Ok, this is my first time posting a picture so I hope this works…my 7 yr old son pretty much designed this layout on his own (mom provided the cash of course!). The tunnel/mountain was our first real attempt at making our scenery. It turned out ok for the first try, thanks to advice from members of this forum! We are still waiting for some lights to arrive that we ordered off of ebay, along with the final area 51 car and we will be done until we move the setup into the garage. I know it’s not as fancy and detailed as others but he’s extremely proud of it and it’s something he can still play with. I figure that when we have a larger room, then I can have my layout as well as his! In the mean time, we’ll just play with his!
Ok, I’ve tried 2 different ways to post according to the directions at the top of the forum–I’ve also tried using the image icon in the message area…can somebody please help me out?
Misty, looks great! Not a bad set up at all. If you go to a local hobby shop, you may get some older CTT, OGR or other magazines and let him look and get ideas. Not sure if your local library will have any train books, but also a great resource. I only have one question, Would you adopt me? I only wish someone else would by my trains for me.
Cool! Nice job. The walls in that room are really neat. The Area 51 stuff is one of my favorites that Lionel has done in the last few years. Heres a pic of my son playing army with his trains. Very temporary layout being on the floor.
Dennis, I blame the whole train thing on my sister-she bought him his Target/Lionel set for his birthday…she definitely got off with the cheap end of it! I keep telling my son he has to save his money for anything else he wants for it…he’s now decided to save up for the Harry Potter Hogwart’s set that is coming out in the fall. Of course, I’ll probably kick in a little bit of $$ for it!
As for the hobby shops… the only local one deals mainly in HO and the last time we were there, they didn’t have a whole lot of magazines to choose from. We get a lot of our ideas from websites on the internet and the CTT magazines.
Roland: I’m sure he would love to do a Naval set up…he’d probably expect me to try to make up a seascape for him…I’m not quite ready for that one yet!!
Paul: Thanks for the comments…his dad painted that room. Took him forever but my son just loves it! I love your son’s layout…it’s all about the imagination for them and the fact that they are doing something he enjoys.
Very nice layout for the kids Misty & Paul !! Always great to see the kids getting creative !! Magazines on trains can help encourage them to read, too !!
Misty, I have an idea you may want to try. If you can find some of the “Rope Lighting” that is popular around Christmas time, it comes in several colors, but a good green would look real neat with the “Area 51” theme. Also, right now, they are doing the “early buy” for the Hogwarts trains, so you probably should order one. If they follow the success of the Polar Express, the dealers will be on backorder before you know it. Also, the Early Buy saves some money and that is a good thing. I know The Train-Station.com is advertising the Early buy for this, but I am sure the other dealers are too. The other option is tell your sister to buy it for him[;)] I think the price I saw was about $230 for the early buy.
Yes, I saw the pre-sale information on it. Wholesale trains actually is the lowest I have found at $209.00…I wasn’t aware of the backorders for the Polar Express set…I’ll probably go ahead and order it for him and then he can work it off to pay me back! Or, I could just order it and send the bill to my sister…she’s rather attached to him for some reason. I think it must be a middle child thing(they both are middle children)…[swg]
And Dennis, I like the idea of the green rope lighting…we were looking for something to help the layout “glow”-I bought some of the fluorescent paint to try to paint something up but I like the idea of the the lights even better.
Misty- That is a nice layout to start with for your son. Hope he enjoys it. I know I would have at his age. BTW- Be careful about adopting Dennis as a son. He’s very slick & will corrupt your son with Southern Grits![;)][:P][:o)][:o)][:o)] Take Care.
Yes, I’ve been reading about all of the “fixes” that those grits can be used for…as for the corrupting of my son, his brother and sister would team up with him and probably have Dennis running for his life! They make me want to run from the house screaming most of the time!!
Well, I did all of the technical work-the lighting and wiring and most of the messy stuff on the tunnel but he set everything else up and placed the buildings, etc where he wanted them. He set up all of the planes, trucks and army stuff in their positions and made the lakes and roads himself. He’s only 7 but he has suprised me with what he can set up. I’ve let him take over most of the designing of it now. His next idea is to make some more mountains and put the grass on them.
Misty, you’ve succeeded as a Mom. It really doesn’t matter how it looks compared to anything else - in his eyes, he has excelled. And, I’ll second the other comments - you’ve treated him very well by helping out $$$-wise.
His layout will grow with him as he matures. He’ll change it, add to it, and try out different things. That’s all that matters.
It’s kind of like the parents buying their kid the super-wiz-bang contraption, when the kid is wetting his pants just to play with the box!
Hello Misty- Your son can use G-R-I-T-S to make Mountains with! They will be hard as a Rock & last forever.[;)][:P][:o)] Just contact Laz. I think he used his Grits from the Harrisburg invasion to build some Mountains.[;)][8D][:o)] Take Care.
Always with the negative waves moriarti, always with the negative waves…
Misty, had another idea, since you have the flourescent paint, you could put a black light above the layout and turn off the regular lights, the paint will really show up. Or, just go with the green rope light like I mentioned earlier. And don’t pay attention to the mad man from Ohio, the 1688 suffers from Grit envy[;)] (he really is a good guy, but we don’t want him to get a swollen head).
