If you miss the childlike innocence of Christmas, your chance to be a kid again will begin Friday.

The California Railroad Museum’s "Some Assembly Required" exhibit begins Nov. 17 and runs until Feb. 20, 2010. The event will showcase a variety of toys in its main lobby room.

“It’s not like our past exhibits because it doesn’t just focus on trains,” said museum librarian Cara Randall, who also researched the history of the toys on display.

Most of the toys are from the 1950s, with a few from the early 1960s and the oldest from the 1870s.

“Our oldest toy is a puzzle set that a shoe company gave away to customers as a promotional deal when they bought a pair of $3 shoes,” Randall said. “It is all made of wood and the idea is to put it together in order to make a train."

Aside from a few board games and puzzles, "Some Assembly Required" will focus on moving toys and vehicles, much like the modern Tonka manufacturer’s trucks.

“These are all from the 1920s-50s, and most are made from steel,” Randall said of the heavy equipment toys. “They will be in our ‘sandbox’ display, which is a place we made to replicate how kids would have played with them in the original time period they were made."

Though they may be sturdy and built to take a beating, the toys are strictly off limits to attendees.

“Many of these toys are so old that we’re afraid they may break if we let people play with them,” Randall said.

In time for the holiday season, the exhibit will also feature a window display from a Bullock's department store dating back to 1956. Bullock's stores were mostly located in California, with some in Arizona and Nevada.

“We decided to kick off Thanksgiving weekend with this display to put people in the holiday mood,” Randall said.

“The window display will feature toy trains running on tracks much like those seen in films from the time. I think we’re just trying to keep this exhibit as lighthearted as possible."

Preparations and research for the exhibit began in September.

“I learned so much about toys in a really short time,” she said. “It was my job to read about the history of what we have on display so we could match the time periods and make it uniform."

With all the research and work by Randall and the other employees, "Some Assembly Required" promises to be an entertaining experience for kids who may not play with toy trucks anymore to adults who looked forward to unwrapping them during the holidays, Randall said.

“It will be fun to show some younger people what toys were like before the video game era,” she said.