Our top 10 Lego sets for Christmas 2023

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With Christmas approaching there is always something on both mine, and Munchkins, Christmas list and that’s Lego! So, while I wile away the hours counting down to the days building the 2018 creator roller coaster, I’ve also rounded up our favourite top 10 Lego sets we will be adding to our lists this year

Number 10

First up we have chosen the Walt Disney tribute camera. One of our favourite additions to the Disney 100 collection.

top 10 Lego sets
Image from lego.com

We absolutely love Disney Lego and particularly the recent 100 years of Disney additions so this would complement the ones we already have on display. It is visually stunning and features so many lovely nods to Disney with the 20 film stills on the reel and original Disney characters.

At £89.99, it is reasonably priced for its size as it would stand out in any room.

Number 9

I’ll admit it. I have had a recent thing for Lego rollercoasters, starting out with the Loop and my recent purchase of the 2018 creator expert set.

Coaster corner, with the loop and start of the original coaster set, in our messy Lego city

Consequently, its no surprise the Space roller coaster makes an appearance here.

Images from lego.com

Being a creator 3 in 1 set, this has the ultimate ‘rebuildability’ with rollercoaster, drop tower and rocket spinner, all with fab space theming. I feel like it would complement our collection of coasters well as be the perfect large but still smallish build for Munchkin.

Number 8

At postion 8, it wouldn’t be a Christmas list without a Christmas set. So this one goes to…

Image from lego.com

The £89.99 Christmas exclusive for 2023 – the Alpine lodge.

I love this set, after building the holiday main street last year I would love to add this to my Christmas village this year. It looks like the most lovely holiday getaway destination and would be a great addition to our city.

Number 7

Two cheaper alternatives for any Lego City enthusiast are Munchkin’s selections of the Ice-cream shop and Monster truck race.

images from Lego.com

At 296 and 301 pieces both these sets are a nice small addition and a good piece number for little peoples attention spans. They are also much more wallet friendly at £29.99 (£3 off lego.com here) for the ice cream shop and £24.99 for the monster trucks.

Number 6

The botanical range has caught my eye recently, with multiple floral offerings almost identical to the real thing and great for the avid Lego builder and beginner alike. The orchid is my favourite, for its realism and beauty. Its also much easier to keep alive, so even at £44.99 its much cheaper than plants in the long term.

Image from lego.com

Another Christmas list idea would be a trip to Legoland. See our Legoland staycation review here ➡️


Number 5

At five, its something different to add to the Lego city, to suit everyone from cyclists, skate boarders and roller skaters alike, with the Street skate park. Whilst it doesn’t look exciting to build, its looks fun to play with so many story ideas in my head. At £49.99 it looks expensive for what you get though, with only 454 pieces.

Number 4

One that has been on my list for a while, also remains high at Christmas. Its the fantastic set that came from Lego ideas this year; the A-frame cabin.

Cause if you can’t live in one, you can always build one.

And I must say, this is a beautiful set, both inside and out.

With so many little features to spot with the hideaway, workstation and all the nature and a nice building experience. This is a fabulous set. Please Santa!

Number 3

At number three we have Munchkin’s most desired Lego city addition. The Artic explorer Truck and mobile lab.

Complete with an artic truck with snow plough, mobile lab and adorable Lego polar bear cubs, this set is as adorable as it looks fun to build and play with.

Number 2

Our second spot goes to my top favourite set right now, the na na na na na na na na na… Batcave shadow box. It looks both stunning to put on display and has ultimate playability with moving parts, multiple characters and batmobile car included.

images from Lego.com

Its a pricey one at £344 but at just shy of 4000 pieces its a lengthy build with some great playable features.

Number 1

It wasn’t hard to choose if me or Munchkin should choose the top spot. As you can see, my top choice got 2nd place so the first spot was there for Munchkin.

I think it would be a tough choice for Munchkin’s favourite Lego theme, with a keen interest in Lego city, Ninjago and some of my additions to our Lego city. But in this top 10 the top set goes to… Ninjago with the Destiny’s bounty – Race against time set. Cheaper at Amazon here…

From the Netflix series ‘Ninjago Dragons Rising’, this set comprises of their ninja airship and two dragons with ultimate playability as you can play along to the episodes. A smaller detail, but important to Munchkin, is the addition of Master Wu in this set too. He’s gathered all the Ninjas from Lloyd to Kai from his other smaller sets, but he’s still not got Master Wu!!


So there is our top 10. What Lego sets would you like for Christmas? Let us know in the comments

Thanks for reading,

Daddy, Munchkin and Sprout

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Legoland short break review 2023

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Like Alton Towers (short break review here ➡️) I have fond childhood memories of getting my driving school licence and panning for gold on a Legoland short break and its also safe to say we may have all gone a little Lego crazy recently at home????…

So, as a parent, I was eagerly waited for the time Munchkin was old enough, or rather tall enough, to make the most of it. With Natalie off on maternity leave it was the perfect time to go off-peak, reduce the queuing and the price. So without further ado, here is what we thought of our experience.

Instant Magic

legoland short break

From arrival you are transported into a Lego utopia. As a Legoland short break guest you get separate free parking and enter, regardless of accommodation choice (Lego Hotel or Castle Hotel), through the Lego hotel entrance. If you into Lego like us, the entrance is amazing, with a towering Lego clock tower, holding a giant Lego mist breathing dragon. Its pretty spectacular, even if it does create a small puddle on the path doing so.

Then when inside, you’ll first experience the sweet smelling aroma you need to quickly get used to – its everywhere! Don’t worry though, it only made me slightly hungry. Then you are instantly transported to a Lego world. There’s a Lego pit to build an already growing wall of Lego up a pillar and a fantastic minifigure wall, complete with moving Lego magnifying glass to get a closer look and see all the minifigures you have ever dreamed of.

Fantastic bricktastic accommodation

There’s currently two hotels to choose from (with a third ‘Woodland village’ coming in 2024) and I cant really see a difference between them unless you want a theme. For the more generic knight’s room or wizard room you can choose the Castle hotel, however if you’d like to go down a Lego theme such as Lego Friends or Ninjago you would more likely opt for the main resort hotel.

The main choice then is whether to go standard or premium but this seems to only come down to extra theming and unlimited free access to the playroom (which can be added to standard for a small fee). We opted for premium as this was at the time a once off… but time will tell if that is the case.

I can say that in the atrium, lifts and restaurants, both hotels transported us to brick built heaven. The premium theming was superb, with numerous Lego decorations around the room. There was a premium coffee machine, PS4, Lego building area and an in-room treasure hunt for which we received a magazine, towel, Lego set, keychain and our first and only Pop badge.

Our only Pop badge

The extras – The Legoland playroom, pool and entertainment

Away from the park there is the Lego pirate themed swimming and activity pool, character meet and greets and the Legoland playroom. We didn’t make it to the pool and what we saw of the entertainment was good with Duplo building challenges, but the best thing to mention here is the playroom.

A castle, a cityscape with road, a town with a train track and an undersea adventure fill the room ready to add your own creations. There’s a duplo zone for the younger ones too, and some digital Lego games. We visited it twice as it was such good fun to get us all building together. There’s drinks and snacks available too, all in a room filled with that sweet vanilla aroma.

The Park – Superb kids rides, experiences and shows

I didn’t know what to expect but was blown away from the park. With Munchkin measuring over 1 metre there was only two rides he couldn’t go on, and there were a handful we took 5 month old Sprout on too! Munchkin was instantly filled with joy as we flew around the park from ride to ride to ride with short off peak queue lengths.

For Munchin, he loved the spinning spider and the biggest rollercoster; the dragon. For me, I loved the flight of the sky lion and the Hydra’s Challenge.

As long as you can hold your littlest one in a sitting position, they can join you on Deep sea adventure, Coastguard HQ, Balloon school, Aero Nomad, the Legoland express and the Fairytale Brook (but there may be more I missed). Sprout was only just sitting and they didn’t mind at all.

Free Lego!

It wouldn’t be a good visit to Legoland if you didn’t come away with some Lego, and what’s better? Free Lego! We had two opportunities to get our hands on free bricks; firstly as a result of completing the in room treasure hunt which is obviously hotel only. But also in the park.

As it was the Springfest event, The Brick in Miniland was giving out free Lego bee’s to build and take home.

Rides that even a thrill seeker could appreciate

Albeit Legoland is not in the league of other theme parks for thrill, there are some rides I could honestly say were good fun, even if less about the G-force and more about the fun factor.

The Dragon has some seriously cool Lego sculptures, before several nice drops through some tight tunnels. The Spinning Spider could seriously throw you about if you span the middle wheel like crazy which we most certainly did. But the top one had to be Hydra’s challenge. If you timed it go into the centre and then fly to the outside and back in, there was some serious thrills to have whilst dodging the bursts of water.

Quirky dining experiences

There’s two restaurants for breakfast and dinner; the Tournament Tavern sits within the Castle Hotel and the Bricks Restaurant within the Resort hotel.

We visited the Tournament Tavern on our first night. There was plenty of Lego to see around the room and the food was superb. On our departure day we visited the Bricks restaurant. This had a set price menu (which you can view here ➡️) but was honestly a little disappointing. If we visited again we would probably double up the Tournament Tavern for both days.

Price

A Legoland short break like most any theme parks doesn’t come cheap. Further to the cost, if you stay on resort, you have to add park tickets for the second day, although the pool, playroom and breakfast are included.

Overall the one night break, with two park days, came just short of £480 but this rises to around £600 at peak times.


Thinking of another theme park? See our review of Alton Towers Staycation here.


Location

Legoland is located in just outside the M25, east of Heathrow Airport.

Sum up and the all important stars

From the moment we arrived to the moment we left I was transported to a Lego dreamland. I had high expectations and the Legoland staycation exceeded every single one. I just had to knock half a star off for the Bricks restaurant but otherwise I can’t wait to stay again. One day in our seemingly brick filled future.

Rating: 4.5 out of 5.

Thanks for reading,

Daddy, Munchkin and Sprout

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We have a YouTube channel!

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Having just written the adjustments of a second child (spoilers, its tough) its complete madness that I decided to embark on a YouTube journey as well.

And not just any YouTube journey, nor a parenting, product review or day out review channel journey like in this blog.

It’s actually a Lego, story-telling, build YouTube journey. A amateur stop motion story telling and build at that too.

Introducing Brickste!

I’m sleepy, it’s rough around many many edges but I’m proud of it so far.

If you like it please consider liking and subscribing. Here’s one of my first three videos:

We would love to know your thoughts. Comment below or on our YouTube.

Thanks for reading,

Daddy, Munchkin and Sprout

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