The Little Engineer and I started celebrated St. Patrick's Day with our trains by decorating a few engines and making some new freight. Here are several easy ideas for ways to incorporate the holiday into any kind of toy train play. ...
DIY Rainbow Train Set
The unfinished surface of wooden train tracks makes an excellent canvas for all kinds of creativity! And ever since I found a new source for unpainted wooden train cars, I've been working on a number of different DIY train sets to share with you. This first one is the one I'm most excited to share ...
Marble Run Train Play: Quarry Cargo Drop
One of our favorite ways to keep train play interesting is to combine our wooden trains with building toys. I've been wanting to incorporate our marble run into a train layout for a long time, and -- finally! -- we set aside an afternoon to figure it out. After learning through trial and error, the ...
Learning About Trees with Wooden Train Tracks
As I was watching the Little Engineer buzz up and down today's special layout in his room, I realized we somehow managed to learn about art, biology, planning and executing a project, and gross and fine motor skills, all with a pile of wooden train tracks. If I hadn't already been excited about the ...
Building with Dreamup Toys Wooden Railway Block Platforms
If your child has ever wanted to be able to combine DUPLO or LEGO blocks with wooden train tracks, good news: there's a new product designed to connect tracks and bricks. Dreamup Toys sent us some of their Wooden Railway Block Platforms to test out, and I'm extremely happy to report that they do ...
The Play Trains! Guide to the Best Wooden Train Sets 2021
Searching for the best wooden train set for your child? I've turned my expert eye on the wooden train sets that currently on the market so that you can make an informed choice. A train set can sound good on paper, but there's nothing like hands-on play to tell you whether it's going to be the right ...
Wooden Train Tracks — The Play Trains! Ultimate Wooden Train Guide
If you traveled back in time to my son's toddler days, you would find us on his bedroom floor, surrounded by wooden train tracks. My son: the one clutching at train in his chubby toddler fist as he ran its wheels down the almost-finished track. Me: the one building my masterpiece railway at ...
Jingle Bell Coupling Chains for Wooden Trains
Here’s a jingle bell train activity we did last year, but I never managed to write about the photos — which means I’ve been looking forward to posting this for twelve months now! My son has always been very interested in couplers and coupling chains. For a long time, when I’d want him to hold…
Two Color Oil and Water Discovery Bottles
These vibrant oil and water discovery bottles contain no lamp oil, using all edible ingredients. This makes them a safe science activity for preschoolers to make on their own! We found some fun train-related things to include in our bottle, but you could make them with any (or no) theme in mind. The Little Engineer…