I grew up in the 80s and latched on to the Pirate theme where I got the much coveted Black Seas Barracuda. My older brother got some of the Town/Police stuff but I stuck with the Pirates theme. I mostly built to existing sets and expansions (had one version of Forbidden Island 3' tall across 5 baseplates) and created a game with a friend where we had ship battles using marbles as cannon balls. Lots of bloody knuckles but no bricks were damaged. Eventually we got smart and had a Monitor vs Merrimac-like stalemate. Then came the age of computers and strayed from our LEGO/GI Joe toys. They spent the next decade in two old CRT monitor boxes.
Went to college, became an engineer, got married and had two girls. Back in '09 got work to send me to Orlando and stumbled across the LEGO store in downtown Disney and bought the girls their first sets from the Belville line (obvious wife input there). They were too young (2 and 4) and the sets mostly sat on the shelf. I had an itch to go get my stuff but the time just wasn't right.
Fast forward to last fall and they were getting more mature in how to play with toys. Then right before Black Friday my wife found the Toys R Us buy one get one half off sale and the itch turned into a bit of a craze as we picked up every set from Kingdoms plus Police HQ, a few mid-size Pirates and Woody's Roundup. I risked the 4am crowd at Target on BF to get Troll Mountain Fortress (so each girl will have a main castle) which let to a massive pile at Christmas. My wife got me the bank which I think is great because my criminals have always complained about not having anything worth stealing
So the winter was spent getting my collection from the folks, organizing it, acquiring a lot of Stack-On & Plano containers, installing 2 new shelves, Castle battles with the girls and spending way too much time on AFOL sites. I also started spending a lot more time with a good friend who is a LEGO devotee. Then came the news, a two-week training course in Orlando (I know, I live the hard life). We drove down last week and have been to the LEGO store 4 times in 7 days.
My amazing wife let me pickup the new Imperial Flagship so I finally have someone to challenge BSB. My daughters got Medieval Market to go with their Castle series, we each got a PAB large cup, and I even got my wife to start a collection with the Creator 3-in-1 Lighthouse Island and Log Cabin sets.
I still need Caribbean Clipper to finish my 1989 Pirates collection, plus I'd like Rock Island Refuge and Imperial Trading Post. The other top two on my list are Falling Water and the new 2011 Milennium Falcon.
So thats way more than I typically would have typed but I'm in class working hard
