"It wasn't all bacon slices and pork crunch..."

We are loving series 13 of the LEGO Minifigures, in fact we've all said its been our favourite yet and as me and the boys sat down to play with our beloved bricks, this epic LEGO battle took place. I love the ideas the boys come out with, they both have a great imagination and sitting down with them is always entertaining.

Get to the shops, get some Minifigures and start creating. With such a versatile toy, whats stopping you?

"I'd rather be the king of kids, than the prince of fools."

As a family we can spend weeks, months even, planning and building a huge well thought out LEGO build. Which as you are probably fully aware, i absolutely adore as it is quality family time with the boys. I love sitting with them both, hearing all their ideas and then working together to come up with ways to make those ideas possible, it's one of my favourite things to do with them. Sometimes though we don't have an extended amount of time to do this, sometimes the boys need something building there and then and our building becomes a little more spontanious.

The release of the series 13 minifigures has got many LEGO geeks like myself excited, for me this has been the best series in terms of characters and has been great for our ever expanding collection of parts. It happens a lot with us that a single minifigure will spur on a larger build (remember Deadpool?, Wyldstyle? even The Joker got built an entire ice cream factory). This time round though two characters from series 13 gave us all the inspiration we needed.

When we saw the pictures of the series months back i was pining after the Hotdog guy, hes going to come in very handy. For Seth though it was all about the king and after seeing him built i can see why Seth started building a castle straight away. Months back our friend Steve had given us a big bag of castle pieces and Seth had been looking for a reason to get using them. The king minifigure sorted that out.

It wasn't long before Seth had built a castle for the big beard donning king and in what seemed like no time at all an army was being built, a mass of knights and soldiers ready to defend the throne.

Ready to move forward on their enemies, they instantly hit a rather important hurdle...

... they had absolutely no one to fight, which is right about where i got summoned upstairs to their room. In great Seth and Opeie style i was given minimal time to come up with some sort of army for king whats his name to fight and inevitably conquer in the process. I quickly looked about and spotted that Ming the Merciless looking chap from series 13 and decided on a baddie army with a magical element. I love building like this sometimes as i have no idea where to start so i just start literally piling up bricks on a base plate.

I wasn't liking it at first but the more small bricks i added the better it looked. lots of small grey pieces to make an uneven rocky surface and i even managed to use the large skull face piece that i bought years ago for 50p that had been sitting in our grey box (i still have no idea what kit it is off). Spikes on the doors and plenty of fire and it was pretty much everything the boys wanted from a bad guys castle. The female minifigures get a rough deal in our house, unless its Mrs M's minifigure the boys are usually playing with male characters (i am unsure why? could make an interesting future post thought). I made sure i used some as the main part of my army and built witches casting spells around a crystal ball.

Surprisingly since being rushed to complete the castle, we've not actually had the battle yet as the boys keep adding to the castles with new ideas and accessories but i am sure if the weather keeps up like it has there will be plenty of medieval LEGO brawling this weekend... 

...someone has got to save that poor princess locked away in the tower after all.

Gifts from the Pirates in Orlando - Medieval Times Dinner and Tournament

Seth is really in to knights and castles, if he has a sword, a shield and someone to battle he's a very happy boy, because of this a meal out at 'medieval times dinner & tournament' was one of the things Seth was looking forward to most. Seth is very much like Mrs M, he wanted to fully research every place we were going so has spent the last few months watching videos on YouTube and looking at pictures. The videos can't really prepare you for the awesomeness that is medieval times. Thanks to Visit Orlando we were there as press. We were booked in for the 18:00 show and we realised at the condo at 17:00 that they advise you are there an hour before the show, oops! We rushed out and after the 45mins drive to get there from where we are staying we realised it wasn't a neccessaty, 15 mins before was fine. (Just want to point out that 45 mins drive does sound like a like a long time but driving in Orlando is so much nicer than driving in the UK and you don't really notice the distance)

On arrival we were handed crowns and got to have our picture taken with the king and queen before being shown to our seats. The dining arena was fantastic and Seth was clearly impressed, there's nothing more rewarding than seeing your children with huge smiles on their faces and full of excitement.

 As with pretty much everywhere in Orlando the staff are amazingly friendly and can't do enough for you and our medieval waiter was no exception, Nicholas was a great chap and very friendly. What stuck out for me was that medieval times had been the only restaurant we had been to that had been able to accommodate both Mrs M's and Opeie's dietary issues without offering just a salad, I was really impressed and it was obviously no big ask from them either, it's a shame more restaurants aren't like this.

One of the things I loved most about the experience was that everything was very authentic, the knights looked like knights, the king looked like someone you would expect to be ruled by and the food was very in keeping with what you would expect from dining during that era, big pieces of meat (to eat with your hands), rustic bread, soup and potatoes, lush!

The show was like nothing I've ever seen before. Six brave knights ready to do battle and a bad guy that caused the lights to drop and smoke to appear every time he entered the arena. Being able to sit and watch while pulling half a chicken apart with my hands and eating made it a real experience (sorry Mrs M and other vegans out there).

I won't give to much away about the show in case you are reading this before you go (although the show is changed every so often) but there was jousting, sword fighting and medieval games. The arena is sectioned into colours and you each get assigned a knight to cheer on during games and battle and obviously you get to boo the other knights which was great as you really feel like part of the show. Ours was the red knight a valiant warrior who when he wasn't battling for the kings acceptance was flirting with the ladies in the audience. Mrs M was to busy yapping to a staff member when she was hit in the side if the head from a flying rose, courtesy of the red knight, very romantic.

The experience from start to finish was around 2 hours and if you can go I can't recommend it enough. Seth informed us that it was his favourite part of the holiday so far and hearing Opeie shout 'come in you can do it' at the knights was great to watch. The whole experience was made even more enjoyable by our host Nicholas who was so helpful throughout and was more than happy to stop and chat to us after the show despite the fact we were keeping him from his work. A great knight was had by all (hahaha).

On the way out Seth purchased the red knights sword and shield from the armoury so that the medieval fun could continue back at the condo (even if he did fall straight to sleep in the car).

Thanks Medieval times dinner and tournament and thanks Nicholas it truly was a memorable evening and something we as a family can look back on and smile, a Knight to remember (I'll stop now). Good Knight. (Hehe)