Model Railroad Festival (Part 3)

Once we were done looking at the small trains we moved on to the much bigger ones. There was one part of a train, the caboose, that was actually inside of the building that you could play in which we did on our way to the other side of the building to look at more of the model trains.Matty did pretty good at climbing up the metal bar stairs to get to the top. The first time he did it he needed a little help but we went back to this thing like three times and by the end he could get up it all by himself pretty fast. He had so much fun looking out of the windows while he was up there. He also wanted someone to join him.So my dad actually got up there and looked out the windows with Matty and told him some more things about this part of the train. I did eventually go up on one of our last visits to this caboose and enjoyed being up there but I did not like trying to find my way back down with all of the things that I was carrying. Even though most of them where in a bag it still was kind of hard. That was one of the times that I wanted Michael there to catch me.You can see how big these trains are from my dad and Matty here. Matty just loved the black train more then any of the others. There was a ton of kids climbing on it where they were not suppose to be and that helped me in making a point to Matty that what they were doing was not safe and that they were not suppose to be on it like that. Once he realized that he was fine with not climbing on it.I love this picture the most! I think that it is so cute how Matty will listen to all of the things that my dad is telling him about how the train works and moves and things like that. When we were walking down the side of this train we noticed that they had some fun train carts that you could go into. The first one that we went inside was a mail cart and Matty had so much fun with that one that we had to go in it twice. My dad and I found areas in Utah and Idaho that we know pretty well and it got us laughing pretty good that they even had them on the system. The other train cart was a hospital one that Matty did not want to go into at all at first and kind of ran away from it. Then when my dad went in and Matty couldn't see him he followed. It was so cute because he said, "We found you grandpa, you were lost." It was just so cute. Once inside the car he had fun and was fine but that was it for him in that one.I was very interested in this train and my dad told me that it was the one that held the Olympic torch when the Olympics was held in Utah. I thought that it looked pretty cool. Matty did get to run around on this train and had so much fun too. I even got up on this one with Matty and accidentally banged my knee on the metal door that opened the wrong way! I was fine but it sure did hurt at the time. It was also a little scary to find some way off of this train too (the other time that I wanted Michael with me). After my dad saw this picture he told me that Matty and I matched the train. I thought that was pretty funny how that worked out and we didn't even plan that.Here are all of the big trains that were outside, except for the black one that I couldn't get to fit into the picture. It was sure a lot of fun letting Matty play on the ones that he could.When we were on our way walking back to the building we saw this train that was going out to the Front-Runner (I think that is what it is called) and since it was free and we thought that we were going to be able to look inside the Front-Runner we decided to go. It was so cold! Even though the sun was out the wind just made it terrible. I felt really bad for a small boy that was sitting next to us because he didn't have a jacket and was wearing sandals. I am glad that we packed real well for Matty or else he would have just been frozen solid. Matty didn't seem to mind the cold to much because he was more focused on the bell sound that the train made and kept on asking why we would stop and go so much. We told him that it made it feel like a real train more. Some of the other adults on the train would laugh and joke about that point too. But it was sad when a couple of them would get grumpy about it, even though it was a FREE ride! When we did get to the Front-Runner stop it was to actually take the train and not to just look inside of it so we didn't get off and just enjoyed the ride back the model train festival building.When we got back Matty wanted to ride on the little train one more time which was totally fine except this time he had to wait in line for a turn since now there was a ton of children there. He did pretty good about waiting but he was a little said that he didn't get to sit in his blue train car like last time. He did have fun going around so I don't think that he was to heart broken. Actually when he was finished he asked if he could go again but we told him that we hand one more train to look at and he was fine with going.This was the last train that we saw and played on that day. Actually, Matty did play on the engine part of the train but he was so fast that I couldn't get any picture of him on it. He did like the steering wheel on the cabooses that was connected to the engine he had just played on. Dad informed him that the wheel was actually a brake to help stop the train but I am not sure that Matty got that part because he kept calling it the steering wheel.This is another favorite picture of mine from that day. Why? The reason is because Matty just looks so tired and he is trying to hard to smile. He got to do and see a lot of fun things that day. It sure was hard to keep him awake on the car ride home but I was able to do it. The only thing that I wish that I could have done for him was to get him a little train to take home from the thing and I did look really hard but you have to expect that everything at a train expo is going to be very, VERY expensive. It still was a fun day and at least I have some great pictures to remember it by too.