Bean, our 4-year old, went on an estimate with his dad the other day, and met a wonderful man who showed him all around his back-yard model train. He is part of the Garden Train group here in Medford. He invited us to Railroad Park on any 2nd or 4th Sunday during dry months, to see all the model trains.

We got busy working on all sorts of farm projects on Sunday, and it was nearly 2:00 when Bean piped up that we were supposed to go to the Train place. We tried to get out of it, since the park is only open until 3:00. We tried to cajole him that we would do it some other time, but he looked at us with those little wounded eyes, and reminded us that this was special to him. He had been invited by a new friend, and we had said we would go. We packed up the car super speedy quick and got to the park at 2:30. We waited in line to get on one of the trains thinking we may just get all the way to the front of the line and be turned away.

What a treasure right here in town. I had no idea this place even existed. I didn’t even know I liked model trains, but what is there not to like? It was like an enormous doll house, with miniature everything.

From now on, when people come to visit us in Southern Oregon, I will insist that they do their best to come on a 2nd or 4th Sunday so we can take them to see this place.

It is quite possible that I was more delighted by this part of the park then most of the kids. Each of the books in the Harry Potter series was exquisite writing, and I loved the character development, the mystery, and the beautiful magic. My boys are still too young, so they only know little bits of the story. I know and love it all and squealed when I spotted the castle!

We could have stuck to our guns on this one and told Bean that there simply wasn’t enough time, and that he should buck up and be a big boy and stop sniveling.

But seriously, I’m so glad we didn’t. Scott and I are already daydreaming of building our own garden train set in the back yard. In years to come. For the grandkids perhaps. Later.