This post was sponsored by Dremel Tools. All opinions are my own.
As I was decorating the house for the holidays this year, there seemed to be so many Christmas decorations that my kiddos weren’t allowed to touch. Even our nice train track with the working engine is something they can only play with when Mom or Dad can help.
I could tell they were feeling a whole lot of “well, this isn’t fun” feelings and honestly, it just didn’t seem fair.
I decided it was high time to create an entire tree, from top to bottom, for my kids to decorate and play with. And this DIY Under the Tree Toy Train Track is just the final touch their Holiday décor needed! Plus, the track is incredibly easy to move around and store! Oh, and plus plus, it’s crazy inexpensive to create!
Starting with 2 pieces of 1″x3″x8″ wood pieces, we used a saw to cut (4) 18″ and (4) 7″ pieces. If you don’t have a saw, make sure to have your pieces cut at the store before you leave!
We chose to cut the 8 pieces at 22 degree angles at the ends to create an octagon shape in the track.
You will also need (3) 18″ pieces and (2) 7″ pieces cut to match the inside angles of the track for the back. These will provide a surface to hold your homes and trees.
I spray painted the track a metallic gray and the back pieces white.
Set the wood aside to fully dry.
Next, we painted our wood and rectangle squares – which will be the houses – colorful and bright shades with acrylic craft paint.
For the roof pieces, we painted our triangle shapes black.
Using white puffy paint, we created a snowy shingle look in layers across each of the triangles.
A bit of craft snow glitter added the perfect sparkle to our snowy rooftops!
Using the hot glue gun, we attached the roofs to the houses.
I prefer to “man” the glue gun during our family crafting time. I know first-hand how painful burns from the glue gun can be on your tender digits!
Once the spray painted wood was dry, it was time to connect the gray track pieces to the white back pieces. Matching the sizes together (18″ track pieces with 18″ back pieces, 7″ track pieces with 7″ back pieces), we screwed them together from the outside of the back piece to the bottom of the back of the track piece.
The Dremel Cordless Screwdriver made this step crazy easy for my little ones to help with!
Hot glue the finished houses and tree shapes to the interior of the back piece and continue filling in with the shapes along the front and sides of the track.
We wanted our houses and trees to be touching so that we could fit as many as possible on our track.
To help hold the track together when in use, narrow strips of velcro did the job!
Plus, the velcro makes it crazy simple to move the track around and store away.
We found some plain wood cars and trains at the craft store and added a bit of paint to them to use on our track. But, the track is wide enough for most toy cars, really.
It’s totally perfect and totally hands-on for the kiddos!
