before me like this, I'm actually filled with immense pride because even if I didn't always succeed in achieving my goals in the year that I made them, with the benefit of hindsight, I can see that I have actually accomplished pretty much all of them - sometimes just years later! It is a good lesson to push ourselves, but only so much; that we can all accomplish our goals, perhaps just not always in the timeframe we initially set for ourselves. 

I used to be able to keep track of how many posts on each subject I had done (I have industriously labelled each and every post under its theme in the back-end of the blog). But unfortunately the analytics of Blogger are very limited so I can't look up specific stats...but if I could, I would love to know:

- How many words have I written in this blog over the years?

- Who is my most avid reader?

- How many times have I written the words "Ushabti Bone" or "Steel Legion Drab"?

- Which is my "best" miniature? (If I were to enter any model that I have ever painted on my blog into a miniature painting competition, which would give me the best chance?)

Unfortunately, I can't answer those questions, I can, however, tell you that outside of miniature painting, this blog has covered all sorts of topics in its ten years, from brewing beer, to guitar, to hikes, books, films, my original creative writing, 3D printing, quizzes, choir and miniatures from at least 25 different game systems...

How 'bout life outside the Caesura? Well, I mean ten years is a long time, and that time from one's late twenties to late thirties is perhaps the most action-packed in one's life! 

Here are the headlines: I got married, had three kids, changed jobs and cars and houses a bunch of times, got published, added a bunch of letters to my qualifications (including Prof), and I'm still working on Carpe-ing that diem as much as possible!

My merch empire has expanded over the years. Alas (for you) it's not available to purchase, so technically it's probably not "merch", but it is pretty awesome!

As always, I really want to thank you all for being with me today; it's a pretty big day for me and the blog. I hope that you have found something that you have enjoyed or learned or been inspired by on The Art of Caesura over any part of the last ten years that you have been here with me. Be sure to come back next week when we continue the 10th birthday celebrations with a look at my all-time favorite miniatures from the blog. 

Upwards and onwards!