You can see the effort he made with the presentation - this was important to him, along with the lighting pelmet. We made a simple stand to lift the layout to a better viewing height, which is simply a couple of panels of thin MDF (left over from the baseboard), a piece of ply, and a few lengths of softwood; the layout sits on the cross-members and slightly recessed between the sides while the open back end allows cables and the transformer to be hidden underneath
He wanted the layout name on the front, which we ordered online and was easy to fit. He also designed a Slugworth logo that's on the end of the layout, and put together a "can you find" list to keep children (and a few adults) amused. Finally he set up bowls of jelly beans and chocolate drops - to demonstrate the "produce" of the factory!
All 8 Dave Brewer Challenge entries had made it to the show with completed layouts (that doesn't always happen), and the standard was very high, so at 3:30pm Joshua was keen to see the winner announced so we went to the main hall. It was Steve Pearce, with "Toot 'n' Come In", well deserved for a fine piece of imaginative and well executed modelling. We then headed back to the layout - having briefly left it unattended - but no sooner had we go there than we were told to head back to the hall, where Joshua was given an award for "Junior winner". I've never known that done before, so we were surprised - and Joshua was clearly delighted. Cue proud Dad moment...
The layout attracted a lot of interest and it was nice to see the little squash court hosting the challenge entries was busy most of the day (it is rather out of the way), which helped us forget the numbing cold in that room! Thanks to all those that said hi and nice things about the layout. Good to see many familiar faces and meet a few new ones too.
Think yourself lucky you were in a squash court Michael, and not that " pracitce room" between the main hall and the squash courts. Now that was cold, don't know how the three stands in there survived. Never saw many people sat on the chairs provided. Pity you weren't in the main hall though, with just a little reorganisation I'm sure there'd have been room. But I suppose it depends on how many entries turn up on the day.
ReplyDeleteCongratulations to Joshua, very well done. Of course he has a good teacher, but now you've got competition.