Yep, it's all Lego.

Saturday Frank and I took the kids to the newly opened Legoland Discovery Centre in Schaumburg. Aside from the hefty price of admission ($19/adult, $15/child over 3), which was augmented by my smart sister-in-law who had sent along coupons for a free adult's admission with the purchase of a child's (Thank you, Karin), it was a nice way to spend an afternoon.

The space is fairly small; 2 stories of a corner building in an upscale strip mall. But then again, it's Lego. They're tiny. The first thing we saw was the amazingly detailed Chicago cityscape. It took over 10,000 man hours and 1,000,000 Legos to build 25 Chicago landmarks. It even had the green building on the corner next to the Chicago Theatre (it wasn't marked as a McD's, but trust me it was there - we've used their restrooms many times over the years). Navy Pier was especially impressive. The carousel played music and went round and round.
The lights and sounds of the city changed over the course of the simulated day. Lights came on and went out in the high rises, street lamps came on, etc. Pretty cool.
There was even a Sears Tower with a little Lego Batman perched on it, watching over the Windy City.
The next section of the Discovery Centre was devoted to the jungle. The kids were given a scratch off card and were asked to answer multiple choice question about various animals (i.e., snakes, tigers, hippos). All of the jungle animals were made out of Lego.

The jungle led us to the Lego Hall of Fame which had life-sized replicas of Batman, R2-D2, Darth Vader, Indiana Jones, Harry Potter and Hagrid. All. made. out. of. Lego.

There was a very tame little ride, a 4-D theater (which showed a very cute film), a Lego "factory" that asked kids to help make the Lego (at the end each child in the room was given a special brick with Legoland Chicago imprinted on it), a cafe with play place and tables stocked with, you guessed it, Legos. Of course there was a gift shop, but you can find a better selection at any Toys R Us or at the Lego shop online.

We're happy to have had the time to go explore this newest addition to the Lego universe. But Frank and I were both of the opinion that once was enough.

Though, I could look at that Chicago cityscape for hours.