Back in June I wrote about the Importance of Play. In that post I briefly mentioned an old hobby of playing with a train set. I also wrote that my daughter and I would build one together one day. Well, what better time to build a train set than the Christmas season?!

A female elf joined our family last year. Her name is Pike (peek-uh), Norwegian for girl. Although she was quarantined in a glass jar for the first two weeks of December because of the pandemic, she still worked her magic and delivered a gingerbread house Lego set and a Jingle Bell Express train set for my daughter and me to play with.

The Lego set came on the 1st, and we had a fun time piecing that together. My role was to find the pieces we needed for each step, and my daughter put them all together. It sits on the small living room table for us to look at and play with.

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Th train set showed up on the 14th. I realized when my daughter unwrapped it that I need a place to build it; our house is not filled with “extra space.” I decided to purchase a piece of plywood, and then I painted it white and added red, green, and gold glitter to make it look like a ‘Winter Wonderland.’ I had a hunch that we would build a train set together in the near future, so when I saw model Christmas village buildings at the Dollar Tree, I took home one of each. Tonight we put the train set together, and my daughter designed and redesigned the town layout. I’m sure we will continue to add to the town infrastructure and population over the years.

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Christmas has always been a magical time in my home, whether it was during my childhood or my daughter’s. This season allows for extra things to take up space, and extra time to play. Make the most of this magical season… and play.

What magic has this season created for you in the past? Will you recreate that magic?