Fintan Reilly - aka "Baby Goon" - aka "Bunky": November 2008

Okay first Bunky leveled up. For you non-geeks that means he went through a developmental leap (or is still kind of going through it). He is so much more like a boy than a baby. His speech is more complex, he has 59/64 pages memorized of a long book (not to mention all the other books), he is starting to (but not quite) make the connection between letters and sounds vs. letters and their shapes (upper & lower case). Reading by 3.5 for sure... Anyway, he's just more mature all around, and it's fascinating to see this change in his behavior and play and needs and so on. Yay!

Now for the Legoland part. It's been there some 12 years or so and I've never been. Yes, me, the legomaniac who would die and go to heaven to be a master builder (or even to have the time to build), the obsessive collector who doesn't open boxes but must have must have must have.

Anyway, the Nanny had a doctor appointment on a Friday so Mark was going to take the day off and stay home / work from home, and so on Thursday I pretty much decided I would too, and then Friday morning we pretty spontaneously decided to go. We got there around noon and by 4:00 had hit every ride he was qualified for. There were no lines, no crowds, no waiting. What took the longest was getting him off the roller coasters without a fuss. So much to see! It wasn't until about 4:30 that afternoon that I got to do a blitz through Miniland seeing the amazing intricate mind-blowing displays. I love that stuff. I can't wait to have a Lego studio of my own to set up my movie studio (though mine will be mini-fig scale). Too bad they close at 5.

Anyway, this is about Fintan, not me and my Lego OCD, so here are some photos.

Airplanes that go up and down!

Yes that Triceratops is entirely lego. Amazing.

Daddy & Bunky on Safari. This was a pretty kewl little ride, better than Jungle cruise with all the animatronic Lego animals. However, it was pretty much African except for the out-of-place pandas. I might have bought into it if they had been last, but they were second to last, just before the pride of lions.

After a fairytale cruise. I was surprised at how many fairy tale characters I could name, even though I don't know most of the stories. It was modernized; the prince had a cell phone.