The Yellow Man turns 30 today!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY LEGO MiniMan! To celebrate the big 3-0 LEGO Group has created a celebration video representing the many accomplishments and adventures this wee-little man has embarked upon…check it out, let your imagination run free, and try to remember all of the adventures the LEGO MiniMan helped you experience! Go MiniMan Go!!!


You can even download it in 3D!!!

Unexpected LEGO Home Décor!

OK, so for those of us that LOVE the Brick and the amazing creations we build, but are finding it tough to display these primary colored WORKS OF ART against our specially picked and painted Sycamore Green family room walls, ApartmentTherapy.com blogger, Aaron, has uncovered the coolest creation that I could easily incorporate into my home!

This cool, yet unexpected planter is definitely my next project…Now I just have to find myself a cute plant and some white spray paint!

Check out how Bob, from the Bob Blog actually created it! http://the-bob-blog.blogspot.com/2008/03/lego-planter_25.html

It is Official...UPDATE

I am a blog party addict! The Bloggy Giveaways Quarterly Giveaway Carnival is finally here, and I am excited! Give away#612 is a LEGO Pink Brick Box! Now this is freebee madness!

For all of you LEGO fans who didn’t get a chance to enter the Ultimate Blog Party giveaway, now is your chance to win a LEGO Creative Building Pink Brick Box!

Playlibrary.com

If I Were...

No one knows creativity better than kids... but sometimes little ones need to be allowed the right environment to fully express their creativity. Mary and Heather, founders MomsTown.com, have some great tips on enhancing creativity and imagination.

My personal favorite is #4... "If I Were..." Here's how you play:
Heather and Mary suggest playing this game in the car, but anyplace will do. Say to your kids, “If I were_____” Have them fill in the blank and then create a story. For example, “If I were an astronaut I would….” Mom and Dad can play along to!

Here is my LEGO version:
"If I were a LEGO minifigure..."
If I were a LEGO minifigure, I would live in a bucket with all of my LEGO brick friends! I would be able to meet other LEGO minifigures, who would be just my size. I would get to meet astronauts and aliens, police and firemen, trolls, dwarves, and knights, and even racecar drivers! I could even meet Indiana Jones! I would build a fortress as big or as small as I please, and share it with all of my LEGO minifigure friends.

Give it a try, or get 9 more creative ideas here.

Day 4 of the Ultimate Blog Party - Amazing LEGO Models to Help Spark Your Creativity

Hey Ultimate Blog Partiers!

Today I thought I would share with you one of my favorite collections of LEGO Creations…hopefully this video of amazing LEGO models will give you a taste of my world and why adults and kids alike continue to build for hours and hours. This video really proves that you can make ANYTHING out of LEGO bricks.

GOSH…if I could just figure out how to build a LEGO car like the one featured in this video…sure would save me a lot in car payments!

Happy Blogging!

HAPPY BLOGGING...and BUILDING!

As many of you know, I am participating in the Ultimate Blog Party, hosted by 5 Minutes for Mom! I am having an absolute ball meeting fellow lady bloggers and checking out their blogs. My blogging mission today was to showcase awesome LEGO models created by families that I could share to inspire creativity in the homes of my fellow party bloggers. I visited the LEGO Club page today and saw an outstanding LEGO lamp that was built by an 11-year-old child and his dad…and it actually works! The lamp currently holds the title of Designers Choice! Check out other amazing LEGO creations at the Club site and maybe tonight you and your family (no matter how old your kids are) can brighten up your family room by pulling out your bucket of bricks and BUILDING!

Party Time! LET'S GET CREATIVE!

Welcome Ultimate Blog Partiers! Thanks for stopping by! I’d like to first introduce myself… I am Homebody, resident Mom Blogger, and I am thrilled to be partying down with fellow moms this week. I write mostly about incorporating CREATIVITY into your everyday family life and I love discovering different ways families play with the brick!

Whether it is journal writing, after-school painting classes or playing on a basketball team, creative activities for children help to challenge their brains and broaden their horizons. Creativity is the critical heartbeat of today’s most successful businesses and is a critical skill in preparing the next generation workforce.

To get you started, I have created a small party favor for you as a token of my appreciation for party hopping to my pad! It is entitled “LEGO Family Building Night Activities Booklet”. I hope you enjoy it! Be sure to stop by later this week for another fun favor!

Also, in case you haven’t reviewed the entire list of Ultimate Blog Party gifts/give-aways, LEGO has donated 7 of its newest Pink Brick Boxes (in honor of the 7 day long party!) They are adorable! (Click here to learn how to become eligible.)

Kindly sponsored by the folks at LEGO, the LEGOstories blog acts as a resource for tracking fun stories about the LEGO brand for all of us LEGO parents, teachers and/or fans, and provides inspiration, tips, links, etc for exploring CREATIVITY and LEGO building. Please feel free to mingle and read my past blog posts, meet my friends, and visit us often to stay abreast about why CREATIVITY matters.

Be sure to check out my last post and learn about the LEGO Creativity Awards, where 5 kids will win $5000 each to pursue their creative passions.


Happy partying... and please feel free to leave a comment!

Share Your Child's Creativity

LEGO just announced the 2nd Annual LEGO Creativity Awards essay contest…like Babble.com’s Droolicious Blogger reports, “New guitar or drum kit? Canvases and paints? Rack server for the home? Personal project (RED)? No matter what dream you're hoping to finance, grab an entry form at LEGO's Creation Nation website and share your kids' creativity with the planet (last day for entries: May 23).”

AND THE WINNER IS….

LEGO CITY wins the Best Activity Toy of the Year at the TOTY’s (Toy of the Year Awards)!!! Chris Byrne, aka the Toy Guy, included an entire list of TOTY winners on his site! CHECK IT OUT HERE!

WOOHOO!!!

All the King's horses and all the Kings men...

All the King's horses and all the Kings men come to life in LEGO form in this impressive LEGO Chess Set. Dave from brickplayer.com has created a complete chess set from LEGO bricks - and, he has included step by step instructions on how to build the entire set. A great family activity that brings a whole new meaning to build and play fun!

There's No Place Like Home

While reading the paper this morning, I came across an article entitled "Customize your Valentine's Day gifts" by Mike Antonucci, which suggested the most adorable gift idea:

Construct a Lego kit of the dream home you and your sweetheart envision.

Lego offers the option of downloading design software at www.legofactory.com, using it to build the virtual version of an original Lego model and ordering the pieces to turn the design into reality.

Or, if you are lucky enough to already live in your dream home, you can create a replica on Lego Factory, and get all of the pieces and building instructions, so the whole family can build a LEGO model of your home together!

Family Fun Night Activity

Have you ever felt compelled to share the fun fact on the bottom of the Snapple bottle cap, or tried to figure out the answer to the question on your popsicle stick before it melted away? Now you and your kids can test each other on your LEGO knowledge. In honor of the 50th birthday of the LEGO brick, Monday, bloggers all over the internet posted fun LEGO facts to their sites.

Jot down of some of the fun facts Gizmodo posted and you’re on your way to an exciting Family Trivia Night:

- 40 billion LEGO bricks stacked on top of one another would connect the earth with the moon.
- The LEGO bricks sold in one year would circle the world five times.
- There are more than 915 million combinations possible for six 2x4 LEGO bricks.
- LEGO bricks are available in 53 different colors.

"Cool" LEGO Creation For Your Home!

Friend to LEGO, Nathan Sawaya, built an actual working LEGO air conditioner…seriously! Man, I wish I knew how to build one of these when I was living in San Diego. I could have saved A LOT on my energy bills! Check out the post here!

One yummy follow up to the LEGO Cake mold post coming up…

TODAY, Gizmodo's, Jesus Diaz, posted an alternative way to create the ultimate LEGO birthday cake! The secret to the interlocking block look…Marshmallows! Check out Jesus Diaz’s post here. Be sure to click through to the Betty Crocker recipe! I may try and attempt this nostalgic baking project tonight!

Attention all home garage inventors and LEGO Fans!

Makers: All Kinds of People Making Amazing Things in Garages, Basements and Backyards was recently released and according to GeekDad, the LEGO Rubik’s Cube Solver made it into the book! I wonder if my LEGO robot could make the cut for the next book!?!

Can you ever really have TOO many LEGO bricks?

Oh goodness…If you come into my home you may be able to check off MOST of the signs BBSpot.com listed as the “Top Eleven Signs You Have Too Many LEGO Bricks”

Signs You Have Too Many LEGO Bricks
11. The spreadsheet you keep track of your LEGO sets on just ran out of rows.
10. You evict your kid from their room so you have somewhere to place your LEGO model of Manhattan.
9. You seriously considered doing the addition to your home in LEGO bricks.
8. You search the Internet hoping to find the "Nutrition Facts" for LEGO bricks.
7. There's a statue of you in every village in Denmark.
6. You know someone got up to use the bathroom in the middle of the night because you can hear their yelps of pain as they step on LEGO bricks you left lying around.
5. Three of your nephews went into the "LEGO room" two weeks ago, and haven't returned. You have to rent a backhoe to unearth them.
4. "LEGO sets" is the largest item in the family budget.
3. Your house is targeted by DHS for having Weapons of Mass Construction.
2. It's not uncommon to bite into a piece of homemade pie and find a LEGO brick that accidentally fell in the filling.
1. Your house burns down and all that's left is a molten lake of plastic.

LEGO Video of my “High School Musical” …. “Grease!!!”

All of the hype around High School Musical 2 has reminded me of my favorite “high school musical” Grease! Check out this awesome stop animation video of Summer Nights!

What's Your Favorite Thing?

I recently came across an awesome article in Newsday Magazine, about a girl that LOVES rubber ducks…"The 13-year-old from Holbrook has a collection of 271 rubber ducks in her room, more than enough to make Ernie from "Sesame Street" jealous.” She even has a LEGO Duck that she built herself!!! As I was reading this article, I was thinking to myself, I bet my family could beat that with all of our LEGO paraphernalia…and then at the bottom of the article they ask us to tell them about our favorite thing in our homes! If you think you can beat the rubber ducks story with your LEGO collection Valerie Kellogg from Newsday wants to hear about it! Check out the article and the “My Favorite Thing” story info here!

Build-Off Update

A quick follow up to last week’s post on the LEGO build off put together to raise funds for the Muscular Dystrophy Association in honor of 14-year old Morgan Hall:

In only its second year, the build-off doubled its participation level and quadrupled its raised funds for a whopping $5,000 this year! Nice job Mandy! Watch the WDBJ 7 video clip to check out some of the awesome creations participants built! (Video link is in the left hand corner).

Calling all parents, kids and builders of all ages…

Eighteen year-old, Mandy Matherly, is putting on the second annual LEGO Build-Off Fundraiser at the Institute of Advanced Learning and Research in Danville, Virginia on Saturday, August 4th! She is putting this on to raise money for the Muscular Dystrophy Association in honor of her 14-year-old friend, Morgan Hall, who suffers from the most acute form of muscular dystrophy.

If you are looking for something worthwhile and meaningful to do with your kids this summer find out how to get involved in the build-off here!