Outside the Box: Model Railroading

As I did once before for my collection of Dry Cell memorabilia, I'm borrowing the "outside the box" idea from My Hockey Card Obsession. This time its all about my new favorite hobby: model railroading, something a bit more hands-on than card collecting.

It was sometime last summer that I decided for whatever reason that I really liked trains again and wanted to start modeling again. I had been really into it when I was younger and even built a large 4' x 8' HO scale layout with my dad in our basement. I remember it being a ton of fun just getting to build basically whatever you want and being able to watch your creation come to life with when the trains started running.

Fast forward to late last year and I already had my first layout completed. It's just a simple display piece (no running trains) to put on one of our bedroom walls. It also served as a practice layout to help me learn some of the ways to do things that were not around back in the early 90's. Here's a look at the finished layout on the wall.

Just like in card collecting, I've got several different projects going on at the same time. For example, I am working on learning how to repaint some locomotives and rolling stock with my new airbrush. That is something I've never done, but am having a great time learning about. In addition to that I'm working on designing my own freelance fictional railroad with custom paint schemes and everything. I've actually started using Inkscape (the software I used to design my custom card designs) to do this. Beyond that I am working on a second shelf type display layout to practice a few more things.

While hockey and cards will likely remain my main hobby, I've gone through stretches lately where I feel that model railroading is so much more enjoyable just because of its hands-on nature. There is something really satisfying about coming up with a design and actually building it. There are so many things you can customize about a model railroad. Everything from the time period you're modeling to the type of scenery you use to the types of locomotives and rolling stock you have running around the layout.

I've been at this modelling thing for about 9 months now and have really enjoyed what I've been doing so far. So much so that I even started another entire blog dedicated to it, called Michigan Model Railroader. Click here to check it out if you are interested. I also have it linked at the bottom of the sidebar on the Card Boarded main page. Below is a look at one of my recent posts and the main page of the blog.

For now I plan on maintaining both hobbies as time permits. Some days I get really into looking for new cards and others I just don't really have the motivation to even look at them. Trains are the same way, some days I get so into a modeling project I lose track of time. Then there are days when I get frustrated with it and decide to take a break.