Millenium Falcon

When I told Jonny that I would build him a big spaceship for Han, I didn't plan it as big as it turned out. But I built the cockpit first, thought it looked good, and then built the rest to scale. It just turned out that meant over 4.5 feet long. The really good thing is that the hallways worked out to a perfect 4-pips wide. It was a really nice scale for building the inside, and even allowed for the secret compartments that Han and company hid in.

X-Wing for the Birthday Boy

Jonny has been asking for quite a few things for his birthday this year. He seems to have some high expectations and a large list of them... One of the things that he has been consistently pleading for is some Star Wars Legos. I am reticent to get him some standard sized Legos for various reasons, including some stubbornness on my part. I asked him if he wanted to get the little Lego sets, or have Daddy make a BIG Star Wars toy. He said, "Both." That seemed a reasonable response. When pressed to choose just one, he said that Daddy could make him one.

Since I will be otherwise occupied closer to his birthday, I decided to start one today. I told him I would build a little X-Wing for Luke, and then a BIG Millenium Falcon for Han. I will probably start on the Millenium Falcon this next week. Stay tuned.

I wasn't sure exactly how the X-Wing would turn out, but I wanted to try to use the Toolos and make rotating wings. It took a long time and experimentation to figure out how. I only figured it out by chance after I had already given up and started on making a fixed-wing version. I realized that the locking mechanism of the Toolos, which has a little slack, would be perfect to allow for the needed motion.


This is the kid version, which is much more stable than the more realistic one. The wing motion is more locked down, and the front is shorter and doesn't include a cockpit. I also included a handle on the back so that the kids can hold that and fly it around. They love it.


Pictures of the more realistic version will be added soon (probably after the kids go to bed).

Star Wars AT-AT

I found out rather quickly that the scale of this model was more than the Toolo joints were made to handle. The weight constantly threatened to throw the whole thing to the ground. But, honestly, it is the Empire's fault. Center of gravity way up in the air, with long skinny legs underneath?? The empire certainly didn't invest much in university schooling for their engineers. But it does look big and bad (well, the movie models -- I don't know about mine.)

I enjoyed getting some good use out of my Toolos. The head actually moves back and forth and up and down. (Well, it mostly stays in the down position due to the weight...) I need to make a smaller, more durable design for my kids to play with since they thought it was really cool until they found out they couldn't touch it. "Wow, cool Dad!!!" -> "No! Stay back! My toys!!"


I tried to use longer legs that I thought might be more accurate to the scale. The blue color really throws it off, however. It also doesn't help that the AT-AT legs are oriented the wrong way. They are skinny in the wrong direction.

This shorter-leg version is much more stable since it has one less joint in the legs. Not exactly suitable for my kids to "walk around" with, but at least I am not afraid of breathing near it.

Geared Swings

I got some Duplo gears (Simple Machines) back in September, and forgot to upload this creation. I was trying to go for a carnival ride -- the one where the swings spin around. I also tried to use as many gears as I had. I just about did.

The kids, especially the boys, have loved these. However, their preferred mode of play is to put a gear on an axle and utilize it for sword fighting. Ahhh, the many uses of Legos.

Arch into Hallway

I had thought about making this for a little while. It will probably stay up for a little while since it doesn't really get in the way. I had some help from the kids, mostly the oldest. It was a lot of fun.

Reunion Video

This got the audio stripped off of it on YouTube, even though I only used partial clips of songs. Maybe it will work here.

Castle On A Hill

After we replaced the carpet in the back bedroom with laminate flooring, I took advantage of the cleared floor space to make a big castle on a hill. I thought about making an escape tunnel with Duplo tubes through the inside of the hill and out the bottom. With that cool of an idea, I just had to get started.

It was interesting trying to build the framework for the hill, making sure to allow for the tubes through the inside. Another design consideration was to make the hill sides very steep so that the kids could play around it easily.

In the end I ran out of Green bricks, and used some other colors on the hill. When I made the Stegosaurus later on, and ran out of green again, I bought some more bricks. I obviously needed more bricks. . . . . . . right??

Larry-Boy!!

Larry Boy was a big hit with the kids. They happily tore him down, as kids are wont to do, but it is the one sculpture they asked me to build again. In fact they asked several times over the next year.

I had to buy some white bricks off of BrickLink since I didn't have enough. Ideally the collar would have been white as well -- but I barely got the eyes made. I might have enough now to do the collar as well. I also managed to score a good load of some royal purple bricks (see the window frames on Jrrm's Hotel). The Duplo bricks in this color only come in the small 2x2 size, but I might have enough to make a decent Larry-Boy out of the proper colors.

My First Creation - Duplo Steam Engine

I am going to put all of my larger creations up here for historical and display purposes. This is my first really large scale creation. It features all of the Legos™ that I owned at that time, though a good number were simply dumped into the trailing train car as it provided a convenient container. I built this in November of 2006, and lamented that there were so few blacks in normal Duplo sets. Shortly thereafter I discovered the Duplo Castle sets and I had to buy several of those, as shown by some subsequent creations.

My littlest was just under two months old at the time.

Jrrm's Hotel

My oldest has really wanted to go to a hotel recently. He (and the other two) have always really enjoyed hotels, though their favorite hotel is the housing apartments at the Los Angeles Temple.

More recently they have become obsessed with the movie Bedtime Stories, which talks about hotels quite a bit. The hotel owner is obsessed with germs, and I think that led to the name of this hotel -- Jrrm's Hotel. It is a hotel for ogres.

I try to get them to help me plan out some creations -- here is the drawing I got for this one. Those are supposed to be clouds on the top left, which I managed to recreate.

Here are some pictures with the kids for scale: a picture of the back showing the three floors, one towards the beginning of construction, and finally a "No Vacancy" shot.

I like the sign on top, made with some Toolo pieces to get a 90 degree turn so that the letters face forward.


Here is a nice one with the lights turned on (on the inside, shining through some transparent bricks).