this was not my best purchase

Ok, I'm not sure if maybe my children are railway challenged or if I have been sucked into the idea that this toy is what childhood is all about, but in my house it is a nightmare. I started buying a set for my son when he was 2. I was so excited for him to open the present only to find out that you need an engineering degree to put the tracks together in some kind of interesting configuration or at least to make them connect so that the trains don't drop off into a frustrating land called the floor.

Once you have that figured out, you then need to have reached a developmental milestone which gives you the dexterity to keep the train actually on the track. After many more hopeful gifts of this wooden railway and the blind faith that it would just take a bit of practice, not to mention the frustration and throwing of the wooden tracks, the trains found a home in a basket under the stairs.

Now my daughter, 2 1/2 is excited about them. She points at the basket (which in my mind is still thinking about what it has done) and says, "choo, choo? Me play choo choo?" So here I am today, in a time warp from 4 years ago helping the little one to put the tracks together only for her to end up in a puddle of tears because the trains don't stay on the tracks. She actually put herself face down, head in arms sobbing. A few minutes later she finally conceded and just brought 3 trains to the table and pushed them around. Watching her made me think how much I wished that I had just bought this train and not jumped on the bandwagon. Trouble is, I'm not going to go out and spend more money on any kind of train now since I have a perfectly good basket full of them right here.

Maybe one day they will grow into them....