Lego Week: DIY Lego Table

Welcome to Lego Week! Today I'm showing off a super easy Lego idea. I wanted to share my Lego Table with you. After gathering materials, it took less than five minutes, and my son has already been playing with it for over an hour... quietly... in his room. :)

I found this amazing, short, yellow, plastic table at a yard sale. It was $.50. YES! Fifty Cents! Right away I knew I would use it for a Lego Table for my son. 

We are lucky enough to live 20 minutes away from a Lego Store. You can find a whole list of store locations on their website. Check out our post about their store here! That is where I found this Building Plate. You can also find them at Toys R Us, Target, Amazon, etc. They sell them in the Duplo size if you have little toddlers in your home, too.

I used super glue around the edges and used Scotch Super 77 Adhesive Spray all over and just centered it on the table. It dried quickly and is the perfect size for my 4 year old son.

A quick search for Lego Tables will show many selling for around $75. I made mine for $15. I've also seen people use those Ikea Lack side tables for Lego Tables. The tables are $7-$15 depending on the color and you can add 4 building plates for $5 each. Those are slightly bigger than this one and will cost you around $35 to make! I hope you get to try this out for your Lego loving kids! 

Super Hero Tower Part 2- Dollhouse Furniture

Here is the latest on the Super Hero Tower that is in progress. I have successfully found wooden furniture at my local thrift stores, craft stores, and Tuesday Morning store for decent prices. I wanted to be able to paint and put stickers on the furniture so I didn't want any plastic or girly things. Here are some of the things I've done so far!

I painted all of the furniture in colors I thought reminded me of different heroes.

I used mod podge over stickers on some of the furniture.

There happened to be little slots on this book shelf, allowing me to put some plywood in to look like a door. I covered it in chalkboard paint so the kids can decorate the door and add windows. It's easily removable and works on the bottom two "floors" of the tower.

Why yes, that is Cyclops in the mirror of that vanity. 

And Thor in the mirror in the bathroom, with a Captain America bathtub and something from Mr. Freeze's Imaginext set. 

The BatCave isn't quite finished yet. I'm planning to attach fabric to the front to hide the cars underneath using Velcro. 

Here's a peek at what it looks like so far, without all of the Super Heroes and accessories from the play sets.

I hope you are enjoying it so far! I will have a final post up when I finish my last touches. 

Part 1 link here

Super Hero Tower - DIY Bookcase Dollhouse

Last year, I was browsing my pinterest boards for fun ideas and kept finding adorable kitchens and dollhouses made from old bookshelves and entertainment centers. I kept saying “if I had a daughter I would so be making this!” But I have a little boy with countless action figures he calls his guys. Then the light bulb went off. Why not make a dollhouse for his guys?! In the garage we had an old bookshelf (older than me) that just happens to have a peak on the top like the roof of a house and many different compartments that were perfect for little rooms. Seriously, I could not have found a better bookshelf.

The first thing I did was clean it. I scrubbed every nook and cranny because it was so old and endured the six of us beating it up and throwing things on it.

After that, I sanded down all the kinks – there were a lot! It felt good to use my hands and work with the wood, though. I think I want to learn to build things!

The bookshelf was a baby blue. I wanted to work with something neutral. I painted everything white. I knew I was going to cover up most of the shelving later on so I only put a coat or two in those areas. I mainly focused on the sides and top of the bookcase. I put on several coats until I was satisfied.

Next, I took a trip to Home Depot. I wandered over to the flooring section of the store and found some laminate tiles I thought would look great in my tower. I picked up several kinds of the wood floor tiles and a few dark black granite tiles. They cost around $.20 each. The cashier was confused by my assortment of tiles and had to ask me what kind of room I was working on. I also picked up a few of the free samples of hardwood and carpets. They’re free. Why not? Surely I’ll find a use for these.

I decided I wanted this to be a Super Hero tower. The majority of guys are super heroes, after all. Luckily, I had already picked up a 12 x 12 paper pad specifically for Superheroes from Michaels. They still have them on sale there. I picked out which papers I wanted to go in each room, thinking I’d put them on the walls of each shelf as wallpaper. Then I decided where the tiles would go for flooring. Since this was going to be super hero related, I wanted to make the bottom the BatCave and put the black granite tiles on the walls. That’s where all the heroes’ cars will be parked.

I used spray adhesive to stick on the paper which worked great and went by pretty quickly. I had to measure everything before cutting. It’s not perfect, but it’s fun.

Then I cut the tiles using a straight blade. (Technically, I had my dad do this part. He’s very precise.) We put the tiles in and voila, we have little rooms for the heroes to play.

After this, I took a long break (a few months) to find suitable furniture and accessories. I’ll write another post later on that includes everything. I hope this inspires you to use some of your old furniture pieces for play! If you don’t have any and really want to make something unique and fun for your kid, check out your local thrift stores, consignment stores, and yard sales for inexpensive pieces (big or small!) and remember that whatever it looks like, you can definitely spruce it up yourself with a little work.