Valentine’s Day in Vicarstown: Book Review and Wooden Train Layout

The Little Engineer and I enjoy taking what we read and acting it out in play. Often, this means playing it out with our wooden trains. (Big shock, I know.) I think there’s a lot to be learned from adapting a book to another form of storytelling. Also, we’re hoping the photos of our layout might be fun to share with your young train lovers. In addition to being a fun literacy activity, it turned out to be a great way to learn about maps and geography as well.

An earlier version of this post was originally published on February 4th, 2013, when the Little Engineer was three years old. It contains links to Amazon.com. If you click on one, we will receive a small commission — at no additional cost to you — on anything you buy at Amazon for a certain length of time afterwards. Read our disclosure policy for more details.

 

The Thomas in Town series of books have long been some of our favorite Thomas & Friends reads. Each of the four titles — Halloween in Anopha, Christmas in Wellsworth, Valentine’s Day in Vicarstown, and Easter in Harwick — tells a holiday story set in a town on the Island of Sodor. In general, these books feature good, descriptive writing while avoiding many of the pitfalls of the recent seasons of the TV show and its related books (the much improved most recent season of the show excepted). The illustrations by Richard Courtney, my favorite Thomas artist, are especially lovely.

One of the best things about this series is the map of the Island of Sodor inside the front cover of each book. The Little Engineer and I have spent a lot of time going over these maps, tracing the rail lines, sounding out the words, talking about cardinal directions and distances. We also managed to figure out where Sodor would be on a real map from observing the real landmasses included on the Sodor map, which helps place things for him whenever I mention something about “the United Kingdom, where Thomas comes from.”

Before we built our layout, the Little Engineer and I read the book several times over the course of a few days. After each reading, we would talk a little about what we would need in a layout to be able to play out the whole story. Locations, scenery, characters, props — not unlike planning for a stage adaptation of a book. (We took the planning part even further to great success when we turned Thomas Gets a Snowplow into a book-inspired train layout.)

One of the interesting things about Valentine’s Day in Vicarstown is that it’s the only one in the series with an engine other than Thomas as the main character.  The book opens with Percy returning home after a long winter’s night pulling the mail.  That meant that the first location we needed was Tidmouth Sheds.  The Little Engineer had just gotten the Sheds for Christmas, so we were able to use that specific roundhouse, otherwise it would have just been our trusty old Imaginarium roundhouse. You can make your own out of a cardboard box if you don’t have one. Cardboard box engine sheds are fun even now that the Little Engineer has more than one wooden one. (See the Roundhouses and Engine Sheds portion of our Ultimate Wooden Train Guide for more options and DIY ideas.)

Next, Thomas asks Percy how his night went, but as soon as Percy begins to answer him, Thomas interrupts him to say that he has to leave right away to go work at Brendam Docks for a few days and chuffs away. He does apologize to Percy and promises to listen at the Valentine’s Day party in Vicarstown, but Thomas, why did you ask him if you didn’t have time to hear his answer? On the other hand, it really fits the way Thomas’ character comes across much of the time, and protagonists need flaws. I mostly find it funny, but I do like to point out to the Little Engineer that Thomas could have handled the situation in a different way.

After Thomas leaves, Percy asks some of the more experienced engines about the Valentine’s Day party. True to their characters, Edward gives a helpful explanation, James brags about how many valentines he got last year, and Gordon claims to be too important for a Valentine’s Day party.

In the books, you don’t see Thomas at Brendam Docks, but we wanted to put it in the layout. First of all, it’s Thomas, so he wasn’t just going to disappear from the tracks while we were playing. And second, it worked out nicely with the geography of Sodor. Let’s take a look at the full layout from above.

There’s Tidmouth on the left in the west coast of Sodor, and Vicarstown (well, really Knapford Station with its sign covered up, plus the retired Vicarstown Dieselworks tucked in the very back) on the right on the east side of the island. To the south of the mainline between the two towns are the Docks. This was a good opportunity to compare our layout with the map and talk about directions again, and also to talk about how our layout differed from the geography shown on the map.

Another reason to add the Docks into the layout was to have that big sea area. The Little Engineer had recently gotten a couple of really water-related presents for his wooden trains for his birthday, the Brio Ferry Ship and the Brio Cargo Harbor Set.  I try to rotate room for them in and out of the layout because we both like playing with them, especially the awesome ferry.

And finally, who could resist the opportunity to decorate Cranky?  Especially for Valentine’s Day.  He looks so happy with his little shiny heart there.

Okay, back to the story in the book. The morning after a huge snowstorm, Sir Topham Hatt comes to the Sheds to tell Percy that Thomas is snowed in at the Docks, and Percy will have to try to use Thomas’ snowplow to clear the line during the day and pull mail cars at night.

After the snow storm, we added cotton balls to the layout (a fun trick I picked up from No Time for Flashcards’ Winter Train Table Sensory Play post).

And off goes Percy wearing Thomas’ snowplow. It’s slightly too big, but Percy tries and works his hardest, and helps the bigger engines clear the snow from the line.

This Snow Covered Percy with a snowplow was my Christmas gift from the Little Engineer and his dada. I really wanted it (you’ll notice I said “our wooden trains” way up at the top), but normally it’s only available as part of the massive (and expensive…especially now that it’s retired) Rumble and Race Mountain Set. Thanks to eBay, my husband tracked it down as a far less costly addition to the collection.

However, a regular Percy (or a different train entirely) would be fine! It could be fun to try to make a snowplow for him out of blue Play Dough or construction paper. A blue one because it’s supposed to be Thomas’ snowplow; I’m still not sure why the wooden trains’ snowplows are boring gray.

Meanwhile, here’s Thomas snowed in at the Docks, still hard at work shunting Troublesome Trucks in the snow because…well, what fun would it be to let him rest?

The book doesn’t say why the Docks were so busy that Thomas would be there for days, so I filled in the blank with something fun and fitting to the story, if not the reality of what real trains might really pull. Sodor has very little to do with reality, after all. We made all of this freight following the steps I explained in Easy DIY Valentine’s Day Freight for Wooden Trains, and it turned out so cute.

Finally it’s Valentine’s Day, and Percy arrives at Vicarstown Station. When he sees his valentine mailbox the tired little engine worries that there’s more mail to pull. His driver explains what’s going on. Then Percy worries that Thomas won’t make it to the party.

For the mailboxes, we used some wood blocks from the craft store and with various heart stickers attached. As you can see, we had fun decorating the station for the party. These were all stickers out of the dollar bins at Target. You can read about my secret for decorating wooden trains and accessories without damaging in Damage-Free Decorating for Wooden Train Layouts.

Sir Topham Hatt addresses the crowd: high grade coal and wash downs for all his “Really Useful valentines” — hooray! Then the children sing and exchange valentines and chocolate hearts and fruits. I think we’ll do some of that when we play through the story again later this week. I really wish I had more little wooden train people who could pass for children.

Finally, Thomas shows up. Percy is so relieved. And then the engine drivers count the valentines. Thomas has twenty, and Percy has, as he peeps, “twenty one!  The most of all!” This is the other part of the book that used to bother me, the focus on having the most. “Most” is a word that I think the new people in charge of the Thomas & Friends show should strike from their writers’ vocabularies, especially when combined with the words, “of all,” because for awhile, it got to the point where everything was “the most of all!”

However, it’s natural for Percy, who is supposed to be one of the youngest engines and represent that level of maturity, to be excited by having the most valentines. And what comes after that line is possibly the more important part. The valentine that puts him over the top comes from Sir Topham himself, in recognition of Percy’s dedicated work plowing the tracks by day and delivering the mail by night. Percy earned that last valentine by going above and beyond his normal duties, and doing so without complaint.

And then, the last two paragraphs of the book are about Thomas’ reaction. Thomas isn’t jealous at all of Percy, neither for winning the valentine count nor the praise from Sir Topham. In response to Sir Topham commenting that Percy is pretty good with Thomas’  snowplow, Thomas laughs and offers it to Percy. And then Percy smiles, feeling lucky that Thomas is his friend.

Which is, of course, the overarching theme of the book:  friendship, and reconnecting after some distance — both real and metaphorical — comes between two friends. Thomas sort of brushed Percy off at the beginning, and Percy seems a little uncertain and sad through the book (something that is subtly handled through the illustrations in many places), but their value and bond as friends is reestablished at the end.

I think the Little Engineer’s favorite part of playing out the story was the party at the station. I had started setting it up while he was still shunting valentine freight with Thomas and Salty. When he noticed what I was doing, he came and took over, removing some of the engines I had put in the background who he didn’t think would be at the party and rearranging the valentine mailboxes and the engines in the front row. Then, without being reminded of the story by me, he started setting valentines by the engines and counting them. Of course, in his version, Thomas got most of the valentines.

His other favorite part of the process — and I don’t have a picture of this, sadly — was playing with the two full spectrum desk lamps I was experimenting with to help light our layout for the photos. I’m not sure if they were two suns or if one was the sun and one was the moon because he was talking so quickly, but he was very excited about turning them off and on and holding them up above the trains.

One last thing I included was the Sodor Engine Wash (bottom left above), so that the engines could go get their celebratory wash downs at the end.  Wash downs are extremely important to engines, if you ask the Little Engineer, so there was no way we were going to leave them out when they were mentioned.  Fortunately, they can be satisfactorily accomplished with just a cloth to “scrub” and polish the wooden trains.

So, that’s our take on Valentine’s Day in Vicarstown. I hope you enjoyed it, because we enjoyed creating it. For another activity based on the book, check out how we used the story to practice counting.

Valentine Counting Activity with Thomas and Friends

 

Train Books and Gifts for Valentine’s Day:

The Little Engine That Could’s  Valentine’s Day Surprise	Thomas in Town: Valentine’s Day in Vicarstown
Thomas’ Valentine Party	NameTrain Heart

 

More train activities and ideas for Valentine’s Day:

Train Valentines Round-up

Looking for train valentines for your little engineer to hand out? I had a hard time getting train valentines the first year I looked for them, so I tracked down as many as I possibly could to share here. Here are some great train Valentine’s Day cards available online, and a list of free printable train valentines as well.

DIY Train Track Valentines

If you’re looking for an unusual — and unusually pretty — train valentine for your child, these DIY train track valentines might be just the thing!

Easy DIY Felt Heart Freight for Wooden Trains

With their fuzzy yet solid feel, these easy-to-make felt hearts are wonderful valentine freight for toy trains and great counters for counting activities.

DIY Engineer Stripe Heart Pendants

These make beautiful gifts for train lovers (or the mothers of train-loving kids) for Valentine’s Day — or any other special day!

Valentine Counting Activity with Thomas and Friends

Another fun activity inspired by Valentine’s Day in Vicarstown. The Little Engineer still asks to play this one a year later.

DIY Felt Valentine Train Play Set

A pretty and engaging felt train play set that’s quick and easy to make for Valentine’s Day.