For my 7 yar old son I had put a number of large boxes together and painted them to look like a train. I then had some old bean bags that I deyed black to look like coal. With small plastic shovels, my son and his friends "shoveled" coal into the engine firebox while I had train music chugging away. The kids loved it. Everyone had a turn being the engineer and the fireman. With colored crepe paper everywhere and the rail theme party items everywhere, such as cone hats, confetti, "train" cake, blowouts and the like, out grand finale was the train pinata. All the children went home with their bag of goodies and a thank you note. Everything had a railroad theme, everyone loved it, and looking forward to doing the same thing next time around.