Why I Do This

 

 At Brick Palooza this display was next to me.  Here are some more pictures, I did not have time to do this justice.

This was done by a Dad and his  7-8 year son.  They  told me they only started on it in July of 2024 and the idea and most of the work was done by his son.  The Dad said his main contribution was the underlying structure and some of the cliff work in the very back of the display.  His son was the creative drive behind it as well as building all of the detail that is in it.

So why is this important to me?  They attended Brick Palooza 2023 and unknown to me his son was so impressed with what I had built, he had to try and build something like it.  So they took over 50 pictures of the my MOC to use as inspiration for his design.  He has an Ice Planet with a mine, control rooms, bunk rooms, a small railroad for moving ore and the list goes on.  They searched for a lot Ice Planet Minifigs, plus some Star Wars Minifigs.  

We talked on and off during the show.  His son wanted to know what he can do to add to it.  As my son tells me always, in the real world, what would be there.  So he will look at adding more recreation and dining facilities as well as improving the operational aspects of the display.  They did not get a good look at the back side of mine last year since it was not accessible to the public. So again they took a lot of pictures of the back side as inspiration. 

If I can inspire one person a year to build MOCs from their imagination, then all that I do is well worth my time and effort.

Brick Palooza Recap

 This was a very interesting show.  A one day show on a Saturday in Santa Rosa, CA.  Because of the tear down timing of only 2 hours.  We decided to remove two hangers or two complete slices, which saved six boxes.  This also meant less work on setup and trying to keep things from prying apart at the table seam.

But first you have to get there.

And while it was not that bad coming across the Sierra Nevada, it did slow things down.

By the time we got to Santa Rosa things were getting deep.

The small creek behind the hotel.  While it never got any higher than this, it made transport challenging.  Out of the three roads in to the hotel, two were flooded and closed.  And the road in front of the hotel was reduced to one lane.

Such is life in Northern California during the rainy season.

Typical setup.  The drape covered tables are where the MOCs will be.  The other area on either side is for vendors.

Here is the final setup.  You will notice that it is one slice shorter on each side.  For one day shows, this will probably be the standard going forward.

We did not have time to really go around and look.  Most people setup in the morning since their displays were small.  Here are some of the more interesting ones.

I really like how this dish antenna was done.

More about this one in the next post.

I have a lot of pictures stored up for posts I want to do in the next few weeks.  We will see if life will accommodate me.