Need activity/play/train table. Also, can you eat and color w/ table lip?

[DAKnits]

After finally deciding on a table a chair set (the Super Art Table by Alex Toys), I am finding a real need for a lower activity table. My DD is 2 years old and 35" tall. She has a lot of small dollhouses (older little people sets), puzzles, blocks, etc... that she has trouble using on the floor. So, I am looking for a smallish table (this is for a small play area in our family room) that she can put her dollhouses on it and can stand and play, but I would love for it to be high enough for her to eat and color with friends. All the activity tables have a lip -- can kids eat and color with a lip on the table. It looks like it would be really uncomfortable for a child to lean her arms on the lip and eat or color/draw.

Also, my DD LOVES LOVES LOVES trains, but I have no room for a large train table. She would even be thrilled if I got her a small starter set of trains, and I would rather not get her a big set anyway b/c the huge one at school is "special" and I'm sure it would lose it's novelty if we had it at home. How big a table do I need to accomodate a small set of trains?

Does anyone have one they recommend? I really don't want to spend a lot of money since I just bought the Alex Table. I found one that's a 30" by 30" square table on wheels for $65, but it's only 15.75" high and I think it's too short to eat or color at, and probably won't be a comfortable height for much longer. What height is good for this kind of table?

Thanks so much for any advice!!!!!

[ellies mom]

The Nilo Block table http://www.nilotoys.com/at.htm might be a good idea. It is higher than a normal train table but not as high as regular table. It is 34"x26" and 20" high. We have the full size table, DD seems to color and eat at it just fine. It is high enough that she can sit at it also.

About the trains, it may be difficult to get any sort of layout to fit on the smaller table. That is why we went with the larger one. You may be able to get a small circle or oval to fit though.

[DAKnits]

Hi!

Thanks for the Nilo Block table suggestion. I checked it out and the only thing I'm concerned about is the height. The 19"h small plastic table my daughter has now is too tall for her to play with her dollhouses on (I tried, but it just won't work for her) -- the 17-18" high train tables at Barnes and Nobles seem to be a great height. Do you know what the smallest "figure 8" train track measures? I would only need a figure 8 or starter set and I have no idea how much space they use.

I found this, but I'm not sure how easy it would be to eat on b/c the lip looks really big, even where it dips down ...

http://www.etoys.com/genProduct.html/PID/1051009/ctid/17?cpncode=09-15268403-2&srccode=cii_9324560&_e=44fca&_v=44FCA25B1uwHa4D8F85BA076

The other table I'm considering is 15 3/4 high ... is this too short for long term use?:

http://www.allchildrensfurniture.com/Lipper-International-520-10212IG1014.html

[sdbc]

For DD's dollhouse, we ended up buying a cheap coffee table since the train tables were too large for our space. It's 16 inches tall and works great. She doesn't sit and color there, but you could just do pillows on the floor if you wanted to use it that way. It would save some $$ on chairs, anyway!

Sue, mommy to Aurora (Rory) born 5/13/04

[DAKnits]

Thanks for letting me know the 16" height is a good one for the dollhouses!! I think I'm going to get the Lipper activity cart -- I like the size, and I love that I can roll it out of the way so easily. I discovered that my coffee table in my family room will work for putting chairs underneath it on the two ends that don't have wood underneath them, so if my DD and a friend want to eat or color, I can pull up chairs to the ends of the coffee table. I can't believe i never tried it before!


Also, I found a few small train sets that will fit on a table that's only 30" x 30" so I can get her the small train set and put it on the activity cart. I'd rather not use our big family room coffee table for train set up since that would take our coffee table out of use unless I want to keep setting up the tracks which I don't want to do, especially since it would be a very large train to go around our very large coffee table.

Thanks for the help!

[sidmand]

I was just coming here to suggest the Lipper one! We just bought that one from Smart Bargains. It cost a fortune to ship, but I had a $20 off coupon for being a BZZ Agent (free shipping for everyone else if you want at www.smartbargains.com/bzz, although I don't think it helps with the oversize charge).

I bought the table and the little drawer for underneath. Not sure I needed the little drawer, but I figure we can store trains, coloring stuff, etc. under there.

DS is about the same size as your DD and this table is pretty short. Very wide though, I think it'll be perfect for trains and art projects. It was pretty easy to put together too and I'm not very good at things like that.

As soon as I put it together, DS started stacking blocks on it, so I guess he likes it too!

Chairs didn't occur to me until I put it together, but I figure he'll be standing at it for awhile and maybe some IKEA chairs will work.

Debbie
http://b2.lilypie.com/BI7Tm5.png

[DAKnits]

Debbie, thanks so much! I feel so much better about having ordered it! It did cost a lot to ship, but all in all it cost me $72 from shop.com (which gets it from smartbargains). I didn't get the bin b/c I don't need it, but I think the table will be perfect for a small train set, dollhouses, blocks etc... I don't have room for a big train table, and I love that I can roll it where I want it. I have small chairs from Little Tikes that will probably fit under it, but I think DD will just want to walk around the table like she does with the train tables.

I'm looking forward to getting it!