What you wish you'd known about train sets and train tables
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Anonymous
| Planning to get some sort of wooden train apparatus for my 2.5 year old for Xmas. Do you love yours? Wish you'd done something differently? What brands should we look at? Storage systems? We have limited space so are planning to build an under the bed table with the hopes that the trains stay there and don't invade the entire house. |
Anonymous
| I find my son does more creative track building on the floor. The tables are more limiting, and some kids will get bored with them. |
Anonymous
|
Don't get a train table.
They are much more fun when you can spread them out on the floor, plus a train table is just wasted space. |
Anonymous
| We got the board and just stuck it on the coffee table. Very, very small house. We moved it when company came. Table was good for a few years, but then he just built on the floor. |
Anonymous
| We have a city-scape rug that has landscapes and roads and build on that. Train tracks are primarily Ikea (cheap, great quality) and Thomas (neat features that are compatible with Ikea). We store them in a square bin that fits in my son's bookcase near the rug. |
Anonymous
|
I know my way around the wooden train aisle. Here's my advice:
Skip the table. It's more fun to create giant tracks that spread across the floor. And easier to access. And we just don't have room in our house for a train table, but I do like the idea of a slide-under-the-bed surface. I imagine that train tracks will still be found on the floor - but it's worth a try! Train tracks are interchangeable. So don't feel like you have to buy the crazily expensive Thomas or Brio. The generic ones work just fine. Ikea, particularly, are very cheap. And every consignment store/sale I've ever been to has a heap of tracks. We can never have too many tracks (because we make giant layouts all over the room.) |
Anonymous
What's the board? |
Anonymous
not that poster - but go to Home Depot or Lowes and purchase a piece of wood |
Anonymous
| We were fine with a 'blank' board. Glad that ours had six large tubs below for storage. Our boy was ten before he would let us move it to his little brother's room. |
Anonymous
| We got a kidcraft table two years ago. It is used every day. I love that it has a big bin under it. We have a tiny house and it is one of the best gifts we have gotten. |
Anonymous
| I went through this analysis last year at this time and probably posted about it. We went with the tracks over the table and have no regrets. We store everything in a large plastic bin. |
dcmamaconcierge
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A.C. Moore Craft Stores have Thomas Trains. You should never pay full price for Percy  This weeks coupon is 55% percent off one item. If you have a smart phone you can download the Coupon Sherpa app and not have to bring in the ad.
Best, D.C. Mama Concierge lisa@dcmamaconcierge.com 202-538-2449 |
Anonymous
| I wish I had realized that the train table at the store and daycare were sufficient and having one at home was as important as I thought. |
Anonymous
Just the table, or trains and table both? |
Anonymous
| DS got his last Christmas as he turned 2, and still uses it every day. We got a used table and got new trains. DH put some wooden thingys on it so the tracks don't come apart easily. We also have wooden roads to play on the floor and he loves those as well, but we don't regret te table at all. |