“Hmm! Adventure. Hmmpf! Excitement. A Jedi craves not these things.”

The world has gone nerd crazy for Star Wars once again! It's crazy to think how much of an impact the films have had on the world of movies and although thousands of people queue to be the first there at the opening night, the toy world has got fans equally as hooked.  I'm writing this post this evening because at midnight the toy stores will be able to sell the toys and merchandise from the upcoming Rogue one movie. It is important to know that I actually didn't think much of The force Awakens and I felt the same about the three movies that came before it, I am a classic Star wars fan through and through. This does not at all hinder my views on the merchandise though. Disney does an awesome job with its licensing and the companies that supply the products and they are everywhere in stores and taking over social media (we all remember the laughing wookie lady). 

For me, as you can probably guess, it's all about the LEGO! I thoroughly enjoyed my solo building session a few months back when I sat outside building the Resistance X-wing fighter. I find building so relaxing, Mrs M always jokes that it is like meditation to me, transcending to a higher state of existence. So being the selfish father that I am, I decided to yet again have a little me time. I thought about all those Star Wars fans turning up to the toy stores before midnight to get their hands on the new merchandise, and how lucky I felt to be sitting in the comfort of my own home, relaxed and slipping slowly into my brick trance.

The only minor downside to the Star wars kits personally is the mass of grey bricks used. I love colour when I am building and would love to custom build all of the cult star wars kits in bright quirky shades. Which is why I jumped at the chance to build the Christmas Deathstar when the boys came up with the idea. The AT-AT kit would definitely be on my colourful custom job list, with it being from the original movies. Being able to build the new AT-ST walker gave me a taster of that though. One thing I really love about the Star wars kits is the weapons, I'm not usually big on guns/blasters on my LEGO builds but I always find it interesting looking at the small parts the designers have used to add detail in to the weaponary.

I had only planned to build the one kit and save the other for the boys to build. I got so into the AT-ST build though, that within minutes of completing the AT-ST, the Tie Striker was being unboxed. I didn't think for one second that I would stay up to complete it but I sat up until 2am clicking those addictive bricks together. The build was great but it wasn't until I reached the wings that I was really impressed as they are so big.

2am and with two new Star wars kits built, I couldn't resist taking them out in the back garden under the stars for a few photos for twitter as I had been tweeting away as I built. All geeked out it was time for bed, only to be woken up first thing by two other LEGO enthusiasts excited by the new ships and casually dropping hints at a possible new Death star delivery from that big jolly red chap in December. The new kits have us all eager for Rogue one just as I imagine that if you watched the movie first you would be eager for the release of the LEGO kits. This relationship between Star wars and LEGO seems unstoppable and I cannot wait to see what comes out next.

You can find the full range of Star wars LEGO here.

"If you can dream it, you can do it."

I love a good family game night. When I was younger it was a game of frustration or mousetrap and although we all still love to sit and play board games of some sort we are definitely products of our era and most of our family game time is console based. The game keeping me and Opeie entertained the most recently is Disney Infinity 3.0 Play without limits. I did that stupid thing years back where I listened to what another parent told me about the earlier games and decided to give it a miss, I never usually do that and I am kicking myself now as the game is amazing.

With an ENORMOUS amount of characters to play with, levels to unlock along the way and a huge free roaming world to play in, I can't see us ever getting bored. Opeie, like many 4 year olds is a big Disney fan and the thing that is so amazing about this game is that pretty much every Disney movie you can think of has been covered character wise over the release of the Disney Infinity games, from the classics like Sorcerer Mickey and Aladdin all the way through to the new releases like Spot from The Good Dinosaur and Inside Out. As far as I am aware all of the characters from the previous Disney Infinity games work with the 3.0 edition but it is important to know that the level packs do not, as we found out recently when Opeie asked if he could get the Guardian of the galaxy pack.

Aside from all the classic characters available, for in game play, 3.0 for me screams "Come and play with me dad" being Star Wars, so me and Opeie have been having so much fun playing together. I am hoping to pick up some more of the Star Wars Characters for the game over the next few weeks and Opeie is working on a 'Good sleep Sticker chart' to hopefully get the Inside Out level pack.

Obviously with 3.0 being Star Wars themed there is plenty of brawling which is great as it is not something I would have expected for this kind of Disney game, parts of the game play remind me of the Kingdom hearts games, which I have loved since playing them many years ago first on the PS2. The game isn't all brawling though and if you are the kind of gamer that is into creating and design then you can let your creative juices run wild in the toy box and create an entire world using your imagination which you can then destroy and rebuild. there really are no limits.

fancy trying out other peoples toy boxes? then there are plenty of downloadable worlds created by people all over the world meaning there are endless ways to play.

If all of this hadn't been exciting enough, Opeie had the little girl round from next door to play last week and it turns out she has the Disney Infinity 2.0 which means we now have Elsa, Repunzel and loads of other fun characters to be playing with for the next few weeks. I would have loved this sort of game as a child myself as I was really into swapping and sharing. Disney Infinity 3.0 is a never ending fountain of fun which will be keeping us entertained as a family over the festive period and for many months to come.

UPDATE!!!

Its been a few weeks since I wrote this post but since then Opeie has been sleeping excellently so as a reward we got him the Inside out level pack which we have been playing over the last few days. The level see's Anger and Joy set out on a mission to bring peace back to imagination land. The gameplay is completely different to Twilight of the republic on this level pack which was a really nice surprise and Opeie is now eager to get hold of the three other characters from the movie (Fear, Disgust and my favourite Sadness).

"I find your lack of Christmas cheer disturbing"

It's that magical time of year again, everyone is prepping for the big day and the streets and shopping centres are bringing out the baubles and glitter. As exciting as this time of year is there is also another huge event celebrating its enormous build up. Star Wars the force awakens is soon to hit the cinemas and even though I saw the excitement and crowds building up when the last 3 movies were released I'm still surprised at just how huge Star Wars is. With the two countdowns looming over us like a fully equipped Deathstar it seemed only right for someone to somehow combine the two.

There's that old joke every year about people being bought gordy Christmas jumpers that are begrudgingly worn to make a family member happy, thanks to Numskull though you can wear your Christmas jumper with style (you just need to sway that Nan or distant Aunt in the right direction), With the release of the official Star Wars Christmas jumper range. I thought I would finally get to model something for a review for once but Opeie his eyes on it as soon as it was out of the package and  informed me that he would be modeling this Christmas AT-AT jumper because its apparently a perfect fit.

Ill be looking forward to Christmas dinner even more now dressed in the height of force fashion

Star Wars not your thing? there is an awesome Dr Who Cyberman Christmas jumper too (and its on sale). For more fun Christmas jumpers check out Yellow Bulldog.

STAR WARS - The Festive menace

There has been one LEGO kit that Seth has been pining after for quite some time.  For years it has been top of his wish list and every now and again I would find Seth Googling images of this saut after kit, hoping for it to appear in his room. It's not that I am tight, we spend a small fortune on LEGO but I couldn't warrant spending the best part of £300 despite how much we wanted it on something I was convinced we could build ourselves from the LEGO we already had.

It was something that came up in conversation every now and again but we always managed to end up building other things. It wasn't until we were leaving the Golden Brickies Lego awards earlier this year that I felt a surge of building inspiration. The boys were very kindly given the LEGO Star Wars advent calendar by a lovely lady (you know who you are) and instantly I had an idea for a review. We do like to go all out with many of our reviews and the build up to this one ended up being one of the most fun.

With so many fun Christmas themed Star Wars Minifigures and parts included in the advent calendars over the last four years, I thought it would be fun to finally recreate the kit Seth has wanted for so long, using the LEGO we had, but giving it the Gifts from the Pirates Christmas twist. You may have already guessed that the kit Seth is so desperate to own is the LEGO Death Star and this custom Christmas version was an absolute joy to build. I'm so pleased with how it came out but most importantly it has put the biggest smile on the boys faces and has been something they can't stop playing with. 

Obviously i love all LEGO but there is a lot of grey on the original build. I love colour and lots of it, So we went for Red and White candy cane colours and added in lots of green accessories, giving it a proper Christmas look. Even now we would still love to own LEGO's Death star kit (because it's a great build), but sitting down together and building our own custom version was amazing, bouncing ideas off each other and letting our creative juices flow. The boys really got in to making accessories and they came up with things I hadn't even thought of (Under estimate not the power of your child's imagination).

We spent quite sometime building the outer shell and once that was complete we sat and made a list of how we wanted to fill each room. We wanted each open space to include some sort of Christmas activity or holiday scene using the vast amount of Star Wars Minifigures on the market. So here's what we came up with room by room:

One of the first sections of the build to go in was Santa's thrown room, Which the boys soon had taken over by Vaderclaus. It was the room originally used for the emperor but as we didn't own that Minifigure and the fact I was lucky enough to end up with an extra few characters from the advent calander from a friend, it made sense for Darth (in his Christmas attire) to take charge. The boys had the real Santa cuffed and kneeling before the Sith Lord and both were adamant that the gingerbread man was his head henchman. We added piles of gifts and the dark looking C-3PO and R2D2 along with the emperors guards holding wands for effect.

While doing my usual mooching about on Bricklink I noticed a Chewbacca micro figure from the LEGO Star wars battle of Hoth game And thought how cute it would look in a bedroom scene with Han and chewy, off to bed ready for the big day. Seth added PJs to Chewbacca which I thought was cute and we added hidden compartments under the bed for blaster storage.

Because we loved the look of the original kit so much we wanted to keep certain parts of the build in our own. The compactor room didn't really fit with our Christmas aesthetic at first but Seth came up with the great idea of turning it into a dance floor, placing his Minifigures in mid dance positions (I love this). I made a disco ball to add above which moves with the compactor lever for effect but you can't have a dance floor without music. I noticed the gamer Minifigure from the latest series lying on a shelf in Seth's room and knew those headphones would look great on Han. A Dj booth was quickly built on the right hand side of the compactor and it all started to come together nicely.

On the left hand side of the compactor we used the space to build a kitchen scene. The back of the compactor doors were great for adding in pots, pans and plates and the space was perfect for building an oven for those storm troopers to get started on the turkey. The LEGO boxing gloves worked perfectly as oven mitts.

Through the archway and into the next room we decided on building a lounge scene. Christmas is great for just lounging on the sofa with your family and why shouldn't the Jedi have the same festive relaxing fun. We built some sofa's, a fireplace (with stockings) and of course a Christmas tree which we have many of throughout the build.

We wanted to recreate a couple of parts from the movies and secretly I think the boys wanted an excuse to order some of the characters from the Empire strikes back Hoth kits so (arm twisted) I ordered a Wampa and a couple of Taun-taun's. As soon as they arrived we added in the Wampa cave from the start of TESB (with Luke trapped obviously) and an upper level penn for the Taun-Taun.

My favourite part of the build was the satellite dish/lazer. We used the original design from the kit so that I knew it would be sturdy but added in candy canes for the Christmas feel. We had moved the dish from its original room to make space for Han and Chewbacca's bedroom and it looked a little sparse, so I added in a toy production line to the rear along with a couple of Santa's elves. I really wanted to use Jawas as elves but paying almost £10 a figure on brick link didn't seem at all appealing (maybe I'll add them in at a later date).

We tried to keep to the characters from the original three movies but as we didn't have the Boba Fett Minifigure, Jango made an appearance as a postal worker, collecting letters for Santa (which i thought was a really cute idea from Seth). The boys were eager to have Jabba the Hutt somewhere on the build so we gave him a room with Leia (in that gold bikini of course) chained up and playing cards. The top prize being the release of Han Solo, trapped beside them in the carbonite.

When we started the build i really wanted there to be a snowball fight going on and also an ice skating rink. I'll be honest the skating rink looked awful and despite sitting for a good 2 hours trying to get my head around it, it didn't look how i envisioned and we eventually ended up scrapping it. The snowball fight stayed though and the Storm troopers looked like they were having an awesome time.

We thought the jail area on the build was a great looking addition so we kept that in ours but changed it from black to green. We only used the original instructions for the outer shell but I'd love to see the original completed to check out all the accessories included (maybe Vaderclause will send it us for Christmas? who knows). I used to be one of those builders that wasn't all that interested in the kits but now I'm hooked because you can learn a lot from the designers at LEGO. Looking at the the kit designs has helped us view parts differently and join Parts we would have never thought of putting together.

As with pretty much everything we build especially larger buildings we always try and include our own Minifigures into the build. So for our final room we recreated our own family Christmas lunch. Were not meat eaters here but as LEGO are yet to release Quorn products i used a turkey for effect. Polly also appeared on her first LEGO build debut and because of the size of the Death star the game 'where's Polly?' is now a thing. We take it in turns to hide the cat and then our Minifigures have to go searching for her (it's a lot of fun).

Seth totally blew me away with his ideas on this family build and towards the end as we were nearing completion he really made me chuckle by saying "when we build I'm like the designer, adding in all the finishing touches." and he is so right. All the little parts that may not stand out all that much at first glance, really make the build. Intercoms, Phones, clocks, Christmas trees, they are all Seth. The postboxes and letters were his idea too. His LEGO ideas are so inspiring. We invited our friend Steve round (another LEGO geek) to have a look at this and i think he was impressed more with Seth's input and the other things Seth has built around his room (and rightly so as a LEGO loving father i couldn't be more proud of his skill).

As i said we will be using the build to review the LEGO advent calender and we've also bought last years too so that the boys have one each to add parts into the Death Star (I'm sure there are plenty of characters that want to join in the fun). Advent calenders have come a long way since i was a boy and the LEGO ones have got so much better over the years.

We had so much fun building this together. What i love about it, is that it has put a huge smile on every ones face that has seen it. It just goes to show that a little effort and some quality family time spent sitting together and building can go a long way.