Gen Y-er On The Loose: Bricks Cascade 2018

Bricks Cascade, Portland's LEGO convention, returned for its 7th year in March of 2018.

This was the first year in a long time that I was NOT a theme coordinator of some sort, and it felt nice to not have any real responsibilities other than setting up my MOCs and watching over them on occasion.

Speaking of MOCs, I had a few new ones this year, including three 16x16 "quilt squares" for the collaborative quilt in the Art section. This year's collaborative theme was "Not LEGO," the idea being to depict a childhood game or toy that was anything but the favored Brick.

My contributions are all in the second row (from the bottom): Strawberry Shortcake, Doll House, and over the right, a depiction of one of my favorite Commodore 64 games of yore, Donald Duck's Playground. And lo and behold, Doll House won a trophy!

I also built the Friendly Town Playground:

Not surprisingly, it was a hit with girls, especially!

I also made this "march" scene, since the Saturday of the convention happened to fall on the same day as March For Our Lives (March 24th).

Props to my friends Laura & Arwyn for donating some of their Minifigs Of Color, so the scene could be diverse.

The buildings on either side are mine, as is the backdrop and the small (forced perspective) buildings in the background.

I brought this Western Town (below), modified from one I did 3 years ago. Some of the buildings had survived the past 3 years, some needed some repairs, and others had to be completely rebuilt. The display seemed to garner a fair amount of excitement from other builders, and there is interest in expanding the Western "theme" next year.

I brought my 2 buildings from the previous year for the Streets Of Brass collaboration again. Nothing new to see here, but it's a fun theme to be a part of. Maybe I'll do something new next year....

I also brought my American Kitchens again. They've appeared a few times, but the 70's kitchen had not been to Bricks Cascade before. I was pleased to win an award for Interiors in Architecture! Someday -- more, perhaps?

Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood Of Make-Believe made its second appearance at this convention.

But this one was new: a Brickheadz-style Scrooge McDuck....

Lastly, I made a couple of contributions to the theme park Ben's Funland, including a hippo for Ben's double-decker carousel, and the purple/yellow carousel, which he was gracious enough to let me tack on. (It's basically the carousel LEGO sells, but with modified colors throughout.)

Some highlights from this year....

I participated in just one game, the Master Build, also known as the Freestyle Build.

We got 2 sets and had 1 hour to build something:

I built a lady pushing an older lady in a wheelchair, past a fountain.

I've been a semi-finalist a few times in this game at BrickCon but have never won in all my times playing it. This time I actually won! :) On Saturday evening I got a trophy and a big bag of brick as a prize. :)

On Saturday night there was an "After Dark" event that included LEGO-related games and adult-minded hi-jinks....

Er, um, so I have heard.

A group of WAFOLS (Lady LEGO fans) walked to Cafe Yum together one evening for supper.

The group meetings involved lots of great prizes being given out, as usual. This year I came home with a new Elves set!

I attended one panel, Boone Builds, which was put on by a guy from our Lego Users Group. It was fun to hear him talk about his journey of creating his Youtube channel and brand. (For those of you who don't know, I used to do the whole Youtube thing. He's way more successful than I ever was, though!)

All in all, it was a nice weekend, with lots to see, plenty of people to talk to, and much fun to be had.