New focus!

Notice the new description of the blog. We are such an active family that does SO much more than just rail-fanning. I am now going to include our adventures of bowling, crafting, recipes, family adventures and so much more. We are a family that works together, plays together and that results in staying together.

Life happens...so does a Tattoo!

So...I have failed as a "blogger". Life has been very crazy lately. In the last 3 months, we have moved, rented out our condo, been BUSY with both our jobs, took up bowling as our new evening hobby and the kiddo started Kindergarten! I feel that finally now with him in school, life will settle a bit. We have had zero time on weekends because of work and other summer activities to get ourselves to the local train museum. Nicholas has been asking so maybe if he gets a good report at school this week we will go. :) However, with our new sport of bowling....we have league nights on Thursday and the kiddo has league on Saturday. We are just busy, busy bees! Something that I have been wanting for a long time is a tattoo. My husband has 2. One of a Duster that he used to drive and one of the 3751 steam locomotive in LA Union Station. I finally got up the courage to get it done yesterday. Here are some pics. I couldn't ask for a better artist. He did both of my husband's tats and many more for a few friends of ours. He made this perfect blend of the pictures I brought him and put his own twist on it. If you are in So. Cal...check him out: Pirates Life Tattoo He does amazing color work.

Homemade Teacher Supply Cake

So...I've been addicted to Pinterest (like really bad)! But it has made my creativeness explode. I was looking for teacher gifts awhile ago and pinned quite a few that I liked. I decided that I was going to make a Supply Cake. I wanted to do something that was useful for the teachers/director & school. Who needs another apple paperweight (not knocking it, but you know what I mean). How much of that stuff do they seriously need/keep?! My son is only in pre-school, so they go through a lot of stuff with the little ones. So, I asked one of my son's pre-school teachers what types of supplies they could use. She gave me a few ideas that I hadn't thought of, ie: staplers/staples. I set out on a mission to Target with no real plan in place and figured I could wing it. I spent about an hour inside the store looking around. The school row was easy...just grabbed a bunch of stuff I knew I could use. The base to the cake was the most difficult. I debated on using Nesting Boxes or paper towel roll (which I had seen on pinterest). But I came up with something totally different. I hope you like it!
This is what I started with: (I ended up not using the stickers I bought, but will given them anyhow)

Here is the base to the cake. 2 sizes of paper plates and a tub of koolaid (great for their summer program!)

I placed everything around the plates and it is all held together by rubber bands. I did not glue anything together. This was my "almost done" picture. I needed to get another pair of scissors, a ruler and pack of gluesticks.

Here is the finished result! I also put together 2 drink cups (filled with packets of crystal light) for each of his classroom teachers. I used ribbon to cover the rubber bands. I cut a square out of a cardboard box and covered it with construction paper for the base to carry it.

Closeup of the stacked rolls of tape holding the pencils.

Closeup of the finished product:

I hope you enjoy my cake. I really enjoyed making it and everyone at school loves it! I was so happy to give it to them today. :)

Blog Update!

So...I've been thinking a lot about my blog lately. I've come to realize that for frequent updates, I can't just make them railroading updates. Yes...we do a LOT of railroad events, but I also want to share other things that we do as a family. So, be prepared for more updates! :)

OERM & ATSF3751

So, last weekend was the only train event weekend of May that we ended up being able to go to. (Sometimes life just gets in the way of having fun!). We could not celebrate Mother's Day on Mother's Day...so we celebrated the following Saturday instead. Saturday was comprised of T-ball in the morning and then off to the Bombshelter at the Perris Air Field for lunch and then to OERM. We invited my in-laws to go with us. This was their 2nd time going to the museum...the first was for Nicholas's 3rd birthday. Nicholas loved showing them around and giving them a taste of what he loves so very much. The whole time we were there, we were also keeping track of the Twitter page of the ATSF3751 to see where they were at on their trip. We were able to get to see the 3751 going through Cajon pass, but it was dark and you couldn't see much. Will have to pay attention for the next time we see her out. I have not uploaded pictures yet from the weekend, so I need to get on that!

A lot of Upcoming Railroad events for May 2012!

May is going to be one busy month with railroading events that are great to take kids to! Saturday & Sunday May 5-6, 2012 - Fullerton Railroad Days - The SF3751 is supposed to be there! We watched the locomotive go by a couple weekends ago in route to and from San Bernardino. We caught it at the Fullerton Station as well as the Claremont Station. Looking forward to being able to see it again. Sunday May 6, 2012 - Antique Truck Show at Orange Empire Railway Museum. We went to this event last year and it was so great to see all the antique trucks/vehicles posing next to the trains. Cool event not to miss! Saturday May 12, 2012 - National Train Day at Union Station - We never miss an opportunity to go to Union station to see their display. Usually because the SF3751 is housed there, so we are always hoping to see her out and about :) We will take the metrolink to union station to give us even more time with trains! Makes for a great day of adventure. Saturday & Sunday May 19-20, 2012 - RailFest at Orange Empire Railway Museum - Cannot wait for this event. :) Always look forward to going to see our friends at the museum. Do you think Nicholas will be tired of all these events in May? I think not! :) If you ever see an event that is going on in So. Cal or neighboring states, please let us know!

SF3751 Trip to San Diego 2010

So, I've mentioned this in previous blogs...but thought I should go into more detail of our adventure.

We were looking for something to do for mother's day weekend. We found out their was a railroad days event planned in San Bernardino that weekend. Perfect. Great fun for us to spend together as a family. As Bryan was on the page for that...he saw a link that said "ride the 3751" (or something like that) and we discovered the excursion to San Diego was the next weekend! We were able to get tickets and were SO excited for the trip.

We planned it all very last minute but it worked perfect! We picked up the SF3751 in Fullerton and headed for San Diego. We had to make a stop at the Pointsettia station to take on water and be serviced. Nicholas was 2 1/2 at the time and he was having a blast! He fell asleep for about 20 minutes on the ride, but that was it. He was just mesmerized by the whole ordeal.

Once we arrived in San Diego...we took a bunch of pictures of the San Diego Station. We love the historic stations! We grabbed a trolley to our hotel. Quickly dumped our bags there and headed to the Padre game (yep...huge Padre fans). Nicholas lasted until the 7th inning before he konked out :) Poor kid. Next day was a SeaWorld adventure. Our last minute planning worked out perfect and we had a great weekend!