Random Giveaway: Lego Creation Nation Prize Package

Here's a Giveaway for all you early Christmas shoppers out there. (I'm afraid I can't count myself among you, but I aspire to.) Enter your comment on this post to win three different Lego products totaling $150! Will you keep them for your kids? Will you give them as gifts to your nieces and nephews? I have no idea. But wherever they end up they are sure to be used and loved. This is what you could win:


A set of Duplos.
Designed for children’s small hands, Lego intends Duplo bricks to encourage creative play and aid in hand-eye coordination, problem solving, patterns, motor skills and more. Recommended for children ages 2-5, but my older kids still use these when they want to build big, fast. This retails for $29.99.



Plus this enormous King's Castle Siege set.
A working catapult flings plastic boulders over the castle walls and moveable walls allow hours of role play fun. Comes with a constructible dragon, five knight minifigures, four skeleton minifigures and one king minifigure. Recommended for children ages 7-12. I love a set like this for the Holidays. My son works on it an hour or two each day until he's done. He feels like he's accomplished something big when it's complete. It retails for $99.99.



Plus two of these Bionicle Action Figures!
I'm not sure which two you'll get, but they are certainly bound to be both fierce and hi-tech all at once. I didn't get how appealing these were to kids until I saw my own children put them together and play with them for hours on end. Popular with ages 6 to 11. These retail for $9.99 each.

And while the Lego sets are terrific, and while I'm a big fan, and while I hope you're the winner, what I really want to tell you about is the amazing Lego Creativity Awards and Lego's ongoing campaign called Creation Nation. The campaign was designed to encourage lifelong creativity — a very worthy goal. Based on essays, each year Lego awards 10 children $5000. Your kids can apply too. It's not a college scholarship. It's money for your child to use right now to further his or her creative endeavors.

I love this idea oh-so-much. For me, creativity and problem solving go hand-in-hand. And I love that Lego gets it. That they are out there actively encouraging children to be creative — giving them money for projects they're working on right now. If your curious, you can find out more about the contest, and Creation Nation here.



Still need some convincing? Well. I was converted the moment I found out Dave Eggers was a judge for the contest. Here's his advice to the children who participated this year: "Give yourself a lot — a lot — of time to goof around and daydream and sketch and make a mess." Sounds good to me.

One last thing: think Legos are just for boys? Think again. Anyone who grew up with Legos in the house (even if they were originally purchased for their brother) can tell you the exquisite pleasure of sitting in front of a pile of bricks and carefully building a house/town/airport/castle. Clicking and unclicking until she got it just right. It would be hard to call any playroom well-stocked without a container of Legos.

Thank you Lego!!

-------------

Random Giveaway Guidelines:
-You have until 9:00 AM (EST) on Thursday, November 15th to enter this giveaway. Note the unusual end time.
-Just make a comment ON THIS POST to enter — any comment.
-Anonymous comments will be ignored/removed.
-One entry per person, please.
-The winner will be randomly picked and announced Thursday.
-What are Random Giveaways? Read about them here.