Last Saturday was the November DixieLUG meeting and it was a blast. Since the LUG group is getting ready to display at BrickFest Alabama January 2016, everyone have been working on moonbase MOCs.

I’ve never worked on a moonbase design, much less been excited about space. However, I did try my hand at getting a moonbase built for the meeting. It was a lot more difficult than I imagined.

I still consider myself a new builder, therefore, I don’t really plan out designs in my head. It makes for a lot of building and rebuilding. So, while my husband did an excellent job of getting started with his build, I only ended up with half a moon base and one connecting corridor. Part of my problem had to do with not having enough bricks of anything (white, Technic and lime green.) This will be slow progress indeed.

I’m glad I built something regardless. It was fun to add something to a larger scene. It was also interesting to see what everyone else brought. A lot of the guys that are members of DixieLUG have played with LEGO since they were kids, so they have interesting ideas for their builds.

If you read our About page you know I was just introduced to LEGO as an adult. The very first set we purchased was the LEGO Winter Village Post Office, because we were looking for something to create a village for our Christmas decorations. I never really felt a connection to what was out there until I came across the LEGO winter village sets. The idea of tearing them down and putting them back together every holiday sounded like a nice tradition to me. So far I haven’t been disappointed…but back to the meeting…

So these guys have been building forever and they come up with some really amazing ideas for moonbase designs. In a conversation this weekend, I was able to understand why space is such a big theme for them. The LEGO space theme came out in the 1980’s, right around the time there was a big push by NASA to go into space. With everyone imagining what the world might be like after making contact with aliens, exploring the nearby planets, etc… LEGO did an excellent job of creating a product and jumping on that bandwagon. For these guys growing up in the ’80s, space is a memory with much fondness. It is what they learned to build on, after all… and these guys are amazing when it comes to thinking up MOCs for their moonbases. Check out all the amazing designs below:

I clearly have a lot to learn.

There were also several modulars brought to the meeting. My favorite was the bookstore/ice cream parlor/ music shop hands down.

Oh! And for the rest of the meeting, this week there wasn’t much to it, but connecting all the moonbases, planning out the layout and sifting through some used LEGO for sale to pull needed parts. It was a good meeting.

If you would like more information about joining DixieLUG, you can visit their Facebook page. We would love to meet you there!