Trains are fun, but are they old school?

on

Jan3

The construction of the Union Pacific Railroad was of greater importance to the people of the United States than the inauguration of steamship service across the Atlantic or the laying of the Atlantic Telegraph. Yet the one has been heralded from time to time and the other allowed to sink into temporary obscurity. ~ W.F. Bailey, The Story of the First Trans-continental Railroad

The best gift my 3 year old boy ever got was a Thomas the Train set.  He plays with those things for hours on end, has learned to surf YouTube on the Apple TV for “choo choo happy” (it’s a long story), and he takes his tracks and trains with him everywhere.  It started with a backpack, and now it’s a backpack AND a small suitcase on wheels.

One of my jobs is to put the tracks together for him on a regular basis – he never uses the table we got him, it’s more fun to assemble them on the floor.  Today, I put together a nice dual loop track, but his 6 year old sister drew him away with … computer games.  All my hard (and fun work) assembling the track, and Nick Jr. online was more important. 

However, the trains still hold his attention much longer, and truth be told, those damned flash games don’t work if you move your mouse outside of their borders, and he gets frustrated with them quickly.