{"id":2987,"date":"2013-03-05T08:36:02","date_gmt":"2013-03-05T13:36:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thisishappystuff.com\/?p=2987"},"modified":"2013-03-04T12:43:19","modified_gmt":"2013-03-04T17:43:19","slug":"celebrate-the-boy-freight-train-game","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.thisishappystuff.com\/?p=2987","title":{"rendered":"celebrate the boy: freight train game"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"IMGP3669-001\"<\/a>happy little dude’s 3rd birthday was this week.\u00c2\u00a0 we had a party with three of his friends from daycare today and i created this game as a take-home party favor.\u00c2\u00a0 it was inspired by the book freight train by donald crews<\/a> (for the visuals) and by the math-at-play website<\/a> (for game concept–it’s a combination of the short path game<\/a> and the number line game<\/a>.\u00c2\u00a0 go read those links for an excellent explanation of why this simple game can be so helpful!)<\/p>\n

i thought i’d share a little tutorial with you in case anyone would like to make their own version of this game!<\/p>\n

although there are infinite variations of ways to make this game (felt! paper! stickers! two layers of fabric and forget the seam binding!), to make the version pictured above, i used a piece of canvas, seam binding, a velcro cable tie<\/a> (one of my new favorite craft supplies!), one wooden cube, two wooden “gingerbread men<\/a>,” fabric paint,\u00c2\u00a0 brushes, scraps of foam sheets, a fine-tip permanent marker and gluestick.<\/p>\n

\"IMGP3656\"<\/a>first, cut a piece of canvas (mine was approximately 10′ x 15′) and finish all four sides with bias tape.<\/p>\n

\"IMGP3657\"<\/a>second, fold over one of the short edges to create a pocket deep enough to store the gingerbread men and sew along the sides.\u00c2\u00a0 \"IMGP3660\"<\/a>third, fold\/roll the game the way you’d like to store it and figure out the best place to add the velcro cable tie.\u00c2\u00a0 i recommend sewing it so that the soft side of the velcro is facing out when the game is rolled up.<\/p>\n

\"IMGP3662\"<\/a>using the #1 method described in this post<\/a>, i created stamps for these trains (for some, i just used some cubes of sponge dipped directly into the paint).\u00c2\u00a0 i used rainbow colors, but you could also paint them all the same color to save time, just make sure there are 10 cars total.\"IMGP3664\"<\/a>then i used paintbrushes to add wheels and to couple the cars together.<\/p>\n

\"IMGP3665\"<\/a>then, paint numbers on one set of the train cars.<\/p>\n

\"IMGP3669\"<\/a>and add dots (3 sides with one dot, 3 sides with two dots) with a permanent marker on the wooden cube.<\/p>\n

\"IMGP3668\"<\/a>each game (once the paint is dry) gets two “gingerbread men” and one die tucked into the pocket, then rolled so that the paint is on the inside.<\/p>\n

click the link below to print off a copy of the instructions to tuck into the game (if desired)<\/p>\n

train game instructions<\/a><\/p>\n

this game made a fun birthday party favor (although we only had four little boys here, including the happy little dude.\u00c2\u00a0 i might balk at making 15 of these…).\u00c2\u00a0 it would also make good travel entertainment or restaurant distraction because it’s easy to tuck into your purse.\u00c2\u00a0 i made this game with trains because a certain little someone is obsessed with trains, but you could easily personalize this for whatever kid you’re giving it to.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

happy little dude’s 3rd birthday was this week.\u00c2\u00a0 we had a party with three of his friends from daycare today and i created this game as a take-home party favor.\u00c2\u00a0 it was inspired by the book freight train by donald … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2987","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-crafty-stuff","category-kid-stuff"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.thisishappystuff.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2987","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.thisishappystuff.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.thisishappystuff.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.thisishappystuff.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.thisishappystuff.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2987"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.thisishappystuff.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2987\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3004,"href":"http:\/\/www.thisishappystuff.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2987\/revisions\/3004"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.thisishappystuff.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2987"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.thisishappystuff.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2987"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.thisishappystuff.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2987"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}