Another month down and I am pleased to report more progress with the Weston on Trent 2014 show. Following the announcement in the last entry of two new exhibitors for this year's event, I can confirm that further layouts have now been booked. Ken Jones is one exhibitor who has agreed to return for a third year with more of his micro layouts whilst another third time returnee, Malcolm Hughes, has agreed to bring some more of his heritage collection. For this year it looks likely that he will provide a display of Lone Star models. John Bottomley who attended the 2013 show with his 00 gauge layout, Torridge, has agreed to return with his N gauge model this year. That already makes a total of 6 or 7 layouts. Last year I reached 20 and hope to do so once again. There are a couple of other returnees I need to confirm soon which will hopefully take the layout total into double figures.

Recently I have joined the Mickleover Model Railway group. Apart from some very enjoyable evenings it has also opened up some other possible new exhibitors. Hopefully these can be sorted soon. One established member has already expressed an interest in attending for the first time. A good start then, but I still need more exhibtors. If any other RMWeb member is interested please send me a message.

It now looks certain that we have sold all of our trade stands already. Only one of last year's traders is still to confirm their availability and I am confident that they will be joining us. If not we do have two other traders waiting in the wings to step in. It is a nice position to be in!

The first set of leaflets were distributed around the recent Burton swapmeet and some were left at the Stafford show so the publicity has already begun. Hopefully this will help to bring in another good crowd. At this point it is worth stating that admission fees will be the same as last year.

As for

The layout

Our house move has still not happened as my solicitors have decided the end of January was a good time to go AWOL. As a result we are still packing up our current house with no date set for the move into my late Grandad's bungalow. Skaleby West remains stored in the spare room and no work has been done yet. The planned scenic extension is currently on hold as another project has emerged. I have been involved with the planning of the "Beyond the Train Set" project for the September RMWeb Live event. This could mean that I will be involved with the construction of the group's Ffarquhar layout as well as planning some of the other displays. I have also volunteered to build the "shunting puzzle" layout for the display. At one point my spare Skaleby West board looked like it may be used for this, now it looks like a seperate board is to be constructed for me so the board can be reallocated to Skaleby West. Whether I will find time to develop it is another matter. It may be that, for 2014, Skaleby West's space in the show will be taken by the "Beyond the train set" display. Time will tell.

Until next time....