No TV set turns into big Lego set

This is the kind of story every parent loves to hear.  A kid who makes a deal, sticks to it, and learns a valuable lesson in the end.  This story about a Lego loving boy is inspiring.

The parents made a deal with their son that he would earn money for not watching TV. Now we all know how hard it can be to pull a 7 year old away from their favorite show.  Well, in this case, the deal paid off to the sum of a few hundred dollars.

The kid saved the money he earned from not watching TV and bought the Lego set every Lego Kid has been begging their parents for.  The Star Wars Death Star set.  At $400 this set would have to count as most kid’s birthday and Christmas present for a few years.

Read the entire story here.

Lego Pokemon

One thing The Lego Kid loves besides Legos is Pokemon. When I stumbled across these creations at Brickshelf.com I was amazed.

 

This kind of Lego creation requires a lot of thought since the characters are very well known.

 

 

 

 

See the entire collection at Brickshelf.com

 

 

Lego utensils

To go along with my last  post about the Lego Table, I found these cool Lego themed utensils at perpetualkid.com. 

For $16.99 they’re a little expensive if you need to get  multiple sets for your kids but they will sure like mealtime a little more with their own Lego cutlery.

Lego Table

Hey Lego Kid, time for  dinner.  Can you imagine this table being in your dining room?  Well It’s actually a board room table but it is made out of a lot of Legos. 

This masterpiece of brick building is the work of abgc architecture. The table is made out of 22,742 bricks and measures 4ft x 9ft.  The table was commissioned by the advertising agency Boys and Girls for their conference room.

ABGC architecture even made a time lapse video of the construction of the table.  Check out the video. It’s pretty amazing.

Lego Table - abgc from abgc-android on Vimeo.

Lego Kid and Lego Mom creations

The Lego Dad had to work last Sunday. Normally I would be knee  deep in a pile of little plastic bricks with The Lego Kid, but I just could not get out of work.

Lego Mom was kind enough to step in and do some crazy creating with Lego Kid.  She certainly has a different view of things so her creations are a little more refined than what Lego Dad and Lego Kid come up with.

 

Here we have a Lego Queen in her throne room with quite a royal scepter.  Next to here is a royal chest with large jewels on top.

 

 

 

 

Here is the newest version of the samurai ninja pirate alien sharkman fort.  We now have a new roof with the skull on it. there is also a little side area that makes a good spot to dock your boat. Lego Mom did a great job helping to remodel this fort.

 

Fortunately, Lego Dad did not have to work this weekend and I was back on the floor clicking bricks together with Lego Kid.  Here are a few of the minifigures we came up with today.

Today Lego Kid was in a sorcerer magician kind of mood. We have the Lego Kids samurai ninja sorcerer on the left with the hood. He rides on his alligator and is friends with the skeleton and his skeleton horse. On the right my sorcerer is Marcus the magical.  He is part Viking part Roman chariot driver and part sorcerer. He rides on a futuristic chariot with his driver Ricky.

The sorcerers battled the evil plant people.  The plant people are out to take over the world and want to turn everyone into trees.  You can see here that Lego Kid’s alligator is jumping right into battle to beat the evil plant people and make the world safe for everyone.

Lego goes 3D with in store displays

Ok, Lego has had pre built sets as displays  in stores for a long  time.  The problem is these sets take up space and are often stolen.  After a trial phase in The Lego Group has decided to roll out the Digital Box

The Digital Box is a display that creates a 3D image of a Lego set based on the picture on the front of the box. The displays are even animated.  How cool is that.  You can see how your set will look in 3D before you build it.

Check out the video of this cool new 3d display in action.

Lego Universe – When will it arrive

  We signed The Lego Kid up  for the Beta of Lego Universe.  If you aren’t familiar with Lego Universe, it is a online multi player game that let’s you play in a virtual Lego world.  We were not selected for the Beta yet and I don’t know if we will be.

The Lego Universe site seems to have some minigames  and activities that appear to be leading up to the launch of the game. With each mission (mini game) you complete, you send more minifigures into Lego Universe.  There is also some sort of countdown which seems to indicate that the launch will be within a few months. 

If you haven’t checked it out already head over to the Lego official site to have a look.

Lego Technology

This weekend Lego Dad and Lego kid were doing what we do best. Creating some crazy Lego stuff.  All of a sudden Lego Kid says, “hey dad, my guy has an iPad”.  Huh?  Sure enough that small square smooth flat piece in the hand of a Lego minifigure looks like an iPad.

We took the idea a little further and created several pieces of Lego Tech. This guy has a fancy Lego I-mac.  This is one of the easiest pieces of Lego Tech to make but it looks pretty convincing.

                                                                              
                               

Next up we have a Storm trooper working hard on his Lego PC.  It’s not as sleek as the I-mac but then again neither are real PCs.

           


                                 
Finally, we went for an iPhone.  We didn’t have the smooth piece in black that we needed but this is close.  We’ll work on that for next time.

The Lego Kid’s creations

One of the great things about playing with Lego’s is that you can let  your imagination run wild.  The Lego Kid does this all the time.  Only a 7 year old could create a world where Pirates and Spacemen live together.

Check out the fort Lego Kid created out of a piece of a Pirate set and the laser cannon from a Star wars set. The spaceman is one of the Kranxx from the Space Police sets.  The hero is a mix of Indiana Jones legs, a Death Star commander body, Darth Maul’s hood, and he has a Ninja Sword. How cool is this guy.

The other Lego Kid creation we are featuring today is the robot dogs. There are two versions, one is made with some common bricks and the other is made out of a Star Wars Battle Droid body. They both feature tails made out of the lever control that comes with many of the sets.  Pretty creative use of very small pieces to make a Lego Pet.

Lego Harry Potter – The Video Game

Warner Brothers Interactive has announced the release date for the newest Lego themed video game.  Lego Harry Potter Years 1-4 will be available this June. 

I know The Lego Kid can hardly wait.  I can’t hardly wait too.  I have to admit, one of the things I love doing best is playing Lego Star Wars with The Lego Kid.  Lego harry Potter looks like it will be just as cool.

We love the Harry Potter Movies and we love Lego’s so this game seems like a real winner. According to the Official Site, you can explore Harry Potters world as many of the characters from the movies.  You can attend lessons, mix potions, fly around on a broom, even play with a friend in Co-Op mode.

While we’re waiting for the release there is  plenty of cool stuff on the Lego Harry Potter site to entertain you.  There are some video’s, a few screenshots, desktop wallpapers, even cool email signatures like this one. 

 

Check out the official Lego Harry Potter video game site for all the details. And make sure you watch the video, there is a password at the end to get you into the VIP section. 

Lego Sculptures of endangered animals

I have seen some cool Lego creations in my time.  I think these take the prize.  These Lego sculptures of endangered animals are on display at The Philadelphia Zoo.

 

Artist Sean Kenney created these sculptures for the exhibit called “Creatures of Habitat: A Gazillion-Piece Animal  Adventure”. The project took more than a year to complete. One sculpture alone used  95,00 Lego’s.  Ok fellow Lego Dad’s, can you imagine what a minefield of Lego’s that would be in the middle of the night, (ouch)

For more information on the exhibit visit the Philadelphia Zoo’s official site.

 View the entire photo gallery here

Lego Design by me

  We all know that the fun part of building with Lego’s is taking a big bin of the bricks, dumping them into a pile, and diving in and making something new. The is just something special  about the sound of digging through the bricks and the click of putting them together.

There are a few problems that come up of course.  First you don’t have a design.  That’s not a bad thing but you may have to take apart and rebuild to get it right. If only you could try your ideas before assembling the bricks.  Well, now you can.

Lego has launched a product that takes the design process and puts it on your computer.  The Lego Digital Designer lets you virtually build a new Lego creations.

The coolest part is you can upload your design and have a customized set with all the parts delivered to your house. You can even get an optional building guide just like the real sets.