I don’t know about you, but I love Legos. Not the fancy, branded sets that build one thing or maybe two, the latest $99 starships, $199 Harry Potter sets, or $399 kits to build the death star (what?). I love the basic, red, green, yellow, blue, and white sets that are an open-ended invitation for children to use their imagination and play, building houses, bases, creatures, skyscrapers — where ever their imagination takes them that day.
My children are getting good at the kits (oh, we have ’em), and they’ve always made their own “jet zoomers” to zoom around the house, but now they’re discovering the beauty of open-ended construction with the little bricks, and oh, it’s beautiful. Widget and I spent yesterday morning constructing a “base” and some vehicles with his little guys and all of our blocky bricks, and it was beautiful. Just the perfect way to spend the day with your kindergartner (and his 103′ fever).
When he went to bed, I went online to grab some more bricks, so his next “base” could be more than a few bricks high, and we could build a skyscraper more than four bricks wide. I thought it would be easy to find the basic sets online, the ones that we used to have, before they all got so specialized and intricate (which I do love, for older children, but for littles? bring on the bricks!). It wasn’t easy, so I asked my twitter peeps. And they answered — in spades!
Where have all the basic legos gone?
There are two easy ways to find them, locally at your Toys R Us, Walmart, or Lego store, or online at lego.com. The magic words are “basic bricks.” Here are two sets that I recommend if you’re looking for “just the bricks, ma’am”:
- The big set: 6177 http://bit.ly/9tCLf1
- The little set: 5574 http://bit.ly/abnDTv
The little set is $12.99 for 280 bricks. I’m picking up a bunch for birthday parties. (You’ve been warned.)
This post was not sponsored or prompted by anyone or anything — it’s just too hard to find these things, and I wanted to help make it easier for others looking for the same thing. This is for you, @yankeedrawl and friends — and a big THANK YOU for all the ideas to @mommy4cocktails @canape @minkymoo @angiekeenan @pgoodness @verybloggybeth @brandie185 @ejwillingham @bigbluemomma @squawky @nowseriouslykid @jodifur @centsiblelife @velma @thejesterman @joufy and @joeymom who made great suggestions, including legos.com, Toys R Us, WalMart, Target, Amazon, the Lego store, CraigsList, yard sales, and eBay. Some of you are a lot more patient than I am. :-0
Toddler Planet is written by 
Toddler Planet 
Michael is a lego fanatic. Happy to help.
Once again your little guys sound just like mine used to be. Such fun memories of building with Lego. My husband and I used to wish we could buy stock in that company — esp. at Christmas. My youngest was even a Lego brick for Halloween one year. We still have it all over the house.
Creativity, imagination, play — it’s all good!
[…] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Susan N and Susan N, Susan N. Susan N said: THANK YOU for help finding legos, @mommy4cocktails @canape @minkymoo @angiekeenan @pgoodness @verybloggybeth Found 'em: http://bit.ly/9aIDVy […]
Thanks for making Lego shopping easier! We too love Legos.
I miss you and hope to see you soon. xoxo
Oh, I miss you too! Let’s do legos some afternoon — next week, after school? Will email you!
If you go to bricktrainshop.com you can find gently used and new odds and ends incredibly cheaply. The have random pieces and the selection changes frequently. The prices are unbelievable.
Our girls love Legos! I’m nearly 100% with you on the sets. My first inclination was to say that they should just go away. I have found some value in them for some people. Like I have a friend who every time he passes an actuarial exam buys a set to build something huge (pirate ship, death star, etc.) and leave as a reminder. They are also good for someone like my eldest who sometimes because of his special needs forgets he can just build and needs a complicated pattern to follow. But my favorite reason that they didn’t do away with them is that you can actually get some good deals sometimes (when that fad fades) and then just use them for parts! We bought some of the large house kits for $30 this past summer and they will be given for Chanukah this year.
And if you live near a store (and online, but it’s more expensive), you can go in and get specific parts, like pink which doesn’t come in most basic sets. My girls don’t play princess but I can’t deny them a few pink legos here and there. LOL
De-lurking to say that just 18 hours ago I went to look for basic legos at the store and couldn’t find them. So thank you! Perfect timing!
We LOVE Legos . . . and Duplos too. The boys are always creating – usually jails to trap the bad guys and boats, and cars and planes and for Ryan usually farms and zoos!! We have a gazillion and they still want more! Have fun building!
There’s no telling how many engineering careers have been sparked by a bucketful of those things and a few feet of carpet. My parents still have all eight billion of mine somewhere. Great stuff.
Yep! My brother and a brother-in-law, both engineers, still very much LEGO fans in their late 30s. We just have to pull it out for the sprouts to get them going. 🙂
[…] grateful for the chance to stay home with my kidlet, who is running a nasty fever, and just play legos with him all […]
Our oldest son (5 1/2) loves his legos! The other idea I had was to go onto the lego website and download the instructions to some of the more intricate sets. Usually, we have the right pieces or can work around it to build something new without buying anything. I am still working on getting him to freely build whatever he wants to build. Can’t wait to spend some time in his lego closet with him soon!
You know we love us some Legos. Here’s the thing about all those fancy sets: They turn into piles of basic bricks. It makes a lot more sense to buy them that way in the first place. We’ve even bought off-brand bricks, which are exactly the same as Legos except cheaper.
We got basic sets at Target (my favourite store!). They come in great plastic tubs – much better for long term storage than the cardboard boxes the blue-print sets come in. We even got a “pink set” that comes with a horse figure and little flowers and stuff and instructions for building a pretty -little house – which my 5 year old daughter loves. The blue set with tires is used by the 10 year old tomboy. They are just so easily overlooked on the shelves – usually down low and surrounded by all those boxes.
In defense of those sets that build one item–it inevitably breaks and then they build something else out of their own imagination. So the child gets the joy of building something out of Star Wars or whatever, and then has fun transforming it into a pirate ship or a different kind of star cruiser or whatever.
My son, 13, still LOVES legos! I think they are a fantastic toy. I just wish they were a bit cheaper.
There’s a reason the only toy (other than a sleep-toy each) that we brought to our temporary accommodation was Lego! (Well, Duplo mainly, but some Lego too). Fainjin builds houses and fire-stations (what else?!), Babess tends to build “birthday cakes”. 🙂
There will be quite a bit of Lego coming into our house this Christmas and early-January birthday.
I love the plain bricks, but I would really really like Santa to bring me one of those Lego robotics sets… it would only come out after the kids’ bedtime!
We love basic Legos too! And by “we,” I mean all 4 of us. It’s the biggest exception we make for plastic toys. There are wooden interlocking Lego-like blocks available, but there just isn’t the same amount of creative building freedom with them.
Hope Widget feels better soon, and everyone else stays healthy!
Thanks, Kim! I suspected as much, with those creative tykes (and their parents) over at your house! Legos are awesome!
hooray!! I love you I love you I love you (more than I already do)!!! we SO need these, Susan!!
xoxoxo
Thank you! I so wanted to buy just bricks for the boys and now I know I can!
http://shop.lego.com/ByCategory/Department.aspx?d=304
this may have been mentioned but they have 160 pages of parts of you need them and also the bases, people etc.
You can buy the bricks buy the pound at the Legoland store… next time I go I will buy you a pound or two!!!!
[…] kinda like legos, but they don’t fit together as […]
I’m with you on wanting more of the basic bricks — I suspect the JavaKids will get a bucket of the plain bricks this Christmas.
Not to hijack your post, but you may be interested in the organizing tips and some of the Lego links on a post I did last month about Legos. http://caffeineandaprayer.com/2010/10/01/legos-organizing-the-obsession/
We’re starting a Jr. First Lego League so I am now getting deeper in debt with Lego!
[…] Originally posted on Toddler Planet. […]