Our family embarked on a new challenge this Christmas season. We constructed our first gingerbread masterpiece. There are a ton of people doing gingerbread houses. Houses are great, but it is the trains that excite our boys. My wife found the detailed plans for this gingerbread train in Familyfun Magazine.
UPDATE: We plan to do it again. We hope to build a bigger and better train this year.
Below are the results of our first attempt at following the FamilyFun plan for building a train. I will provide pictures that tells the story much better than my words. You can click on any of the images for a larger copy.
We spent a total of three days building this train. That was two weekend afternoons of dough preparation and baking. We then spent about three hours on a Monday evening assembling and decorating the train.
Oh…We have been asked several times already about the snow. The snow is just a dusting of coconut shavings.
You can see another picture of this train on my main blog The Land of Ozz. If you would rather build a gingerbread house then you need to check out Simply Recipes: How to Make a Gingerbread House.
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What a lovely gingerbread train! I love the use of red licorice twists for the tracks. Coconut flakes as snow is a good idea too, better than the powdered sugar that I used. Does Riley get to eat it?
Hi, there.
I found the family fun site and have all instructions for the train. The problem is that the pdf file with the templates does not come up for me. Do you happen to have the templates? If so, is there anyway you can send them as an attachment to me?? Thanks. Last year, my daughter and I made a house. But she loves trains, and this year, I’d really like to do the train.
Elise, Yes! Riley did get to eat it. At least part of it. We gave two cars to some friends. Thanks for the link from your blog. I am honored.
Lisa, I emailed you with a response. Thanks for checking out Grill’n Time.
[...] Last year we did an engine, caboose, and two other cars. This year we got a little over ambitious and created an engine, caboose, and four cars. One (the passenger car) was custom made rather than using the Family Fun magazine template. [...]
hey im fourteen and i made this for my 3-year old cousin for his birthday (which is on christmas day) he loved it
but couldnt find red licrorice so used block instead
Wow how great. When I friend sent this to me I right away passed it on to a friend who has a train collection and display that takes from the day after Halloween until about two weeks before Christmas to put up. He is going to make the gingerbread train but the train cars will be about the size of an old animal cracker box, and will become part of his train museum in his layout. It takes up a part of the family room, part of the dining room and about 75% of the front room, the rest is his tree, and a walkway to see the whole thing. each room is a different part of the scene. Mountains with ski lodge with working lift and smoke coming from the lodge chimney(family room), the rural area complete with farms and river(dining), and the front room is the town. He even has a mortuary complete with herse parked outside. (where does one find a toy herse?), there is a drive in movie playing Marilyn Monroe films, a bar playing Elvis and other 60’s era music, over by one of his churches are carolers singing Christmas songs. He must think that this gingerbread one is really cool for him to make a place for it in his display. Thanks for sharing this with us, I just wanted you to know how far this has gone. I only wish my friend had a computer so he could take pictures or video to share the whole thing on line. We have been trying for a couple years to drag him into the 21st century I even offered to come do the work but so far a no go.
That train is so amazing! And your son is absolutely adorable. Thank you for sharing this. I really want to make a gingerbread…something this weekend. I found the link to this on simply recipes, and I am glad I checked it out!
What a lovely gingergread train you made with your son Riley. I loved it, and so much work went in to making it.
All the preparation, the baking, cutting and putting together, and then decorating it. Was well worth it by the end of it.
You did a job well done.
Happy Holidays xx