It’s showtime again!  Come and see us at the Utah Valley County Fair!

• Date: August 13-16
• Location: 475 S Main Spanish Fork, Utah

Our display will be located at the covered tennis courts.  Here’s when we’ll be there:

• Wednesday the 13th: 4 PM to 10 PM
• Thursday the 14th: 12 PM to 10 PM
• Friday the 15th: 12 PM to 10 PM
• Saturday the 16th: 10 AM to 10 PM

See ya there!

AHH!!!

After a great show, you’d think there’d be news about it sooner! I apologize; it has been one wild summer.

But it’s true: our show June 27-28 was great! We put on our biggest display yet in the West Valley Family Fitness Center, and everyone who came loved it. Here’s a breakdown of this show’s stats:

• 248 people attended
• We sold 24 packs of fruit snacks and hard candy
• We sold 4 official sets and 32 grab bags
• We sold 8 keychains and 1 T-shirt

We worked really hard during this show, most notably in advertising. For instance, every thirty minutes someone went out to distribute fliers. Our work paid off, though, and everyone had a great time.

A new member also joined our ranks! Ryan Adams made his first appearance at this show, bringing an awesome collection of custom minifigs. Welcome, Ryan!

We’ll be at West Fest this Friday and Saturday displaying our Lego train and city layout in the West Valley City Family Fitness Center (5415 W 3100 S West Valley). It’s gonna be a great show; come and see us!

But we haven’t done any updating as far as our two most recent shows are concerned, so before this new one, let’s take a quick look at what the club has been up to!

On April 11th, ULUG and GBLT&C attended the Scout Jamborall at the South Towne Expo Center. It was our second Jamborall, and it brought great success. We were one of the favorite booths, and even received a small writeup in the Salt Lake Tribune! This event was also the first time we had no electricity, and we ran all the trains off of a modified NXT train regulator built by George. We merged the two cities into one mega-city, and also began customizing the train yard. The water front also returned.

We stayed busy this spring, with another show in Wendover from May 15th through the 17th. This was our first ULUG sponsored show, and we were privileged to be able to set up and display our layout at West Wendover High School. This was also our first show with all custom Lego tables, and much to our delight, it was well attended–especially for our first attempt at our very own show.

Many of us stayed at Spencer’s home during this time, where we held a barbecue and club members built and sorted Lego well into the night. Ryan and Brian both enjoyed celebrating birthdays together on the 16th.

And we just keep growing! Each show is better than the last, and you’re sure for a treat at this weekend’s Fest.

ULUG will be displaying a LEGO train and city layout in the West Valley City Family Fitness Center during this year’s West Fest. The West Fest goes from June 26-29, but we will only be there on the 27^th and 28^th (Friday and Saturday). The Fitness Center is on 5415 W 3100 S in West Valley. You can see it on Google Maps here.

More details to come, stay tuned!

The Hostlers Model Railroad Festival 2008 will be held this weekend (February 29, March 1st&2nd) at the Ogden Union Station. We will have a display set up upstairs in the “Old Timers Room.” It is free to get in to see our LEGO layout, but the rest of the show will cost $5 to get in. We will have a huge layout, come check it out

• Where: Ogden Union Staion, Old Timers’ Room (Mapquest link)
• When: February 29, 4 PM to 9 PM; March 1, 9:30 AM to 6 PM; March 2, 10 AM to 4 PM
• Cost: LEGO layout is free, rest of show $5, kids 12 and under are free.

. . . because we rock at advertising for them. Our crowd today was the second largest we’ve ever had–second only to last year’s Scout Jamborall in Ogden, where the crowd was four people deep! We took questions and informed our spectators about our hobby, sold “Lego” candy, and during the few minutes Reed had me man the sales table, I sold two shirts and a magnet with our club’s logo on them (which means Reed must have sold a lot himself!). And nearly everyone who talked to us wanted to know the same thing: where we got our Lego. LEGO, we directed them to you. Give us something!

Nah, just kidding, LEGO. Our reward is you staying in business and continuing to produce such excellent sets as the upcoming 10185 Green Grocer. (Ha! I knew I’d be able to sneak that in somewhere!)

Anyway, my report on the show will come on Monday, complete with pictures. But for now, I’ve got some cleaning up to do. Have a lovely Saturday night!

Quote of the day:

“If I were running one of them other displays, I’d be pissed that the Lego group has all the people.” — A spectator, aside to his friend

We had an awesome turnout last night! For the entire five hours of the show, we had a constant crowd of awed spectators. “The Lego display” was the most popular there, and had even been used as a selling point.

As for the nerds who ran the display, we had our own share of fun. Several of us had been at the barn since seven in the morning, so by the end of the day you can imagine things would have gotten pretty zany.

Case in point, Brian built a robot gun train . . . thing. Three spring-loaded missiles, computer programmed to fire at an unsuspecting Reed (thank you, Mindstorms!), all while being pulled by our signature Utah Railway locomotive. Oh, yeah.

Well, Reed found out about it before we could get him. So we hooked it up anyway just for the heck of it. The first few runs were a failure; in fact, on the first remotely successful try, the train took a curve and the weapon fell off its car. But it was still dangling from the train somehow, which agitated the trigger on the next turn. Thus the weapon destroyed itself, and little bits of plastic were seen flying in all directions to the various regions of our layout.

Our next try would be a success, however, at least compared to what we’d had so far. In this video you’ll see our train with all its black cars. At the very end is this big gray machine-looking thing. Just watch that, and the three guys at the corner of the table where the train turns. The first guy to move is Steve, then Reed tries to catch the missiles, then (hopefully depending on the video quality) you see them all fly out at Dave heading for the spot that should have really hurt if slightly more force had been applied.

A priceless moment in ULUG and GBLT&C history, for sure. The weapon destroyed itself again just before entering the tunnel after that turn. It was like a bee, dying after using its one sting. Unfortunately I didn’t get it on video.With things like this going on, I can’t wait to see what we come up with today! We’ll be open to the public from 10:00 to 6:00 at Thanksgiving Point’s Show Barn. Five bucks admission, but it’s totally worth it. ;-)Picture of the day:

Quote of the day:

“I love how my calluses are shaped like studs.” — Nathan C^1

It’s about time for the train show at Thanksgiving Point! The show is being put on by the Ophir-Tinic & Western Model Railroad Club from January 25th to the 26th. The plan is to set up on the stage. We will have a great representation of LEGO Castle this time in addition to our already well established city and Space areas. Oh, and plenty of trains, too ;). See  you there!

When
January 25, 4 – 9 pm
January 26, 10 am – 6 pm

Where
Show Barn at Thanksgiving Point (Map)

Admission
Adults $5
Children 11 and under free

More info at Thanksgiving Point’s website.

First off, I apologize for the lack of updates over the past month or so. The Wasatch Rails show went great! We were pushed out of our promised ground floor area and into the corner of the second level by one of the bigger train clubs, so we didn’t have as big of a space as we were planning on. We were still able to set up an awesome layout though, and everyone had a great time. We had all the usual awesome MOCs and a bunch of new stuff, like our working train drawbridge we built back in September, the Moonbase, and a carnival with moving rides. Sadly, this show was the last display of Spencer’s iconic yellow skyscraper. It was retired to make way for a new tower which will be cooler than the last (or at least it had better be ). The large blue Moonbase module collapsed during transport back home, making this show its first and last display venue. Jason is currently working on rebuilding it with an improved design.

Reed’s Photos
Nelsons’ Photos (2 pages)
Note to anyone with photos from the show- please post a link in the comments so this can be updated. Thanks!

December Meeting
Again, I apologize for not announcing our Christmas ULUG meeting. It was held today (December 15, 2007) from 1:30 to 4:00ish at David’s home. After talking LEGO for a while and playing with David’s trains we held a white elephant gift exchange. Thanks to David for hosting!

This weekend is the annual Wasatch Rails model train show at the Utah State Fairgrounds in Salt Lake City. We’re going to have a great layout (as always :D) on the main floor of the building! Come and enjoy!

When - November 2nd (Friday), 3rd (Saturday), and 4th (Sunday), 2007
Where - Grand Building at the Utah State Fairgrounds (155 North 1000 West in Salt Lake City)
Hours - Friday 5PM to 9PM - Saturday 9AM to 6PM - Sunday 10AM to 4PM
Cost - Adults $5.00 - Children 12 and under are FREE!