I just learned about The Brick Train Awards. There are various categories and winners are chosen for each region, and those winners then move forward to the global competition.

We definitely have some skilled MILUG train builders ( @sema4 @MikeS @Ptrotter ) as well as other skilled builders who may want to try making a train so I thought I would share this. The 2020 awards were just announced so there is definitely time if anyone wants to create or refine an existing train they have for the 2021 awards (looks like the submission window is in June).

Just added MosaiCon photos!

Our website has been updated with a few new blogs and a couple of photo albums have been added to our Facebook page with some of events from earlier this year.

It was announced today that the LEGO Ideas site and LEGO Rebrick site will be merging and Rebrick will be shut down in September to create more of a one stop shop that will serve as "the crowdsourcing and co-creation hub for teen and adult LEGO fans".
There will be some improvements to the functionality of the site as well as a few small changes to the Ideas program and the structure of contests.

Our monthly AFOL (Adult Fans of LEGO) meet-up is the first Wednesday of every month.
We will be meeting Wednesday October 7, 2020 7:00pm - 9:00pm. Due to the Coronavirus Pandemic we will NOT be meeting in person. Instead we will be meeting online.

Come and join us, have a drink (beer, wine, spirits, pop, coffee, tea or whatever is in your kitchen), and chat about LEGO!

This is an open event for anyone 19yrs+ interested in LEGO. Any AFOL (Adult Fan of LEGO) is welcome whether you collect sets, build sets or build your own creations. Come share your love of LEGO with us. We love to meet new folks!

For members participating in our MONTHLY BUILD CHALLENGE, please have your build challenge MOC ready to show off (see the post ‘MILUG Build Challenge September: Halloween!‘ in the Events & Activities forum). If you are new to MILUG or want to see what we’re all about then you can sit back and enjoy looking at everyone’s MOCs!

Membership is not required to attend your first meet-up so come out, meet our members (we’re really friendly), have a drink (not required) and find out what LUGs (LEGO User Groups) are all about!

Where: Online meeting via Google Meet. Please contact us in advance by replying to this post, or you can contact us at MidIslandLUG@gmail.com or message us on Facebook (@midislandlug) for the link to join the meeting.

There is a pretty cool prize for this LEGO Ideas contest:

"We invite you to show us your LEGO moment in space! Use your imagination to create the ultimate space model – make it as sci-fi or realistic as you wish, just stay within a base of 16 x 16 studs. One lucky winner has the chance to have their entry transformed into a new Gift with Purchase set, and will win a collection of past exclusive Gift with Purchase sets!"

What an honour to see the MILUG collaborative Bavarian Village MOC (my own creation) being featured on The Brick Show's YouTube review of top MOCs at BrickCan 2018! You can find us at the 2:45 mark.

There is a new LEGO Rebrick contest with some great prizes! Create an ultimate NEXO KNIGHTS mech and submit your photo/s on LEGO Rebrick. Contest ends June 27th at 7pm pst.

The next cmf series will be the 2nd wave of Disney characters. There are definitely some must-haves for me including Chip 'n Dale, Jack Skellington and Sally, and the black and white Mickey and Minnie (although different than the Steamboat Willie figures I am happy I can get these for $5 each rather than having to buy the overpriced set that's $120 for 751 pieces).

Here is a list of sets projected to be retiring in 2019. The list of over 100 sets is broken down by theme which is great. Most notable (for me) are The Great Wall of China (Architecture), Parisian Restaurant (Creator Expert), Pirate Roller Coaster (Creator), Ninjago City and Ninjago Docks, and 5 Ideas sets including Saturn V and Voltron.

@vdog I agree and with the pandemic they are seeing even more entries in their contests so competition is steep for sure.

LEGO Ideas Contest Announcement:
You might have seen the new LEGO Campus in Billund being slowly built and hopefully the final touches will be made in 2021. But we're already looking for some interior design! The LEGO Art team will be able to display some LEGO Art in the campus and have asked LEGO Ideas to make a contest to source some of those: https://ideas.lego.com/blogs/a4ae09b6-0d4c-4307-9da8-3ee9f3d368d6/post/73860e93-05e8-44ec-8009-bb74649a14a2

Art is incredibly subjective, but what is art to you? Show us what art means to you, using bricks in this new contest. It can be anything you like, so long as it’s the best work of art you can make!

You must also be able to build your model physically, because the winning entries will be displayed in the new LEGO Campus in Billund, Denmark! This is something we know a LOT of fans will be very interested in. So bring your a-game!

For this contest, we don’t have specific element requirements. But the judges are looking to display this artwork. So things that are absolutely tiny, or absolutely massive may not be selected as winners.

If you’re one of five winners of this contest, you’ll win the following:

A complete LEGO ART Series of your choice, of either:

• 4 x 31197 – LEGO Art Andy Warhol's Marilyn Monroe
• 4 x 31198 – LEGO Art The Beatles
• 3 x 31199 – LEGO Art Marvel Studios Iron Man
• 3 x 31200 – LEGO Art Star Wars The Sith
• Your artwork displayed in the new LEGO Campus, Billund, Denmark

Our monthly AFOL (Adult Fans of LEGO) meet-up is the first Wednesday of every month.
We will be meeting Wednesday October 7, 2020 7:00pm - 9:00pm. Due to the Coronavirus Pandemic we will NOT be meeting in person. Instead we will be meeting online.

Come and join us, have a drink (beer, wine, spirits, pop, coffee, tea or whatever is in your kitchen), and chat about LEGO!

This is an open event for anyone 19yrs+ interested in LEGO. Any AFOL (Adult Fan of LEGO) is welcome whether you collect sets, build sets or build your own creations. Come share your love of LEGO with us. We love to meet new folks!

For members participating in our MONTHLY BUILD CHALLENGE, please have your build challenge MOC ready to show off (see the post ‘MILUG Build Challenge September: Halloween!‘ in the Events & Activities forum). If you are new to MILUG or want to see what we’re all about then you can sit back and enjoy looking at everyone’s MOCs!

Membership is not required to attend your first meet-up so come out, meet our members (we’re really friendly), have a drink (not required) and find out what LUGs (LEGO User Groups) are all about!

Where: Online meeting via Google Meet. Please contact us in advance by replying to this post, or you can contact us at MidIslandLUG@gmail.com or message us on Facebook (@midislandlug) for the link to join the meeting.

The website for Brickvention 2021 ONLINE is now LIVE!

www.brickvention.online

To celebrate Brickvention whist Melbourne recovers from lockdown, the committee agreed to pursue a new format for 2021*, inclusive of a national scale build competition and a full day of free online content that will stream through the Brickvention social channels. 

@Ptrotter that totally works too

@Ptrotter that would be awesome! We usually end our meetings with a bit of a show & tell segment so that works perfectly. I look forward to seeing it!

I just learned about The Brick Train Awards. There are various categories and winners are chosen for each region, and those winners then move forward to the global competition.

We definitely have some skilled MILUG train builders ( @sema4 @MikeS @Ptrotter ) as well as other skilled builders who may want to try making a train so I thought I would share this. The 2020 awards were just announced so there is definitely time if anyone wants to create or refine an existing train they have for the 2021 awards (looks like the submission window is in June).

Congrats on getting your submission accepted and good luck @vdog ! There have been a record number of submissions passing the 10k mark the last two rounds (26 and 35 respectively) as there are more people online voting. I don't know if you are on Facebook but I know that those who plug themselves on the various LEGO Facebook groups tend to do very well and their submissions often see a surge in votes after their posts, but be sure to include a link to your submission on Ideas!

The ambassador for the LDraw community has announced the second LDraw parts update of 2020. Here is the original message from their library admin...

The 2020-02 LDraw Parts Update has been now been released. This adds 712 new files to the core library, including 510 new parts and 15 new primitives.

Thanks are due to all the part authors who created or corrected parts for this release. The small, but dedicated, band of reviewers also play an important role in keeping files moving through the Parts Tracker and deserve just as much credit.

You can preview the new parts in 2020-02, and download the zip-file update or Windows install package directly from LDraw here. Alternatively you can use the LDView option File | Check for Library Updates... to install the update.

@ian at least there are various sessions so some will be at a more reasonable time! When you sign up you can select which seasions you want to go to. I just selected all of them and if it works with my schedule that day then good, if not then no big deal.