A Lego Extravaganza

Last week, after much encouragement (read: begging) by my oldest boy, we took a trip to the Lego store at the mall. We don’t go often because 1) I really dislike going to the mall and 2) we inevitably buy something. Usually several somethings.

But we needed a birthday party gift (even though we ended up not being able to make the party, thank you ridiculous traffic in this area), so off we went.

One thing that’s nice about the Lego store is that they have places where kids can play with loose Lego and just build whatever they want.

One horrible thing about the Lego store is that they have places where kids can play with loose Lego and just build whatever they want.

Yes. It’s a double-edged sword, that. See, my kids love it. And they’ll build and build and build. But, at some point there will either be another kid who deserves a turn or, eventually, we have to leave to go home because they’re trying to close the mall. And this then inevitably turns into a shriek fest, because I guess the 9 zillion Lego we have at home aren’t anywhere near as fun or cool as the handful of loose bricks they have out at the Lego store.

So then, because I can’t quite bring myself to leave them playing in the big bin of Lego right there by the unmanned doors that lead into the larger mall and go off to complete my purchases at the checkout that requires me to stand with my back to the play area, I get to haul to two shrieking children to the back of the store with our boxes of Lego and try to ignore all the pointed looks I’m getting from other people trying to buy their boxes of Lego.

Regardless, our trip was a success and — bonus! — we got a Millennium Falcon for about $50 off because the box was damaged. No missing pieces. Everything inside was fine. But if the box gets damaged, they discount it. And so the oldest (with occasional help from daddy) has been working on that for most of the week in his spare time.

It’s almost awesome enough for me to forget the echoing screams of “Leeegggoooooo” from my youngest as I dragged him through the mall to the car.

Almost.