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I spoke to a lady at the Dartmouth Sportsplex show today who was looking for
pictures of "the LEGO cathedral". Sam, while working the kids play area, told
her to look on LUGNET. In case she finds this post first, the link she wants
is:
http://www.amyhughes.org/lego/church/index.html
An absolutely incredible creation.
Gail Meagher
NovaLUG
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Still one day (Sunday November 18th, 10 am - 3 pm) left to come see the NovaLUG
display at the Dartmouth Sportsplex, just across the MacDonald bridge. Pictures
of setup (taken every half hour) and the show on Saturday can be seen in my
Brickshelf gallery
http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=285523
(Saturdays awaiting moderation).
Come say Hi. Warning, there is a swim meet in the pool this weekend, so parking
is more difficult than usual.
Gail Meagher
NovaLUG
Halifax
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NovaLUG (Nova Scotia LEGO Users Group) will be displaying at the
Museum of Industry in Stellarton, NS
this Saturday and Sunday, March 10 and 11. We will have a 5 foot by 25 foot
town/train layout, and
a display and demonstrations of some LEGO robotics (both RCX and NXT). The
museum is open 9 am to 5 pm Saturday and 10 am to 5 pm Sunday. Regular museum
admission rates apply. The museum will be supplying a play area to build your
own LEGO creations. This is the first weekend of March Break in Nova Scotia.
The museum itself looks pretty neat as well, and includes
Samson, Canada’s oldest surviving
steam locomotive, built in 1838.
Setup will be a challenge for us, as we can’t get into the museum to start until
8 am on Saturday. We have never tried this large a layout with this few members
(four) setting up in this short a time. We plan on having trains running by 9
am, and hope to have the layout set up (maybe not the greenery or telephone
poles) by 10 am. Please don’t get between me and the timbits I need to pull
this off :). We will also be trying out a new for us RCX train switching
system.
From the museum website
Admissions for 2006*
Adults $7.00
Children $3.00 (ages 6 thru 17yrs)
Children under 5yrs are Free!
Seniors $4.00 (65yrs & over)
Family $15.00 (2 adults & their children under 18yrs)
* Note: All prices include applicable sales tax
Gail Meagher
NovaLUG
Halifax
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Greetings to all!
I asked my wife Karen to write the article for me so it will be easier for
everyone to understand! ;~D So here it is:
This was the third year for the Jack Frost Festival at Charlottetown. It's a
huge event which draws thousands of people from all over the Maritimes -- even a
potato farmer all the way from Houlton, Maine! The Festival was originally
conceived to take place outdoors, but there was such disastrous weather in 2006
that the organizers decided to have indoor activities as well this year -- just
in case. Despite the perfect cold and dry weather outdoors, Lego Town held its
own in style!
Word of Lego Town was spreading quickly around the town (no pun intended). One
woman who arrived late on Saturday afternoon admitted with great embarassment to
being "the only mother in Charlottetown" who hadn't brought her children to Lego
Town! When we arrived at the Confederation Mall at the Sunday 10:00 am opening
time, numerous families were already gathered around the many tables in the Food
Court, happily building with Lego, oblivious to anything else but their building
(remind you of anyone you know?) and possibly their immediate table companions.
As soon as we started up the Arlen's train layout and the Jean-Marc's Great Ball
Contraption (GBC), crowds gathered around to admire Lego in motion.
We have heard so many comments about how wonderful it was to see families
playing together. You can see the photos, but imagine an entire Food Court - 50
tables or so - covered with Legos and the chairs filled with kids of all ages.
One lady commented that she was surprised at how quiet so many children could
be! The mall had organized a Lego contest the week before, with local children
entering their creations. The winners' entries were on display and children
continued to add their new creations throughout the weekend. The display table
eventually filled up, so a spontaneous extension began on the raised stage in
the middle of the court. By the time we left the stage was ringed with Lego
creations!
We were peppered with questions about all things Lego, both in English and
French. We gave explanations about TLC, LUGNET, NovaLUG, BrickLink, Peeron,
AFOLs, MOCs, NXT, Mindstorms, trains and much more. We realized that a lot of
people don't know that they can buy Lego anywhere but in local stores. These
were just some of the questions we fielded:
1) Are you from Denmark?
2) Do you work for Lego?
3) Do you own all this stuff?
4) Can I buy the GBC?
5) What do I have to do to work for The Lego Company one day? (JM said he'd
like to know, too!)
6) How can a telephone make a robot move? (Sorry you weren't there, Owen!)
We displayed a large-scale dump truck built by Richard Hubley of Pleasantville
(just outside of Bridgewater). This was a good thing because some men passing
through finally understood that Lego is really relevant after all!
Jean-Marc was really in his element(s), so to speak. He didn't stop talking the
entire day - he didn't even stop to eat! In addition to his demonstrations, he
gave two magic shows each day, and the children were very attentive and all
hoped to find the right key to open the magic lock and take home the Lego prize.
One of the funniest sights during the shows was Jean-Marc standing in front of
the backdrop - a sign from TLC that read "How Tall are You in Lego Bricks?"
The robots were a great hit! People enjoyed taking the controls and trying out
the NXT and RCX robots. Sometimes all the robots were on centre stage at the
same time. The blue Scout was a crowd pleaser as it repetitively bumped into
people and backed up. We received numerous requests from young people to try
Owen's cell phone controlled NXT bot. One father agreed that it was the first
time he had seen a useful application for a cell phone. We really enjoyed
interacting with so many children and young adults - the "NXT generation" are
quick to catch on to the technology and a some understand it even better than we
do! It was wonderful to be able to open some young minds to the pleasure of
robotics through Lego.
We heard wonderful stories about people's experiences with Lego and heard a lot
of people confess about the boxes of Lego stored in their attics from childhood
days. We heard about a house designed in Lego years ago (Modulex?) before being
built, and we even met a few people who never lived through the Dark Ages - they
just never stopped playing! There were quite a few visitors from Moncton, and a
few of them had even heard about "some guy with a huge Lego collection"
(Legosam?). One of our favourite stories was from a woman whose brother lives
in Wales and travels all over the world. He said that everywhere he goes, he
finds Lego pieces, including one he found in a taxi during his latest trip to
Paris. "Lego is taking over the world," he is said to have exclaimed. Let's
hope so!
The staff from the Mall were so supportive and easy to work with that it was a
real pleasure to participate in this event. A cheerful security guard, Danny,
was posted in front of the displays to keep little hands at bay -- and even
reload the GBC from time to time. We came home with a great gift - a banner
(92" x 22") that says "Welcome to Lego Town" that can be used for future shows.
If all goes well we will return to Charlottetown for next year's Festival and we
hope that more NovaLUGers will participate!
For a few picture of the event, visit my Brickshelf folder after moderation:
http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=235498
Enjoy!
Jean-Marc
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Hi Everyone,
Just a heads up to let you know that there will be a LEGO Town at the Jack Frost
Festival this coming weekend in Charlottetown, PEI at the Confederation Court
Mall. There will be representatives from NovaLUG <http://novalug.ca> doing
demonstrations and building Lego on site. TLC has sent along bricks for the
public to play with as well as some models and contest with prizes!
For details on the festival:
http://www.visitcharlottetown.com/jackfrost/
For details on the Lego Town:
http://www.visitcharlottetown.com/jackfrost/lego_town.cfm
Hope to see you there!
Jean-Marc Detraz (aka legomotive)
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Jean Marc - I was just looking at your brickshelf pictures...very cool...
Interesting thing I noticed...that sumo robot looks really similar to the one
you used in August I think :)
Bryan
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NovaLUG will be displaying a 6' by 16' layout at the Maritime Museum of
the Atlantic ( http://museum.gov.ns.ca/mma/index.html ) in Halifax, from
Sunday December 10th to Sunday January 7th. The layout will be staffed
by NovaLUG members on weekends and (hopefully) the week between
Christmas and New Years. Other times the trains will run with the push
of a button. The layout includes models of various buildings from the
Halifax area, including the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic.
Museum hours
Monday closed
Tuesday 9:30 am - 8:00 pm
Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday 9:30 am - 5:00 pm
Sunday 1:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Closed
Christmas Eve Sun. Dec 24, 2006
Christmas Day Dec. 25, 2006
Boxing Day Dec. 26, 2006
New Year's Day Jan. 1, 2007
Admission:
Adults $4, for more info see
http://museum.gov.ns.ca/mma/hours/hours.html
The layout is located upstairs among the ship models, in the glassed in
area usually used by model builders. Please drop by and say hi.
Gail Meagher
NovaLUG
Nova Scotia, Canada
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In lugnet.org.ca.novalug, Jean-Marc Détraz wrote:
> Seven stalwart members of NovaLUG participated in the Dartmouth Sportsplex
> annual Train and Hobby Show on November 18th and 19th for the fifth consecutive
> year. As in previous years, we had our own exhibition room right off the main
> entrance and this year we added a sales table offering the only logical choice
> for Holiday presents - Lego!
snip
Awesome work guys! I especially like the farm. The barn, silos, forage
wagons/harvester, tractor, hay elevator and barn cleaner are all fantastic.
Great attention to detail!
J
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Seven stalwart members of NovaLUG participated in the Dartmouth Sportsplex
annual Train and Hobby Show on November 18th and 19th for the fifth consecutive
year. As in previous years, we had our own exhibition room right off the main
entrance and this year we added a sales table offering the only logical choice
for Holiday presents - Lego!
The main layout was 19 by 31 feet in a C shape, using 376½ 32x32 stud plates of
surface area, and offered a city full of interesting vignettes which included a
harbour front and automated tramway. The city expanded from last year to
include a large hospital, a hotel and an office building. There were two train
loops, one city only and the other incorprated the large rural area at one end
of the layout. The main layout is always a crowd pleaser as people discover the
various happenings of the town and enjoy the comings and goings of the trains.
There were smiles of recognition as people identified beautiful models of local
landmark buildings interspersed with others from the land of imagination! The
multi-level rural area included a large mountain where twelve modern-day
apostles listened to a scintillating sermon. As usual, a certain member
finished his layout two hours before the end of the show so he could take
pictures just before we started to tear down the display.
Our children's corner was a big hit not only with the children but also their
parents who either played along or enjoyed a moment of peace while their
children were totally engrossed with their Lego creations. Modifications were
made to the speed regulator to prevent potential train wrecks in the hands of
reckless young conductors. We have learned the importance of constant
supervision of the children's corner which we share in shifts.
There was an impressive collection of Technic and robotic models and the crowd
enjoyed regular demonstrations of Power Pullers, a crane, and a car with
pneumatic suspension, among others. In addition to a few RCX-based robots
including a Killough platform, we ramped up the activity this year by featuring
a sumo-bot wrestling ring, a NXT master-slave pair and a NXT robot who followed
instructions sent from a Bluetooth cell phone. Adults as well as children
enjoyed taking a turn at the controls. Many were surprised and fascinated to
discover this growing area of The Lego Company's product line.
We ended the show with our usual meeting at Tim Hortons for coffee and
discussion and were happy to learn that more and more organizations are
contacting us for both participation in shows and even permanent displays.
We've been playing well in 2006 and we look forward to playing even better in
2007!
Picture links:
Lawrence http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=216779
Gail http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=216749
Jean-Marc http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=216672
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NovaLUG completed their first day of a two day show at the Dartmouth
Sportsplex today. You can still come see us tomorrow (November 19th)
from 10 am til 3 pm. Better to show up early as we start teardown about
2:30 with an application of Agent Orange (have to clear out quickly for
bingo).
Gail Meagher
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