Oh Darling, You Really Shouldn't Have

[GP-9_Man11786]

I am very lucky to have a wife who is very supportive of my hobby. She's willing to go to train shows with me and willing to let me have time up in the train room. However, a month or so ago, we were at a train show in Charlotte and a vendor had a bunch of Model Power structure kits at fire sale prices. My wife imeadiatly spotted the brewery kit. Since my other hobby, the one she's even more supportive of, is brewing beer, she excited said "I'm buying this for you!" The trouble is, I had absolutly place on my layout for this kit. But she bought it for me, therefore it is going on the layout somehow.

My question is, how many of you have things on your layout purchased by well-meaning spouses, friends or family members?

[Anonymous]

Early in my marriage, I told my wife about my childhood wish to have a Marklin Crocodile. This what I meant:

and this is what my wife got me for our first wedding anniversary:

Close, but not close enough

Oh, btw, it´ll be 30 years tomorrow, since I got it.

[RR_Mel]

We are approaching our Fiftieth and my wife has always been super supportive of my model railroad.  When I first started my current HO layout in 1990 she was always available for assistance when I needed a second hand.  She got really into it in the mid 1990s and built up the town Cemetery.

 

In the early 2000s we went to our local yearly Model Railroad Show (We’ve never missed one) and she did her thing “Oh Darling you really need to look at this over here”.  It was a Bachmann G gauge 2-8-0.  We spent a long time looking at the G gauge miscellaneous equipment, all very impressive but we finally moved on to the HO displays for the remainder of the of our visit.

 

Well when my Birthday arrived and I opened the largest present and you’ve probably already guessed by now it was a Bachmann G Narrow Gauge Spectrum 2-8-0, Deadwood Central.

 

 

 

And that my friends is how WE got started with Our Garden Railroad.  Over the years We’ve ended up with the Narrow Gauge Consolidation, a Shay, two 4-6-0s, 19 Narrow Gauge passenger/logging cars, 300’ of track and crushing ants, spiders, snails and worms all over the back yard garden as well as a bit over a dozen structures.

 

 

EDIT:

 

Sorry, I didn’t answer your question.  When my children left the roost the first gift to dad was from my one of my sons for Christmas, it was unusable on my layout.  I let it go until close to my birthday then my wife an I told all of them not to spend their hard earned money on us and to spend it on their families.  That really did the trick, now they ask first and we point them in the correct direction.

 

I still have that first gift, a very early Plasticville Police Station (in a bin box on the shelf).

 

 

Mel

 

 

Modeling the SP in HO scale since 1951

 

My Model Railroad   

http://melvineperry.blogspot.com/

 

Bakersfield, California

[Heartland Division CB&Q]

GP-9 .... To answer your question, I do sometimes get train stuff I don't want. Not for model railroad layouts are all sorts of train trinkets, jigsaw puzzles, games, and trash. .... Model railroad stuff given to me as a general rule does not fit my theme for my layout. .... I recieved a very nice GP7 painted and lettered for C&NW. Not my railroad, but I sometimes use it at an interchange track. ... Also, I received a lot of Union Pacific stuff from a relative who quit model railroading. I have not yet installed decoders in it, but will do some if they are coming into town. (They live 1,000 miles away.) ... Gifts of figures and vehicles have actually been appropriate for my layout, and I use them. Although, I doubt I need yet another set of HO dogs and cats. LOL .... I did not use a set of O guage cemetary markers I once received on my HO layout. LOL again. ... 

Ulrich ... Happy anniversary, and I like the locomotive you received even if not what you expected.

Mel ..... Sounds like you have good understanding and cooperation from your wife. 

Years ago, my wife gave me a brass 2-4-4-2 as a birthday present. At the time, I had a layout depicting the 1900 era. I wanted the engine and showed it to her at the hooby shop where she bought it for me. ..... At home, I showed her some locomotives I already had which were heavily weathered looking like they had grime and soot on them. When I told her I intended to do the same to the engine she gave me, she became very upset. Clearly, she did not want me to make that engine ugly. .... I never did change the lettering and weather it. 

Below is the 2-4-4-2 sitting on my current layout. Most of the time it is displayed in a nice location of my bookshelves. 

 

 

[BRAKIE]

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GP-9_Man11786

My question is, how many of you have things on your layout purchased by well-meaning spouses, friends or family members?

I have several unusable items that doesn't fit  given to me as gifts over the years.

Examples:

A Mantua 4-4-0 General,a house on fire with smoke unit,several oversize Hot Wheel vehicles,A S Scale size Godzilla,a older Revell water tank and other oddities both hobby and none hobby..

I have a antique dish cabinet I keep my jun-er ah,collection in.

[IRONROOSTER]

Ah well.  It was my wife who got me started in the hobby.  I had kidded her about having a train for our first born.  Well the Christmas she was pregnant she bought me a Tyco train set.  The next day I found MR on the newstand and a hobby was born.

I still have the Tyco set even though I have changed scales to S.

Enjoy

Paul

[RideOnRoad]

My wife is a huge supporter. As a matter of fact, she is responsible for one of the best looking structures on the layout.

["JaBear"]

Her-in-doors went and bought me 6 Athearn passenger cars because she reckoned that my future layout needed passenger trains. I didn’t have the heart that I was planning a freight hauling bridge route. What’s made it worse that having seen, on this forum, ffolks passenger cars with full interiors, passengers and LED lighting, I feel that I should give it a go and do the same.  Of course I had to pick up a few extra Rivarossi passenger cars to compliment the fleet .......

And to think I used to pride myself on my capacity for rational thought.

Cheers, the Bear.

[Hobbez]

Recieving train related gifts from friends and family used to be a major problem.  My family is full of yard salers and thrift store shoppers and anytime someone saw a box of train stuff at a garage sale, they would buy it and bring it to me.  Invariably, the box was full of old train set stuff.  One day my mother and a group of family were visting my layout and noticed an overflowing box of all they stuff they had brought me over the years.  I had to explain, embarassed, that all that borken train set cars and track were not really any use to me.  During the discussions that followed, the wife said I was a train snob when it came to rolling stock.  Now no one brings home yard sale items anymore, but I do get Walthers gift certificats for christmass!

[maxman]

Been married almost 39 years.  38-1/2 years ago I came home from work to find meat loaf on the table.  I hate that stuff.  I asked why she made that ####.  She said "because your mother said you like it".  Had a discussion about why I thought that meat loaf was a waste of good hamburg and catsup.  Haven't had meat loaf since.

Same thing applies to trains.  Might as well get that straightened out up front, or you'll continue to get meat loaf unusable train stuff for another 38 years.

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[vsmith]

My wife chides me all the time about my hobby, but then when she's out antiquing or thrift shopping, she's the first to call me and ask if the train stuff she's come across is something I can use. Thanks to her I picked up alot of interesting old tinplate litho trains, some almost new HO and Lionel, and the biggest prize being an almost new LGB G set that's usually $399, for only $99.