Category: LEGO

Have you ever loved parts of a LEGO set but wished they were just a little bit…more? It happens! When we get that feeling, we think about whether or not we can use the set as a base for a MOC! Most recently, we did this with the LEGO City Police Monster Truck Heist (60245) and Donut Shop Opening (60233) sets.

Here’s what happened with Police Monster Truck Heist: we loved the bank facade but didn’t really care about the vehicles. We also wanted a bank building and not just a facade.

To begin, we built the set and pulled a couple of other bank-type pieces we had laying around. It’s a super cute little set. We also had an ATM that Don Manuel had built and another little bank-type atrium.

Next, we started laying out our ideas for a bank. We imagined Scrooge McDuck owned the bank, so we wanted a vault so that he could dive into his money like he does in the cartoon.

Then, we added lots of green and gold!

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Then, we completed the MOC, and since then, we have added goblins from Harry Potter’s Gringott’s bank to work in the bank, robbers planning a heist out back, and Iron Man sunbathing on the roof waiting to go to work. You’ll have to stay tuned to our YouTube to see those reveals though!

For Donut Shop Opening, Don Manuel and I have different approaches to MOC-ing sets. I like to build the set first and then modify it. He likes to start right off MOC-ing. So, I worked on the donut shop, and he worked on the toy store. Then, we put them together!

First, we needed to figure out what they would might look like together. We knew we wanted to keep them to one 32×32 baseplate. With some imagining and giggling, this is what we decided on. If you look closely, you can see that Don Manuel claimed all the extra space for the toy store! 🙂

Let’s start with the donut shop (because donuts are awesome!). I expanded and enclosed the building and added tables and chairs and patrons.

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Don Manuel expanded the toy store, added lots of displays, and then added a second floor with apartments!

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This is our finished product!

We love it! And the citizens of Moorogel love it! It will be featured on a future episode on our YouTube channel if you’re interested in more details and where it has landed in Moorogel 2.0!

So, if you are thinking about trying a MOC using a LEGO set as a base…do it! It’s LEGO, you can always take it apart and try again if you don’t love your first attempt!

When the LEGO Creator Gingerbread House came out last year, and we watched several online reviews of it, it didn’t look like a set we were interested in. We had the Winter Firehouse but decided not to get the Gingerbread House since our Lego city, Moorogel, didn’t really have a winter area. Fast forward to now and our upgraded and larger version of Moorogel, and we have a whole winter village happening! So…we decided to get the Gingerbread House to add another building to the winter village since it’s a little light on larger buildings at the moment (ok…the truth is…I might have ordered the Gingerbread House without telling Don Manuel, but…) Well! Am I ever happy we got it, because, in person, it’s an absolutely fantastic set!

To get started, there are 5 sets of bags, 2 instruction books, and 1 sticker sheet. The first set of bags and the first instruction book build all of the little accessories like the gingerbread people, baby carriage, snowblower, and Christmas tree and presents. I was absolutely smitten with these!

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It was at this time that my build session was abruptly attacked by a feline who wanted to play too. It was cute…for a minute…until he decided whacking Lego pieces onto the floor was more fun. He had to go.

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Once the rogue cat was removed, the gingerbread house build got underway. When I say that the build techniques on this set are super creative, fun, and awesome…I mean it!

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I was making good progress when I got interrupted by cute grandsons photos, so I had to pause to “awwwwww”

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Ok…back to work on the build! I’m having so much fun with it, I forget to take photos after each bag set. Also, in fairness, I’ve been interrupted several times at this point!

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After this last step is when all hell breaks loose! I have lost track of time, and it is almost midnight on a work night, but I want to finish the build. Don Manuel is happily playing COD when I hear him freak out! Not in the “someone killed me” kind of way but in the “HELP” kind of way! A HUGE wolf spider was trotting across the living room floor…possibly to steal the tv…because this chica was ginormous. Well, when Don Manuel put a glass over it to trap it to get it outside, because it was wayyyy too big to squish, it spontaneously gave birth to approximately elevendybagillion itty bitty baby spiders. They scooted right out under that glass like it wasn’t there. By the time I got there from the other side of the living room, armageddon was underway! Look at this momma!

Woooooo! After getting the spider outside and the living room completely disinfected trying to get rid of our case of the heebie jeebies, I finished the build. AND I LOVE IT!

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I can’t wait to get this incorporated into Moorogel’s new winter village! Keep an eye on our YouTube channel for an upcoming tour!

We were excited to get the LEGO Ideas The Flintstones set (21316)! We had been looking forward to seeing it IRL ever since we saw the mockups of it at Philly Brick Fest 2019! At Brick Fest, we got to sit in the authentic movie Flintstone Mobile…total #nerdgasm

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But, I digress! The Flintstones set is awesome! I think all the Ideas sets turn out to be fan favorites. This set has 748 pieces: 6 bags, 1 instruction book, and NO STICKERS! All the cool pieces are printed!

I want to highlight just how innovative the build techniques for this set are! The house has two swing out attachments on the back to expand the living area. It is not fully enclosed when closed, which is a little disappointing as we tend to like complete buildings.

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We have added the completed set to our Lego City, Moorogel. Somehow, it just weirdly seems to fit right in! It also inspired us. We are going to MOC up a bowling alley for Fred and Barney to work in since there’s no quarry in Moorogel.

Our recommendation? Pick up this set as soon as you can! You can get yours here

Note: As Amazon Affiliates, we may occasionally receive teeny tiny monetary compensation for purchases based on our recommendations.

Were we planning on getting the LEGO Ideas Dinosaur Fossils set (21320)? No. Did we get the LEGO Ideas Dinosaur Fossils set? Yes. Yes we did. Why did we get a set we weren’t intending to purchase? Well, because somewhere in there we decided our Lego city, Moorogel, needed a museum, and Erusa Ert was born! And, it needed dinosaur fossils, obvi.

6 bags, stickers, 3 instruction books for the 3 different dinos, and 910 pieces. Let us just say, these were quick builds. However, the piece usage was incredibly creative and the building techniques were super cool!

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Our resident master bearded builder had fun with this!

All-in-all, we’re rather happy we picked up this set!

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We have since installed the dinos in Erusa Ert, and they look fantastic! We’ll be uploading videos to our YouTube channel and Facebook in August, so stay tuned to see the completed museum. We did notice that we seem to have one issue with waking up to find drunk skeletons passed out on the floor of the museum. We’re not sure what’s going on, but we intend to find out! 🙂

We were FINALLY able to get our hands on the LEGO Friends The Television Series Set (21319)! It has 1070 pieces and includes stickers.

This was a fun build with interesting building techniques. We tend to LOVE the LEGO Ideas sets as they are created by fans like us and are often just super cool! With this build, we had some extra help too…the supervisor was really critical.

There were 6 bags to build with instructions.

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We found the sideways builds for the throw rugs to be especially awesome!

We’re currently thinking about how to incorporate this into our LEGO city, Moorogel. We are considering doing a MOC with the Big Bang Theory set and turning it into a first floor shop with apartments above. We’ll see!

We recommend this set! Give it a try…if you can get your hands on one!

Woo Hoo! We got the Lunar Lander set! Now…one half of us was not really interested in this set, but the beginning of Moorogel Erusa Ert construction created a need for this set to be included (yayyyyy!!!! for the half of us who really wanted this set!)! What’s Erusa Ert? Keep watching this blog and our socials to find out!

Ok…let’s begin! This is a Lego exclusive, so you’ll need to get it from your local Lego Store on online at lego.com. It has 1087 pieces, 1 instruction book, 3 piles of bricks, and (sadly) stickers.

Despite the small number of pieces, this build actually took a bit of time because it’s intricate. It’s really fun though with some great techniques…a few that I’d never seen before. Let’s build!

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And just like that…we’re done!

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We really recommend picking up this set while it’s available! The gold pieces are spectacular, and the little astronauts are amazing. This set will go in Moorogel Erusa Ert!

Y’all. This LEGO set was MADE FOR MEEEEE!!! I love books. Love them!!! I had been wanting this set since it came out, but limited time exclusive sets kept taking our Lego dollars. Well, one cancelled vacation due to COVID-19, and we have the bookshop! We loved this build. Loved it! It has really cool building techniques, and we loved the color scheme.

First off, it’s an Expert level set with 2,504 pieces, 8 piles of bags and a few extra base plates, 2 instruction booklets, and NO stickers! It builds as two modulars: the bookshop and the townhouse. This set is also a Lego Store exclusive, so you’ll have to get it there or online at lego.com.

Let’s get started. We love the floor pattern and the bookshelves. We kinda think there should be more shelves and more books in a bookshop.

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We LOVE the circular stair technique, and we’ll definitely be stealing it to use in some of our MOCs. Here is the second floor. Don’t miss that grandfather clock!

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Moving on the the 3rd floor. It’s a small bedroom. There’s an especially great teal iguana that we might be replacing with a froggy or something so that the iguana can go live on the Moorogel Rescue Island 🙂 And, there you have it…the bookshop!

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The second phase of this build is the townhouse. I wanted to love the bookshop best, but the townhouse is really fantastic! First up, the basement and first floor:

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Then, the second floor, balcony, and roof!

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And we’re done!

Finishing this build and trying to incorporate it into Moorogel caused a bit of reconfiguring, but we love the result. It’s one of the best things about LEGO…you get to continually recreate and imagine!

The LEGO 40th Anniversary Train set was a free gift with a purchase over $99. We have 3. Seriously. The COVID-19 social distancing/self-quarantining caused us to spend our cancelled vacation dollars on LEGO sets to build while we’re at home for the foreseeable future.

Anyway, cancelled Bali vacation aside, this was a cute, fun build! One instruction book, a few stickers (which is disappointing…we were hoping everything was printed), and a few bags. We’re still building in a temporary spot due to the most epic LEGO knolling happening in our regular spot.

This was a quick build as there are only 188 pieces, but there were some interesting techniques which we enjoyed.

So far, cute! Right?

Here’s the finished build!

Wondering where it ended up in Moorogel? In the park! For kids to play on!

What are we doing with the other 2 trains that we got? Glad you asked! One will stay in the box on a shelf 🙂 The other is going in Moorogel Erusa Ert…a big, exciting new project for the citizens of our Lego city! Stay tuned to find out what Erusa Ert is, and watch its progress here on the blog!

Now, we know not everyone loves the LEGO Friends set, but we do! The colors of the bricks are really great. We don’t use the Friends minifigs, but other than that we love the sets. We’ve been picking up the Rescue sets and making an island in Moorogel. It’s really starting to look amazing. This week, we grabbed the LEGO Friends Rescue Lighthouse Center.

We had to build in a temporary location, because our normal build table is covered in the mother load of internet LEGO scores. We’ve been washing an knolling LEGO all week! But, I digress…

Let’s get started. This set has 602 pieces, two instruction books, and five bags of LEGO.

Book 1 is smaller and includes the builds for the little “one off” pieces. The seals in this set are freaking adorable! We are especially in love with the LEGO coral. We’ve never seen it before, and are obsessed and want LOTS more.

The second book has all of the steps for the rescue lighthouse. It was a really fun build with several interesting techniques and lots of cool details.

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Overall, we are really happy with this new addition to Moorogel, and we’re looking forward to picking up a couple more of the Rescue sets to fill in the island.

Want to get one for yourself? You can get it on Amazon!