Member's Holiday Greetings and Layouts Here!!!

Here is my office Christmas Layout:

Here is my home layout 

Griff, Both layouts look great!

 Merry Christmas to all!  And a Happy New Year!

John

Here’s a tighter shot of the scene in front of the hotel 

My wife suggested I add the MTH Dreyfus Building to the office layout.

Office building on the office layout!  Looks great!

Christmas Greetings from the other side of the pond!

Here’s our round the tree layout. With Mason’s Polar Express.

Merry Christmas 

Nick & Mason 

Very well done that track plan! My grandson has my Polar  Express - hope to inspect his road today! We rode the Texas State RR’s Polar Express Nov. 29 here is a video clip as Mikado #30 approaches...

All the postings are great!  Griff, that video is most impressive!

 I managed to get some ceramic buildings out of the garage and arranged on a portion of my new layout I am building.  I will post photographs after I get the people etc on it.  I forgot to get the Polar Express our before my surgery, so it will take some doing , but not impossible.  Stay tuned!

Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah to all.

My relatively simple Standard Gauge setup around the Christmas tree. Lots of detail work to be done here, but it works. The trolley man has had one to many spiked-egg nogs I fear, but am happy to report he made all his stops safely.

It’s interesting to me none of the manufacturers have ever replicated the firebox flare of real steam engines  at night. I had a red and yellow pair of grain of wheat bulbs under a tyco HO Pacific with crummy solder joints and the effect was pretty good.

I called my under tree layout the "Meeting of the Gauges and Eras"  It's a simplistice layout with just two loops under the tree.  The outer loop is O gauge Fasttrack.  Running on that loop is a minty 1946 Lionel 1400W set led by a 221 Steamer with 2400 tinplate passenger cars.  The inner loop of track is Lionel 00 Gauge.  On it I'm running a 1937 Lionel 001 Hudson and 1938-42 Lionel 00 Gauge cars.  Merry Christmas to all OGR subscribers.  

Merry Christmas! My photography is not so good, but here it is. I only got one loop up around the tree, but my wife likes this LGB train. I have to wait until she finishes decorating the marvelous tree...

George

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Merry Christmas !

Received an early Christmas present this year!!! Special shout-out to Henning’s.
They ran a contest for a photo to use during the Holidays on the cover for their FB page. So I entered a photo of the Christmas layout that I did for a community project a few years ago. More than 60 photos were submitted and were then reduced to a top 10. The top 10 were then voted on by members and mine was the winner. So here is the photo being used on the Henning’s cover...and the prize, a 2019 Lionel Christmas Car that is pictured on my layout! Even at 75, I never get tired of stuff like this...Just sayin. 😉

MERRY CHRISTMAS to all!!! 🎄🚂🎅🏻

We got a bigger tree last year so I'll need to build a new train platform. But in the meantime this year I used a bunch of leftover O-36 FasTrack curves along with a LH & RH O-36 curve that I hadn't added to the layout yet with some also leftover 5-inch and 10-inch tracks. It fits nicely around the 25 inch square tree stand and I do like the end result. Have a Merry Christmas.

Great layouts, everybody! All our best for Christmas and 2020! Forgive the improper bell stowage - Barrel Guy is hanging on for all he's worth...

Kept it simple this year...no houses, just trains. Big deal for me is the 1-700e Hudson under the tree. Been wanting one since I saw one running at the NLOE when I was 9 years old. Finally got one

Here is my Christmas layout it is a 4x4 rounded square. Was running my Marx 666 in the first video, the second is track side 2353, delivering Milk, Presents, Christmas Trees, cookies and Lump Coal. Christmas Eve passenger service starts.

Texas and Pacific 2-10-4 610 pulls a troop hospital train, followed by the Sunshine Special pulled under wartime emergency conditions by a mikado

It's still a work in-progress but this is as far as I'm going to get before Christmas.  Merry Christmas!

The 2019 edition. Our dog, Pearl, has created a few challenges. I left out the Santa Pylon, as I am sure she would eventually take it out. For some reason, she doesn’t like bushes next to the Polar Express house. There has to be over twenty trees and bushes on there, but she kept stealing those two. She also likes to stick her nose in the snow. Then she exhales and blows it everywhere, so I have to do a lot of touching up. Still, that is the worst she does, so it isn’t a big deal.

I bought a bunch of Lemax figures at Menards.  My kids had fun placing them around the layout.  When I tried to give them pointers, they told me I was being bossy so I had to leave the room. 

MikeH posted:

I bought a bunch of Lemax figures at Menards.  My kids had fun placing them around the layout.  When I tried to give them pointers, they told me I was being bossy so I had to leave the room. 

I think they did a great job, or did you sneak back in and move them? 

Great layout!

George

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!!! This year, instead of running an Ives Standard gauge passenger train around the Christmas tree, we decided to run my first train set that Santa gave me for Christmas in 1956. It’s the Lionel #1615 switcher steam engine with work train. The next year, 1957, Santa brought me a pair of Lionel 027 manual switches, and I added them to the oval to make a siding. The siding has a Lionel diesel switcher from the era with a gondola and work caboose. I added several buildings and things by Ives, Lionel, and other makers. 

Merry Christmas!

MERRY CHRISTMAS to all!!! 🎄🚂🎅🏻

George S posted:

MikeH posted:

I bought a bunch of Lemax figures at Menards.  My kids had fun placing them around the layout.  When I tried to give them pointers, they told me I was being bossy so I had to leave the room. 

I think they did a great job, or did you sneak back in and move them? 

Great layout!

George

Oh no.  You are right (and so were they ).  I couldn't shut up.  So I left and they did a good job! 

Scrambler81 posted:

The 2019 edition. Our dog, Pearl, has created a few challenges. I left out the Santa Pylon, as I am sure she would eventually take it out. For some reason, she doesn’t like bushes next to the Polar Express house. There has to be over twenty trees and bushes on there, but she kept stealing those two. She also likes to stick her nose in the snow. Then she exhales and blows it everywhere, so I have to do a lot of touching up. Still, that is the worst she does, so it isn’t a big deal.

 

VERY nice, Chris. You didn't forget the church (reason for the season) nor even SNOOPY ! Well-done !!

Nick12DMC posted:

Christmas Greetings from the other side of the pond!

Here’s our round the tree layout. With Mason’s Polar Express.

Merry Christmas 

Nick & Mason 

LOVE your choice of accessories, Nick ! Merry Christmas !

This is from an unknown author, and has circulated around the 'Net several
times, but it's appropriate for the holiday season.

 'Twas the night before Christmas, and all through my pike,
 Not a steamer was stirring, not even a Mike.
 My yard tracks invitingly empty and bare,
 In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there.

 The diesels were nestled all snug in their sheds,
 While visions of DCS/Legacy/TMCC danced in their heads.
 While I, in my blue-and-white engineer's cap,
 Had just settled down for a long winter's nap,

 When down in the train room, there rose such a clatter,
  I sprang from my bed to see what was the matter.
 Away to the basement I flew like an ace,
 Tripped over the cat and fell flat on my face.

 I stifled a curse meant for Chessie (the cat),
 And I muttered to no one, "I meant to do that,"
 When what to my wondering eyes should appear
 But an O-scale sleigh and eight Preiser reindeer,

 With an engineer driving, so lively and quick,
 I knew in a moment it must be St. Nick.
 More rapid than GG-1's, onward they came,
 And he blew a steam whistle and called them by name:

 "On Lionel!  On MTH, Williams and #rd Rail!
 On Kadee and Micro-Trains, Atlas and others!
 To the top of the mountains of Hydrocal plaster,
 Now dash away, dash away, dash away faster!"

 As dry leaves that behind a new Genesis fly,
 When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky,
 So in through the window the coursers they flew
 With the sleigh full of trains, and St. Nicholas too.

 And then, on my roundhouse, I saw on the roof
 The prints in the dust of each HO-scale hoof.
 As I drew a deep breathe, and was turning around,
 From beneath the benchwork, St. Nick came with a bound.

 He was dressed like an engineer from head to foot,
 And his clothes had that fine smell of ashes and soot;
 A bundle of trains he had flung on his back,
 And he looked like a peddler just opening his pack.

 His eyes - just like marker lights! Dimples, how merry!
 His cheeks like a Warbonnet; nose like a cherry!
 His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,
 And his beard was so white; it would please Phoebe Snow.

 He puffed on a pipe as he refilled its bowl,
 And the smoke, it smelled just like bituminous coal.
 He had a broad face and a belly (I found)
 That shook like a tank car with wheels out-of-round.

 He was chubby and plump, and I wanted to shout,
 "Yes!  The man's got a route the UP can't buy out!"
 A wink of his eye as he passed near the door
 Soon gave me to know I'd have freight cars galore.

 He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work.
 He filled all my yard tracks; then turned with a jerk,
 And leaving an airbrush he'd found on eBay,
 And giving a nod, he returned to his sleigh.

 He pumped up the brakes, blew two blasts on his whistle,
 And away they all flew like the down of a thistle.
 But I heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of sight,
 "MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL!  KEEP 'EM ROLLING! GOOD-NIGHT!"

 High greens and clear track to all of you!

Merry Christmas !!!! 2019 RR  up and running.  

a mix of new and old.. Lionel/MTH a temporary holiday layout on temporary benchwork. Changes every year. First year of two independent loops under one tree. 🎄❤️🚂🎄

The layout has been up and running since the week before Thanksgiving. Finally got around to taking some photographs.

I got approval this year to expand it 1/2ft wide and 3ft longer. It gave me room for the 3rd loop. It helped that the grandkids love it so much.

I could not have done it without all the great info I have learned from this forum. 

Merry Christmas ,

Mark W.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all!  Just a simple loop around the tree in our house this year.  Here are a couple shots and a video of my new Lionel D&H “blue dip” ALCo C-420 (custom-run by Forum-sponsor Mr. Muffin) hauling the “tree train”.  I also purchased two custom-run Lehigh Valley C-420’s from Steve and will post photos of them soon.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all. 

I no longer have a layout but come to the forum here every day. Thanks for all the wonderful posts and I look forward to many more..

Here is a pic from my apartment layout in 2014

Merry Christmas to all!

Merry Christmas from RMT!

These photos were taken in 2005 of part of the Christmas layout in our home that year....kind of went overboard a bit! A total of 4 mainlines as 3 separate loops and a dogbone, over 65 ceramic houses, cars and trucks, people, lights and some hand crafted buildings by my late father-in-law Mickey. Of course, it was all RMT trains (except for the Williams CNJ GP-7s, Kline CNJ Pacific and a Weaver CNJ caboose) operating the trackage. The tin Middletown station in the RDC photo was from my original Christmas layout many, many years ago!

Best wishes to all our customers and train friends...Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. May you and your families be abundantly blessed this Holiday Season.

Susie and Walter Matuch

Wishing Everyone a Very Merry Christmas and a Safe and Happy New Year and may God Bless Each and Everyone on this forum. My 7 year old granddaughter Christmas layout her first one.

Merry Christmas everyone!