How is it already December?! I’m shocked. I was making family calendars again this year and looking thru pictures of the kids and some of the activities from the beginning of this year felt like they’d only just happened! I must be stuck in some kind of time warp.
We finally got our house all fully decorated for Christmas, and the pumpkins are gone. I even changed out the tablecloth to a Christmas one. That’s when you know I mean business! There is eerily no snow yet this year. Just a few flurries here and there, but nothing that stuck more than a few hours. We’ll see if we get some snow before Christmas!
Will has been showing the kids classic Christmas movies, and we’ve been doing a dinner and a movie night on the weekends. The kids recently watched the Polar Express, which I will admit I watched only 10 minutes of before I called it enough. I do love the book though. But the Polar Express is about a train – so it’s going to be a winner for our train loving family! For that reason we decided to book the Edaville Railroad version of the Polar Express. It was quite fun but pretty pricey. The train stopped at 3 stops, one to receive hot cocoa, another to pass out chocolate chip cookies, and the last one for Santa to board the train. After we received the cookies, Patricia said, “Julius won”. When I asked her what she meant she said “I thought we were going to have m&m cookies and he thought we were going to have chocolate chippies, he was right.” They are the best siblings. I love watching them interact and play together… even though they get frustrated with one another every once in a while.
Edaville’s steam train!
I thought given the Polar Express was a pretty popular theme around this time… I’d show you how I made Julius’ birthday train. It could very easily stand in for the Polar Express. I had an epiphany painting this one. After making my fair share of cardboard masterpieces (see the spaceship, or the catbus) I finally figured out the right way to paint! I highly recommend you use a small foam roller rather than trying to use a foam brush! It went on evenly, took me 1/3 the amount of paint and I only did one coat!
The Julius Express
What You’ll Need:
- 2 very large boxes (mine were from a very large swivel chair)
- 1 large box (mine was from a dishwasher)
- 1 medium box (mine was from a vacuum)
- other scrap cardboard (I used another 2 large boxes that were in worse condition)
- 1 roll of white duct tape
- 1 roll of black duct tape
- box cutter
- 1 32oz bottle of black acrylic paint (I only used about half)
- 1 foam roller
- hot glue gun
- Fiberfil stuffing
- Start by laying out boxes where you would like them to go. I recommend the two very large boxes for train cars, the large box for the driver compartment of the engine, and the smaller box as the front of the engine.
- Cut out windows in the sides of the engine car and a smaller window in the front of the engine compartment. Cut a large door in the back of the driver compartment of the engine.
- Cut a rectangle of cardboard from your square boxes that is the length of the front of the engine, but twice as wide. Gently bend this to form a half circle. Using the black duct tape, tape this to the medium box to make the front of the engine more shapely.
- Measure and cut a piece of cardboard in an arch shape to fit the front of the train. Tape arch on.
- Bend a piece of cardboard to form a cowcatcher.
- Bend a 1ft high piece of cardboard into a 4″ diameter cylinder for a chimney. Tape together. Cut a hole in the top of the train front to insert the chimney.
- Cut rectangle windows out of the passenger cars, and cut a door in the front and back of each passenger car.
- Cut 12 small wheels and 2 large wheels.
- Paint everything black. Use the foam roller and press with an even pressure to obtain a uniform coverage. I only needed a single coat for the whole train.
So easy!
Note the shape of the cow-catcher in the front of the image.
- Let dry.
- Use the white tape to form stripes on the cowcatcher.
Cowcatcher after bent into place.
- Use the white tape around the windows and doors as an outline (I used half a piece of tape.)
- Use the white tape to form two stripes around the smokestack
- Use the white tape to form spokes on the wheels, then around the edge of the wheels as an outline. Paint a black dot in the center of the spokes.
So… many… wheels! And while I was painting them I also saw so… many… spiders! I ignored them.
- Use glue gun to attach wheels to cars.
- Place fiberfill in chimney of smokestack to look like steam.
- Cut a small hole for your flashlight in the front of the train. Insert flashlight.
- All aboard!
WOW.