Organizing

I was going to build my townhouse set for a January post, but I just haven't had the time. Most of my spare time has been used sorting this:

That is a giant bag of LEGO that my parents found in a thrift store and gave to me for Christmas. It weighed almost 29 pounds! I had the last 3 days off of work because of snow, so I finally got things sorted and put away. Now I just have to get all the containers to fit in my LEGO area:

This photo doesn't even include my baseplates, minifigures, 2 more drawer units, or all the display items in the upper cabinet.

There was a bunch of minifigures from SpongeBob, Harry Potter, Hobbit/Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, and other themes in the bag:

I just started to look them up on bricklink.com's catalog so I can figure out which sets were mixed up in the bag. Many of the minifigures are missing heads, hands, or other pieces, so I need to buy replacement parts. Based on which sets I believe this person had, there are also minifigures that didn't make it into the bag.

Sorting the bag and seeing all the new stuff I have for my collection has been fun. I'll put the sets together once I figure out which ones I have (assuming that I'll have all the pieces).

Christmas Train Ride & Christmas Town Square

I've been super busy this month, so the post is a little late. Today, I'll be writing about the two small Christmas sets: Christmas Train Ride (40262) and Christmas Town Square (40263). They were $9.99 each. The train set comes with 169 pieces and the town square has 179. Both of the sets took about 40 minutes to build. Let's start with the train:

This set has 3 minifigures:

The mini builds that make up the set are a coffee stand, a ticket booth, the train, a picnic table, a lamppost with a bench, and a tree with a little snowy area:

These are the pieces I had leftover:

Let's put it all together:

The train is fun and a great addition to any Christmas scene. It could also be used in a park, zoo, mall, or any other place you might find a little train ride. The lamppost is nice, I like that it has a town map feature. I like the coffee and ticket stands, I just wish that they were a little bigger because a minifigure can't fit in them. Overall, it's a good set for the money, especially since it comes with 3 minifigures.

Now, we'll look at the town square:

This set also comes with 3 minifigures:

The mini builds in this set include a snowman, a lamppost with mailbox, a sled with presents, a food stand, and a tree surrounded by fencing:

Here are the leftover pieces:

And here is everything put together:

Another great seasonal set. The tree is my favorite part of this one. The way it is built is interesting and the fancy fence is very nice looking. The little wreaths on the fence are another great touch. Like the map hanging on the lamppost in the last set, this lamppost has a little letter sign to let people know there's a mailbox there. The snowman is adorable. Once again, I like the food stand, I just wish it was big enough for a minifigure to stand in.

Now for one last photo. I decided to put both of the sets together and have train ride in town square:

Thanks for reading! It was a lot of fun building these little holiday sets. For January, I will probably be posting about the Park Street Townhouse.

Thanksgiving Harvest

Today's post is about the Thanksgiving Harvest set (40261). It was $9.99 and has 133 pieces. I ordered it a little too late and just got it Friday or I would have posted this before Thanksgiving. It took me 35 minutes to put this set together and take photos. First, let's look at the box. Just like the Halloween set, there is a little comic on the back:

The pieces are divided between one large bag and two smaller ones:

Two minifigures, a farmer and a little girl, are included:

Now that the minifigures are built, we can move on to the rest of the set. There are 6 minibuilds that make up this set. A crow, a basket of fruits and vegetables, a turkey, a garden with scarecrow, a wagon, and a tree:

Here are the leftover pieces:

Now let's see everything together:

I really love these little seasonal sets. They are fun to put together and they usually have a unique piece or two that I didn't have before. I'm pretty sure the little girl's face is different than any of my other figures. The wagon is a very nice build. The colors look great and I can see myself using this for future projects. The turkey and crow are cute additions, as is the scarecrow with the garden plot. The colors of the tree definitely give the set an Autumn feeling.

The back of the instruction booklet for this set has a picture advertising the two little Christmas sets:

I ordered both of those when I bought this one, so I will be putting them together this week and using them for my December post next weekend. Thanks for reading!