Seasonal

Seasonal: Easter Bunny & Friends Flower

Saturday, 10th March 2018 By Caz

I spent enough in the LEGO store in Gateshead the other day to earn two gifts with purchase. The first was the Easter Bunny Minifig and display box. I have to confess, I’m no fan of these fancy boxes, and I probably won’t be keeping it. Horror! you man say. Whatever.

The Bunny minifig itself is quite cute, with big pink ears, a smart bowtie and waistcoat, and apparently a new print on the egg.

I was expecting the bunny but I wasn’t expecting to also get this Friends flower polybag (30404).

It was another fun little build and will go well with my other gift with purchase flowers.

Seasonal: Flower Display (40187)

Wednesday, 7th February 2018 By Caz

I got this little Flower Display (40187) from Bluewater on Saturday and thought it would make a nice set to display for a while. I’m not sure if it will remain built in the longer term, but it gives the LEGO shelves a bit of colour. It was a nice quick build. I particularly like the shape the tulip has ended up. Given enough slopes of the right colour, you could make a whole bunch!

Haul #8: Shepherd’s Bush PAB & Extras

Tuesday, 9th January 2018 By Caz

Wow, I had a very productive trip to the London AFOLs meetup yesterday! I came home with a huge haul. Before the meeting I went to the LEGO store at Westfield Shepherd’s Bush for the first time, and filled up at the PAB wall.

At the actual meeting I was able to collect a couple of old Star Wars sets I bought off a friend, swap my spare copy of Christmas Build Up 2017 for the 206 version, buy some CMFs I was missing and get three bags of exciting bits from a Bricklink Store owner who is closing down.

Starting off with the free brick box, which I got with purchases made on Boxing Day from S@H, it’s almost a cube, but basically I was able to fill it with whatever I liked for nothing! Sadly, not reusable though.

It was a slightly awkward shape, but I stuffed it as full as I could.

A very decent set of contents – mainly 1×2 and 1×1 bricks in bright colours. I can see some Micropolis builds being very colourful in the near future!

Next up is the small PAB cup…

PAB Shepherd's Bush Jan '18_small — PAB Shepherd’s Bush Jan ’18_small

I have a project designed in LDD that I’m slowly gathering the parts for – and I needed a load of 2×2 round plates in blue, so I was delighted to find a stack of them in Shepherd’s Bush. I grabbed a load of 1×2 black bricks with the grill pattern as well as some miscellaneous plates and tiles.

PAB Shepherd's Bush Small Pot Contents Jan '18 — PAB Shepherd’s Bush Small Pot Contents Jan ’18

And now for the biggie – the lid was barely shut!

PAB Shepherd's Bush Large Pot Jan '18 — PAB Shepherd’s Bush Large Pot Jan ’18

LOTS more of those black 1×2 textured bricks, some rories and 2×6 bricks for Micropolis bases and – randomly – a steering wheel from somewhere! I don’t remember picking that up… Do you like my inserts for the cup lid studs? They jam in perfectly and will give me another twelve 1×2 and eight 1×1 bricks in each.

PAB Shepherd's Bush Large Pot Contents Jan '18 — PAB Shepherd’s Bush Large Pot Contents Jan ’18

Perhaps the most pleasing haul of the evening was this little lot – a guy had turned up at the meeting with a holdall full of loose bricks in ziplock bags. We were encouraged to have a rummage as he “wanted to get rid of all of it”. Apparently he had a Bricklink store which he wanted to close and this was a way of offloading the remaining stock.

Well rummage I did, and came up with these three tasty bags. The first one had loads of smaller elements in it which will be perfect for Micropolis. The largest bag had a large number of 2×2 trans yellow bricks which caught my eye. And the smallest bag was stuffed with round 1×1 and 2×2 tiles in a variety of colours. The price? Six quid for the lot! I think I have done rather well there…

Bricklink Store "Closing Down Sale"! — Bricklink Store “Closing Down Sale”!

Seasonal: Nutcracker (40254)

Wednesday, 20th December 2017 By Caz

One of the freebies I got yesterday in my Leicester Square haul was this festive Nutcracker (40254).

It was an enjoyable build with some useful little parts included. I’m not sure how long I will keep it built but for the moment it looks good standing guard in my LEGO room.

Haul #4: Leicester Square December 17

Tuesday, 19th December 2017 By Caz

I was in Central London today for an evening event with some friends from work, and took the opportunity to visit the flagship LEGO store in Leicester Square for the first time. I know it’s been open for a while, but I haven’t been there before as I usually avoid the most touristy parts of the capital, and I’ve only been out of my Dark Ages since last month. Here’s my haul:

Leicester Square Haul Dec '17 — Leicester Square Haul Dec ’17

I treated myself to the Architecture London Skyline (21034) set, the exclusive bowler-hatted Lester Minifig Polybag (40308) and a large and small Pick-A-Brick cup, which took my purchases over the threshold for two freebie sets – the festive Nutcracker (40254) and a second copy of the 24-in-1 Christmas Build Up 2017 (40253). I’m happy to get another one as one of my AFOL friends has a 2016 equivalent which they are happy to swap for my 2017 extra.

I found some useful bits in the Wall, but probably could have crammed my cups with more if I had had the time and patience – visiting the store in the last shopping week before Christmas was bedlam and I wouldn’t recommend it. I was minding my own business filling one cup when someone almost pinched the other one which i had already filled! Savages…

PAB Leicester Square Pots Dec '17 — PAB Leicester Square Pots Dec ’17

Here is the contents of the big cup – some slopes and inverted slopes, yellow 1×6 and 1×4 bricks, a load of 2×2 red bricks, plenty of 1×1 round bricks and tiles in red transparent, lots of pink 1×2 plates and a few in lime green. Plus some other bits and pieces.

PAB Leicester Square Large Cup Dec' 17 — PAB Leicester Square Large Cup Dec’ 17

The small cup contained a load of loose 1×1 trans yellow plates, some other useful 2×8 and 4×4 plates in various colours and a few more 2×2 inverted slopes in blue.

PAB Leicester Square Small Cup Dec '17 — PAB Leicester Square Small Cup Dec ’17

Pretty pleased with these, I’m not sure what I’m going to build with them yet! Watch this space.

Advent: Day 1

Friday, 1st December 2017 By Caz

I bought myself a LEGO Star Wars Advent Calendar (75184) this year – the first time I’ve had an advent calendar of any sort for ages. And I also got the neat promotional set 24-in-1 (40253) free with a reasonable purchase from the LEGO shop online a couple of weeks ago. Both sets come in colourful boxes with great images on the front, which give you a good idea of what you can expect to build.

Of course, the Advent Calendar will be unveiled one day at a time, but the 24-in-1 required me to empty the contents into a sorting tray and start rummaging! There appears to be a good selection of pieces in plenty of interesting colours and yes, another pesky orange Brick Separator! The instruction booklet is substantial with decent step-by-step guides to each model (and advice to use that brick separator at the end of each day, ready for the next one!). Parts are re-used so you won’t be able to make all 24 models at once, but that seemed fair enough.

So what were today’s builds? The Star Wars calendar instructions appear on the rear of each door as you open them. No. 1 hid a charming little Ghost ship, nice and colourful and a few decent details around the sides.

Star Wars Advent - Day 1 — Star Wars Advent – Day 1

Meanwhile we had a different sort of ship with the 24-in-1 – a Tall Ship with treasure aboard! Quite a cute model and an inventive use of the wing pieces for sails.

I had also bought myself what I thought was a nice little Christmas Tree model with a couple of minifigs and presents around it. I was quite disappointed on opening it that it just appeared to contain enough pieces to make the minifigs, presents and a “star” for the top of the “tree” – which was just a print on a cardboard box inside!

I must admit to feeling pretty cheated by this packaging:

I had genuinely assumed the tree would be in there too, and rather disappointing that it wasn’t. Do you find the first picture misleading?