On 31 October I did a post on the Halloween train layout and this is pretty much as far as I got with the thing until a few days ago. Lack of energy plus waiting for more stuff to come in made me delay any more work on it until a few days ago.
31 Oct 2026
Here's my progress since 31 October.
Ed
2 Nov 2026
I painted the white Styrofoam scenic plot a satin forest green - it's what I had in The Cave and I didn't feel like running to Lowe's (which is close to my house) for a custom can of paint. It didn't matter if any of the white Styrofoam peeked through the painting, as it was gonna be covered over anyway.
2026-11-05 Two More Landscape Plots
These two additional plots had been planned all along, it just took a while longer to get done.
2026-11-08 Scenery
Those three scenic plots were given a dry brush of tan which covered a lot of that sort of shiny, satin forest green paint. I can't tell you what a chore it was trying to gather all this stuff from out in The Cave, but in the end it was worth braving that abyss.
Here's how I applied the ground cover.
-First: I brushed on a dilute mixture of water and PVA glue - about 3 parts water to one part glue
-Second: I sprinkled on various colored and textured Woodland Scenics turf material using a cheap plastic sifter.
-Third: I sprayed it all down with a diluted mixture of water and liquid dish detergent
-Fourth: I 'planted' the trees. This batch had just been delivered yesterday and were the tallest and cheapest trees I could get in bulk from Amazon. 30each 15cm trees...
...and I can use more!
Planting the trees was easy as the scenery plots were covered in lightweight spackling vs. plaster or tile grout. Unlike plaster or grout, spackling doesn't dry rock hard. However, for fine scale model scenery, it doesn't take detailing well. That's okay for things like simple, temporary scenery making like this.
-Fifth: Wait. It will take at least about 12 hours or more for all the glue to dry and set up properly
2026-11-09 Trees Planted and Scenes Are Beginning To Take Shape
Aragog's Lair is front and center (almost) on the layout. The scene needs a bit more work but for now this is okay.
The ground cover was still wet when I placed Aragog in his lair, but I was impatient to see what he would look like there! LOL
I've had these figures from Mattel for years now. This scene would look better if had the room to make the lake shore, and a bunch of Dementor figures flying and hovering around, but I like the figures so they'll stay here for now.
A Schleich Troll has come down from the mountains looking for mischief!
