I’m like a little kid at Christmas when I receive a new Lego book to review, and the new Lego Power Functions books from No Starch Press that arrived this week are no exception! Author and Lego builder Yoshito Isogawa just released two new titles that are sure winners. The first is The Lego Power Functions Idea Book, Vol. 1: Machines and Mechanisms, and the second is The Lego Power Functions Idea Book, Vol. 2: Car and Contraptions. Lego Power Functions, or PF for short, are electronic Technic parts that are added to stationary Lego models, like an Excavator, to bring them to life with movement, lights, and even remote control functions. I often write about the Lego Mindstorms EV3 robot which employs a similar but slightly different set of electronic parts, and Mr. Isogowa also wrote The Lego Mindstorms EV3 Idea Book which I previously reviewed. The Technic bricks utilized are the same whether you use Power Functions or EV3 motors, and the concepts presented are universal to both Lego platforms.
Both the Machines and Mechanisms and Cars and Contraptions books use a highly visual presentation to convey their content. That is, there are very few words in the books. The instructions and concepts are explained entirely through pictures. Take this angled gear mechanism for example. There’s a parts list, and the mechanism is shown using multiple pictures taken at different angles so that you can see how the parts fit together without needing step-by-step instructions. I spent some time putting this camshaft gear together, and the visual method worked well for me. I only had 6 camshaft parts instead of the 8 that were used in the book diagrams, but I was able to modify the gear to work with the reduced number of parts. The books encourage you to use the parts you have and to experiment! It’s an amazing feeling when you take the pictures in the books and bring them to life. You know you have learned something! I can’t wait to share the moving camshaft gear with my FIRST Lego League kids!
If you have to pick one book over the other, and I hope you don’t, I would probably suggest the Machines and Mechanisms book. Most of the items in it have 20 or fewer parts. The items are smaller, and they actually make up some of the bigger items in the Cars and Contraptions book. The Machines and Mechanisms book contains the foundation blocks to understanding basic Technic movement concepts. Once you’ve mastered Machines and Mechanisms, then you’ll be ready to move onto Cars and Contraptions. But, by all means, if you have a ton of experience building with Technic Lego bricks already, or you love Lego wheels, then start out with Cars and Contraptions. If you have Lego bricks at home but not necessarily Technic parts, you’ll need to pick up a kit so that you can get the full experience of building the examples shown in the books. Besides the excavator that I mentioned earlier, and the base Power Functions electronic parts, I would also recommend the Tracked Crane or the Mini Mobile Crane.
I was able to pull my parts from my EV3 kit, and I’m pleased to report that I had just about every part used in both books. Each book includes a parts list at the back, so you can check what you have against what’s needed before you buy. The Lego Power Functions Idea Book, Vol. 1: Machines and Mechanisms, and the The Lego Power Functions Idea Book, Vol 2.: Cars and Contraptions are both available for pre-order on Amazon for $18.06 in paperback format. GeekMom received these items for review purposes.It's birthday time around here (3 birthdays this month) and I realized that I never shared my oldest's 5th birthday from last year. It was her first real birthday party (with friends, not just family). Since she want to have both boys and girls, finding a theme that would work for both was challenging, but we decided on a LEGO theme. I didn't take too many great pics (I regret now), but getting ready for 14 5yr old was crazy enough! I started off making a t-shirt for her to wear, a simple lego man with a 5.
I just printed it on iron-on transfer paper, and put it on a store bought plain tee - easy peasy. You can download the image here. Finding lego decorations was really, really hard, so we ended up making most of them ourselves. Including a lego wreath for the front door (our old christmas wreath with a lego '5' that the little one built). We made some paper legos from construction paper and garage sale stickers (dots) from the dollar store, I sewed them onto bias tape to make some bunting. This was really fast to do and we hung them from all the doorways. We also made a ton of tissue paper pom poms in primary colors and hung them all around. While the kids arrived we set up a coloring station with some lego coloring and activity books to work on. You can download the pdf here, it is a collection of coloring pages and games. (just make sure to print it double sided, you can sew down the middle or just staple it together to make the book) I printed a separate cover on yellow card stock with the first page in the pdf.
The table was easy - just using a mixture of primary colors created the lego feel, I added a couple of logos to the cutlery and straws. The food table was the most fun. We filled it with lego cupcakes and cookies, crackers, cheese, fruit kebobs, and veggies. Keeping it very colorful. The whole room turned out really fun! We spent the afternoon dancing, coloring and building lego of course! For anyone who wanted a break, we kept the coloring station out with some simple coloring sheets to design your own minifigure and color your own logo block. You can download the coloring pages here. The gift bags were primary colored bags with construction paper dots on them. we filled them with candy blocks, lego books, small packs of lego, crayons, stickers and lots of fun little things This year, she picked a mermaid theme, so watch out for some mermaid party tutorials coming soon....Minion LegosMinions BuildMinions EtcLego Building PlansBuilding IdeasLego PlanMinion BrickBrick DespicableLego DespicableForwardInstructions to build my Pick a Brick Despicable Me Minion, using parts only found on the LEGO brand retail store's Pick a Brick wall.