Lego Wars

"The Force is strong in you...You little, little man."

We have been literally taken over by the invasion of the minifigs. One must tread lightly in the Shin-Ting household lest you crush a little jedi, or princess, or wookie, or droid underfoot. It's hard to believe that this sci-fi movie that I vividly remember at age 8 lining up with my family for a first showing in a line that wrapped around the block of D.C's Uptown theatre, is now still a phenomenon that my 3 and 7 year olds are just crazy about. Benji still doesn't say much for a 3.5 year old. But he does say "Han Solo" -- over, and over, and over again. And he does request to "Watch Lego" which is his way of requesting that we all go downstairs to watch Connor play Lego Star Wars on the X-Box. So it was with great consternation that, somehow, our favorite Star Wars minifigs disappeared. I'm guessing that Benji must have taken them lovingly out with him somewhere, clenched in his little fist, and now they are on a mission of no return. Unfortunately, that has left us without our Han Solo and missing our version of Luke Skywalker (who is actually Wedge Antilles in head but Skywalker in spirit -- apparently Connor found the "smiley face" of Wedge Antilles more appealing than the serious, determined look on Skywalker and switched the heads).

So what's a mother to do? As it turns out, Lego doesn't really sell the minifigs separately from their sets. So one option would be to buy another $50.00 X-wingfighter -- not! Ebay would be a good alternative if it weren't for the stunning prices, with some figures commanding up to $20.00 each, plus you have to artfully outbid the other crazies -- sigh! With little hope left, I called up the closest Lego store in Virginia where a salesman was kind enough (he must have received many similar calls from despairing moms) to direct me to a hard-to-find window on the Lego website for lost parts. So with a little over five dollars and a prayer, Han Solo is being shipped to us from Denmark!

If he makes it into our eager little hands, what a journey he will have made, as will have I.