I am in SO much trouble

Oh, Liz, my heart goes out to you and your son. In my life, these things are sent to teach me to be more empathetic when my kids make mistakes. You are a kind and loving mom... he will forgive you.

Perhaps you could offer to help make it up to him if the loss is permanent. If you organized the materials and provided him with some spare time, could your dh make another crane? You could show your son what you are doing: forgoing a movie date with a buddy and folding all the laundry so that his dad has time to make the crane. What if you asked dh for a train for your birthday to replace ds's, or if you used the money you usually spend on yourself (movie tickets, books)? (Forgive me if this unsolicited advice is unwelcome. For me, I try to look at ways of making things better for my kids, but you and your son may need to spend some time just understanding the loss of his treasure.)

Thanks, everybody, for the sympathy. I am going to put up signs today. We checked the back alleys in case somebody dumped it but no luck. To make matters worse it was garbage day so they might have dumped it in somebody's garbage can. I still haven't told ds. I think he thinks it's at his babysitters. I wouldn't usually keep him in the dark so long but we were hoping it would turn up.

I think it's a good idea to try to make it up to him by doing more than just buying new ones. It's going to cost about $80 to replace just the engines but that doesn't mean anything to him. The funny thing is we always thought the Thomas trains were ridiculously over priced and refused to buy them. All of these were presents from relatives and he loves them like no other toy, has already gotten 2 years of play out of them and shows no sign of tiring of them.

I'll make the signs right now since he's off with his Dad.

Thanks again.