Hey look, it's our first YouTube video! Follow the Little Engineer through a day at his favorite train show, the Pacific Science Center's Model Railroad Show. I edited this with kids who enjoy watching videos of other kids playing trains in mind...I know I don't have the only one! Check out ...
Monorail Ticket Booth Pretend Play
Even before we went on our play date with the Seattle Center Monorail, the Little Engineer had started playing a monorail version of Big Engine, his game where we pretend his bed is a locomotive. As usual, one of his favorite parts to play was the ticket booth. So when I saw all the cool stuff ...
Paper Engineer’s Hat Craft for Kids
This is a great way for kids to show their affection for their favorite stuffed animals, especially if their plush friends like to play trains with them! The idea came to me while creating a pattern for the felt engineer hats I've been sewing for some very special stuffed animals. At the time, ...
Toddler Train Track @ IKEA
If you're anything like me, you'll look at this picture and see a aid for visualizing the shape and size of rugs. At least, that's how I used to see this sight every time I pushed the cart through IKEA. Fortunately, I have the Little Engineer around to see things with different eyes. Eyes that ...
Our Play Date at the Seattle Monorail
We had been inside the Seattle Monorail's Red Train for five or ten minutes already when it seemed to sink in for the Little Engineer. He picked up his best buddy, Meekat, from where the he had been sitting next to Monorail Bunny on a seat and lifted the meerkat above his head, beaming upward in ...
Rescuing Toy Trains from Ice
I can't think of a better motivator for a little train lover to put on a thinking cap than to see a collection of toy trains, trapped in ice and in desperate need of rescue. Especially if the toy trains are new, never-before-seen ones, like they were for the Little Engineer when we did this last ...
Assembling and Painting Wooden Trains with My Toddler
Here's another fun thing we picked up at the Northwest Railway Museum's gift shop last July, along with the Instant Foam Railroad I wrote about before. These are the Made By Me! Train Engine, Passenger Coach, and Caboose by Maple Landmark, an American company that makes high-quality, classic ...
Painting with Trains on Canvas
Painting with trains or other toys with wheels is nothing new -- and this certainly wasn't the first time we did it -- but here's the Little Engineer's latest twist on it. His ideas led the project deeper into the realm of pretend play, and resulted in a pretty cool end product. Not that the ...
Exploring the Possibilities of an Instant Foam Railroad
I remember having a lot of fun with expanding foam capsules like these when I was a kid, but I didn't expect to be surprised by them as an adult. Then again, lots of unexpected things happen with the Little Engineer around. I'm not sure if the designers intended it all of it or not, put there was ...
BIG ENGINE: Train Pretend Play on a BIG Scale
"Mama, Mama, Mama come and play Big Engine!" "Big Engine" is the Little Engineer's bed. When we picked the Kura bed out at Ikea almost a year and a half ago (can it be that long?), I didn't realize that it really was a train. Not that trains didn't influence us in choosing it; I had visions ...
Speed Up Routines with Tickets for Your Little Engineer
Every so often, I come up with an idea that works really well with the Little Engineer. And then things get better, and I phase the idea out (or, more accurately, I forget to do it because it's no longer necessary at the time). Which is just as well, because most of these ideas stop working so ...
Classical Train Music: Encouraging a Child’s Love of Music
Affiliate links are included below for your convenience. When the Little Engineer was tiny, the days turned into weeks, then months, and I never remembered to do some of the things I had planned to do with my baby. One of those was to surround him with the music we loved in the hope that he'd ...
Engine Paint Shop — Train Color Matching Activity for Preschoolers
One of my son's favorite things about trains are their "coats of paint." Along with wearing solid-color shirts as coats of paint that let him become an engine of that color, he especially loves pretending to paint his wooden trains, or Big Engine (his bed). Knowing this came in handy the last time ...
A New Coat of Paint for Breakfast: James Eggs and Thomas Toast
One of the reasons I've come to love the Thomas engines is their colors. There's a good variety, and they're bright and vivid without making my eyes hurt. The Little Engineer loves their colors even more than I do. He even went through a phase when he would only wear plain-colored shirts. They ...
Our Latest Wooden Train Layout
Every few weeks, we disassemble the tracks that take up the majority of the open floor space in our living room, vacuum the play mats, and start anew. The last time this happened, we got off to a bit of a false start. I deemed my original plan too dangerous due to the likelihood that the Little ...
“Train Song” by Charlie Hope – Train Music for Children
When I heard the music accompanying the video below, "Train Song," I knew I had to track it down. I loved the simple but poetic lyrics and the way you can hear the train coming closer and closer through the song. And I especially loved how the joy in the chorus mixes with the mournful notes of a ...
Grass Tracks – an Outdoor, Active, and Imaginative Train Game
Every day, the Little Engineer wakes up with a plan for the day, a plan he strives to stick to. Generally, ninety-five percent of it is "play trains!" Play wooden trains indoors, that is. I know he really enjoys being outside--he's remapped his grandparents' entire backyard as the Island of ...
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Hi, I'm Jessica! While playing trains for the last several years, my Little Engineer and I have had a lot of fun and learned so much together. I'm excited to share our discoveries with other people who have kids who love trains in their lives.