Haley's Hobby

Haley's hobby, of watching trains, that she shares with her Dad means something else to her Dad.  He likes to watch them go by, just as much as Haley does, but he also likes to take pictures of them.  He is not the only one.  There is a whole society of people that like to take pictures of trains going by.  Not only do they like to take these pictures but they like to share them with each other.

My husband belongs to several groups that post pictures of the trains that they take online.   They also like to get together occasionally and look at each others pictures.  A couple of years ago my husband got together with some friends and set their pictures to music and they made a night of it watching their shows, having dinner and drinks and just enjoying their mutual hobby.

My husband became the video guru.  People send their photo montages (set to music) to him and he makes sure that they will run smoothly.  Then at the appointed time he runs all of the shows for the group from his computer on a big screen.

The advantage to this is that Haley is left with a plethora of train pictures set to music.  She gets immense joy from watching these shows.  The people that make these shows know that they will be enjoyed by their friends for an evening.  I bet they have no idea how much joy they give to one little girl forevermore.

The weekend is coming up where everyone will get together and share their shows and so my husband has been previewing a lot of shows, making sure that they will be presented without a problem.  Haley has been enjoying them.  She also had gotten into looking at the shows that we still have from several years past.

The fun thing for me is that in general the music is good, so when Haley wants to watch the shows I enjoy the music.  This weekend Haley watched the shows over and over again.  She sang at the top of her lungs along with some of the songs.  She had a great time.

She was so in to it on Sunday evening that I could hear her from downstairs.  She had the show on pretty loud and she was going from the computer room to our bedroom and back singing along. 

Pretty soon I couldn't hear her singing anymore. 

I went upstairs to put her to bed and I found her sitting at the computer with her legs crossed on the table, her hand on the mouse and her head on the back of the chair.  She was nodding off, just about asleep.  I gently got her up and turned off her show and put her in bed. 

She was so happy to watch those shows and she really got in to the music.  I think she had worn herself out.