Tag Archives: Babies/Childcare/Toys

These 3D printed needle covers were designed to put children at ease during vaccinations!

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Needles can be scary and I am saying that as an adult, so I can only imagine the fear children must feel. Post the pandemic, there is no choice but to face the fear of needles if you want to stay safe. To make it easier for children to conquer their fears, designer James Dickson created playful needle covers that can help make the entire process of getting vaccinations less daunting.

The children’s needle covers aim to reduce the fear of vaccination by hiding the needle within a form that a child is familiar with. Playful forms such as a plane or butterfly are universal, simple, and engaging for children. The medical professional can simply slide the cover over the needle and proceed with the vaccination. This is not just something that is meant for use during the pandemic but can be a continued use to administer medication through needles whenever required. This could brighten the day for many children who are patients in hospitals and have to stay for a while or even generally for those in the pediatric ward. Needle covers like these make the experience and atmosphere a little less dreary in all clinics and hospitals.

“For the prototyping of the Children’s Needle Covers, I opted for 3D printing with spray paint applied to give the desired color. This is not a final product but a prototype to show the intended form, function, and aesthetics of the Needle Covers,” says Dickson. He started with hand sketches, then moved onto creating small cardboard prototypes, followed by digital 3D modelling. After the CAD was finalized the design was 3D printed and spray painted. Medical professionals can even offer the cover to the child to take back home as a memento and after safely disposing the syringe. I vote for Dickson to create Avengers-themed needle covers next!

Designer: James Dickson

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LEGO designs by master builders that showcase why it is more than a kid’s toy

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LEGO building is no more child’s play! Today, master builders and artists build impressive and intricate LEGO creations that will leave you stunned. They are no less than works of art, with immense efforts, time, and energy is dedicated to them. I love scrolling through these creations, admiring them, and feeling an intense surge of satisfaction at their perfection. So, here’s a list of some extraordinary builds that I hope will give you that same feeling of satisfaction. Enjoy!

Using over 100,000 LEGO pieces, designer Ekow Nimako imagines the Kumbi Saleh 3020 CE a Ghanaian metropolis 1000 years in the future. This artwork is the centerpiece for his exhibition titled Building Black Civilizations and showcases details like nothing you have ever seen before, almost reminiscent of the Game of Thrones title sequence!





Designed by LEGO fanatic Steve Guinness, the LEGO set is called 21327 Typewriter – styled to bring back the memories of 50s typewriters. It doesn’t surprise that the LEGO typewriter is actually inspired by the original typewriter used by LEGO Group founder Ole Kirk Kristiansen. According to Federico Begher, VP of Global Marketing at LEGO Group, the vintage typewriter has an enchanting appeal and, “Steve’s incredible replica is a thoroughly worthy LEGO Ideas success story.” It’ll be something that mingles the two worlds seamlessly – a thing that LEGO fans will take pride in displaying in their living room. Steve wanted to create something intricate and new for LEGO, so he bought a vintage typewriter. He then set out to figure out how he could arrange the bricks and replicate a typewriter’s complex mechanism to achieve the final design. In the end, he managed to create a LEGO set that doesn’t look like a LEGO creation when viewed from a distance.

Speaking of Game of Thrones-esque magnanimous scenes, Rocco Buttliere, a Chicago-based architect has displayed his detailed skill and love of architecture with this Purple Forbidden City! Borrowing from the historic ages of the Chinese royalty, the design features a Hall of Supreme Harmony. Speaking of building this design, the designer says, “Finally, and probably most instructive to myself and perhaps others during this time of uncertainty, are a particular few words of a famous proverb by Laozi which kept me looking forward during this four-month undertaking: A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.”





This Illegal LEGO collection may be the piece a master builder needs to unleash their creativity. Each piece is a statement in contradictions, with half a raised side and the other a receiver/negative half, making it almost impossible to join your pieces. Or is it? As far as master builders go, they are always looking for complicated pieces that can help them build the next big impossible structure.

It would be an unfair characterization to call LEGO a child’s toy. Clearly, the product’s an incredibly engaging and interactive DIY system for adults too, and has been used for everything from scale-down models to art projects, to even the rare full-size LEGO supercar… but rarely has LEGO been used as an actual material to build a real, working product.  Burls Art details how LEGO is a pretty great choice to make the guitar in the first place. The interlocking pieces are pretty robust and the fact that you’ve got LEGO bricks in different colors makes it pretty easy to design your own pattern on the guitar. To assemble the piece, Burls plugs the LEGO pieces together in sheets, before layering them one above another and pouring epoxy resin to really seal them in place (the last thing you want is to have a guitar falling apart when you play an exceptionally funky slapping bassline).

This laptop riser/ monitor stand is the perfect addition to your work from home desk! Bored of the usual laptop stands? Build your own using LEGO! The nifty little design even accommodates little storage drawers to keep your pens, pencils, notepads, and other miscellaneous stationery. It even manages to incorporate cable management in its structure.

Designed over a period of 8,660 hours with more than 400,000 bricks, this Lamborghini Sian FKP 37 is the closest thing to the real deal! Earlier last year, Lamborghini and LEGO co-created a 1:8 replica of the Sian car… This year, they pushed the limits to build this incredibly realistic beast that looks stunningly like the original (in both shape and size) and weighs a mind-numbing 2.2 metric tonnes! This breath-takingly realistic car was created by a team of 15 people who put over 8000 hours of work into recreating the automotive beauty. The car was built meticulously out of LEGO Technic pieces, and barring the wheels and the logo on front, practically the entire vehicle is made solely from LEGO bricks. In fact, even the headlights, taillights, and the light-strips running along the side are LEGO pieces!

LEGO just approved of turning the Starry Night into a production-ready set. The idea for the product came from LEGO Ideas, a playground where LEGO enthusiasts upload their creations, and LEGO fans vote on designs that they want to see willed into existence. The Starry Night rendition comes from Truman Cheng, a Master Builder who goes by the username legotruman. Cheng’s rendition of the post-impressionist masterpiece uses a total of 1,552 pieces, and gathered a stunning 10 thousand votes on the LEGO Ideas platform!

Looking every bit like the real deal, the Ship In A Bottle is the latest from the clever master-builders at LEGO Ideas who churn out magical numbers such as the LEGO Typewriter we saw. Made using 962 pieces of LEGO (although a majority of them are just the water under the ship), the Ship In A Bottle comes with everything you’d expect, including a ship with 3 sails, a transparent bottle, a stand, a nameplate (the ship’s called the Leviathan), and even a cork-stopper made from LEGO bricks!

The latest LEGO sets include the Moff Gideon’s Imperial Light Cruiser (which I’m surely going to add to the collection), Imperial Armored Marauder, and the bounty hunter Boba Fett’s Starship. The highlight of them all is the Imperial Light Cruiser (75315) which comes with a bridge (doubles as a handle for flying action), large spring-loaded shooters, and dual mini TIE Fighters. How could the LEGO set not have the main leads – that’s why it also comes with The Mandalorian and Baby Yoda minifigures along with the infamous villain Moff Gideon, Fennec Shand, Cara Dune, and the Dark Tropper too.

 

 

Watch how a father made this realistic wooden replica of the Lamborghini Sian for his child to ride

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65 days is a pretty ambitious timeline for building a Lamborghini from scratch, especially if you’re working alone… but if you’re a seasoned woodworking expert like Trương Văn Đạo, things sort of fall into place. Văn Đạo made this miniature working replica of the Sian Roadster for his son, and meticulously documented the entire process on his YouTube channel ND Woodworking Art. The child-sized Lamborghini isn’t just a replica model though… it runs too, as Văn Đạo demonstrated by driving along on a highway too. The car comes outfitted with automatic scissor doors, working LED headlights + taillights, swiveling rear-view mirrors, a rather nifty (yet slightly toyish) dashboard along with a replica wooden steering wheel, and even a key-fob that lets you control aspects of the car! It’s a tight fit for adults but is perfectly sized for young children. No, there are no seatbelts, but it’s safe to say this Lamborghini isn’t crossing any speed limits.

Designer: ND Woodworking Art

Wooden Lamborghini Sian Roadster by ND Woodworking Art

Wooden Lamborghini Sian Roadster by ND Woodworking Art

Just like the original Sian, Văn Đạo’s replica runs on an electric powertrain. The car doesn’t just sit on a random toy car’s chassis too, everything’s made and assembled from scratch, including the steering fork, the rear-wheel drive, and get this, even the wheels, which are made from wood and then covered with rubber treads! The car is almost exclusively made from blocks of wood that have been glued together and sanded down to a fine surface before being layered with polish (the video shows the remarkable 65-day process in a timelapse), and you’ve really got to appreciate how good Văn Đạo is at his craft for being able to pull this off from start to finish.

Wooden Lamborghini Sian Roadster by ND Woodworking Art

Wooden Lamborghini Sian Roadster by ND Woodworking Art

For final touches, Văn Đạo plugs in the headlights and taillights in, and even puts in the Lamborghini logo on the front and a faux license plate on the back. The rear fins of the car come with the Sian branding too! The car’s doors are operated by pistons that are controlled using the key-fob (view them in action at the exact 08:30 mark), and yes, there are adjustable side-view mirrors too! The video currently stands at above 9.5 million views, although it isn’t the first time Văn Đạo’s attempted something so ambitious. In the past, he’s managed to build child-size wooden replicas of the BMW 328 Hommage, the Ferrari Aperta, and the Bugatti Centodieci too! I’d say his kid pretty much lucked out in the dad department!

Wooden Lamborghini Sian Roadster by ND Woodworking Art

Wooden Lamborghini Sian Roadster by ND Woodworking Art

LEGO’s DIY “ship in the bottle” is much more fun than owning the real thing!

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Looking every bit like the real deal, the Ship In A Bottle is the latest from the clever master-builders at LEGO Ideas who churn out magical numbers such as the LEGO Typewriter we saw last week. Made using 962 pieces of LEGO (although a majority of them are just the water under the ship), the Ship In A Bottle comes with everything you’d expect, including a ship with 3 sails, a transparent bottle, a stand, a nameplate (the ship’s called the Leviathan), and even a cork-stopper made from LEGO bricks!

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I’m not really a LEGO fanboy, so this is the first time I’m seeing a LEGO bottle made from actual transparent pieces. The bottle assembles around the ship, making it much easier to build the ship first and then construct the bottle (as opposed to authentic ship-in-bottles that are painstakingly assembled within pre-existing glass bottles). The bottle sports its own stopper, with a wax seal, all made from LEGO bricks, and rests on a nifty decorative stand, with a faux compass underneath. All in all, the entire artifact measures 3 inches in height, and 13 inches in width, making it a perfect thing to place on a mantelpiece or bookshelf.

Like all LEGO Ideas projects, the Ship In The Bottle started out as a fan-made design (from LEGO master-builder JakeSadovich77) that was voted the most popular creation by the LEGO community. Based on these votes, LEGO selected the idea and brought it to life. The LEGO Ship In The Bottle is now available on LEGO’s online store as well as on Amazon.

Designer: JakeSadovich77 for LEGO

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A Japanese designer made 100% natural crayons by recycling produce and vegetable waste!

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I am not a parent but I have been around kids enough to know that they will put everything in their mouth and there is always a risk when products designed to keep them entertained are also full of chemicals – like crayons. Crayons (and kids), rarely stay inside the lines and will end up in the child’s mouth or the walls. It is not only a health hazard and a cleaning liability, crayons also have an astonishing environmental impact. A Japanese company, Mizuiro Inc., worked with designer Naoko Kimura to create a sustainable alternative to the traditional crayon. Called Oyasai Crayons, they are made with all-natural ingredients!

Did you know that over 150 million crayons are discarded annually throughout the U.S. by restaurants alone? Most of the crayons in the market are made of paraffin wax, which contains petroleum, a toxic chemical to the environment making the product non-biodegradable and harmful – now imagine a child putting that in their mouth. That is where Oyasai Crayons come in – these safe and organic crayons are made from rice bran oil and rice wax from rice bran. Both solid rice bran wax and liquid rice bran oil are byproducts of the rice polishing process so these crayons are essentially made from waste. The pigment is all-natural too, it comes from recycled plant materials like outer leaves of vegetables are typically discarded after harvesting. However, Oyasai Crayons use this food waste by collecting it and converting it into colors for the crayons. In fact, these are the same pigments used for natural food coloring further showcasing that everything in the product is chemical-free.

Naoko Kimura is the one who came up with the idea when he discovered the colorful options that could be produced by vegetables while working as a graphic designer and parenting from home. He worked on the concept and realized that vegetable waste from harvesting was cast out because it didn’t meet standards and that is what he used to produce the Oyasai crayons in his home country, Japan. As of now, the collection features 10 colors made from Japanese yam, green onion, long potato, burdock, corn, snow carrot, apple, cassis, purple potato, and takesumi (bamboo charcoal). Oyasai Crayons meet the JIS standard which ensures they meet the benchmark for crayon strength. They have also earned the European standard toy safety EN71-3: 2013 certificate as a result of a strict safety inspection and continued on to win numerous design awards. It is important to keep in mind that while these are natural ingredients and a food-grade product, these are not edible crayons but simply a safer, more sustainable, and stress-free option for your child to play with.

Designer: Naoko Kimura

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Lamborghini built a stunning life-size replica of its Sian FKP 37 out of 400,000 LEGO bricks

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Designed over a period of 8,660 hours with more than 400,000 bricks, this Lamborghini Sian FKP 37 is the closest thing to the real deal! Earlier last year, Lamborghini and Lego co-created a 1:8 replica of the Sian car… This year, they pushed the limits to build this incredibly realistic beast that looks stunningly like the original and weighs a mind-numbing 2.2 metric tonnes!

This stunningly realistic car was created by a team of 15 people who put over 8000 hours of work into recreating the automotive beauty. The car was built meticulously out of Lego Technik pieces, and barring the wheels and the logo on front, practically the entire vehicle is made solely from LEGO bricks. In fact, even the headlights, taillights, and the light-strips running along the side are LEGO pieces!

This one-of-a-kind project required 154 different types of Lego pieces, including 20 made specifically for the project, Lamborghini mentioned in a press release. Instead of using solid pieces, the car showcases panel-work comprising interlocking hexagonal pieces, paying a hat-tip to Lamborghini’s recurring use of hexagonal patterns and elements in their design language. The result is extremely lifelike, and matches the original Sian’s sizes perfectly, albeit weighing a ridiculous 4,850 pounds. As a tribute to the 1:8th model that kickstarted this journey to begin with, the larger LEGO variant is spray-painted in the same acid-green UV-coated color finish, applied at Lamborghini’s own paint shop.

The interiors are stunningly lifelike too, with every element of the dashboard, seats, and the steering wheel built out of LEGO parts (finally with the Lamborghini logo being inlaid into the wheel). Sadly, the doors don’t open, but the windows give one a glimpse into the incredibly detailed interiors. The car finally rests on real Lamborghini wheels, as used in the original Sian.

The original Sian is touted as Lamborghini’s most powerful production car ever made. It’s also the company’s first hybrid, comprising a naturally-aspirated 6.5-liter V-12 and an electric motor, giving it a total of 807 horsepower, 0-60 mph in 2.8 seconds, and a top speed of over 217 mph. You can see the original Sian FKP 37 near its lifelike LEGO counterpart below!

Designers: LEGO and Lamborghini

The Tesla Cybertruck won’t deliver before 2022, but Hot Wheels has an RC Cybertruck you can buy today!

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Designed at 1:10th scale, Mattel’s Cybertruck replica comes with its own remote control as well as a Cyberquad. As far as I can tell, the windows on the toy pickup truck break much more easily…

Mattel’s 1:10 RC Cybertruck comes with that unmistakably polarizing design, authentic wheels + tire treads, working head and taillights, and a flat-bed that’s big enough to fit its free-rolling Cyberquad. The truck itself is controlled by a pretty neat-looking controller that mimics the shape of the Cybertruck’s own steering wheel, and allows you to operate the truck up to 12 MPH (which may seem paltry at first, but it makes Mattel’s Cybertruck one of the fasted remote-controlled cars on the market).

The RC Cybertruck’s available on Mattel’s website (you don’t need to wait till 2022 for yours)… and at just $100, it’s about the same price as the real Cybertruck’s preorder. You know, the refundable preorder that you can definitely cancel for this delightfully wicked RC truck?

Designer: Mattel (Hot Wheels)

LEGO released a DIY Infinity Gauntlet kit that definitely doesn’t wipe out humanity with a snap… we hope

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With 590 pieces (including 6 faux Infinity Stones), this meticulously detailed LEGO Infinity Gauntlet definitely adds a Marvel-ous touch to your room (I had to make that joke. You know it).

While LEGO’s Infinity Gauntlet doesn’t give you any sufficient superpowers, it’s definitely one of the most interesting pieces of pop-culture decor you can have in your room. Made from golden LEGO bricks, the gauntlet’s solid (which means you can’t wear it) and is slightly smaller than you’d expect… but LEGO makes up for it by incorporating movable joints into the fingers, which means the gauntlet can technically ‘snap’ its fingers.

The LEGO® Marvel Infinity Gauntlet (76191) is available for pre-order on LEGO’s website for $69.99.

Designer: LEGO

This foldable child safety seat for ages 0-12 is designed to be used in a public taxi or even Uber!

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Car seats for children are bulky, space-consuming, and have to be replaced often as they grow. We need child seats that are compact enough to store and be easily accessible in every car because the purpose is to keep your child safe irrespective of the car you have. Taxie is a Red Dot Design Award winner that solves this fundamental issue so you don’t have to choose between spending too much money on seats as your child grows or on a new car to fit a big seat. This foldable child safety seat makes it possible to share cars or take an Uber while still being able to carry your seat.

Apart from being universally car-friendly, Taxie works for children between 15 months to 12 years of age which is more than most current ones in the market, and adheres to the latest ECE-R129 standard of safety. Designers identified the top three reasons that make it difficult for shared car drivers to provide a child safety seat – children of different ages require different types of seat, a child safety seat is too bulky to store in the car boot, setting up a child seat and dismantling them take up time. It is impossible for parents or drivers to carry various sizes of child safety seats to accommodate all their needs.

It can be transformed into three different safety seats that suit infants, toddlers, and children above the age of 4 years. Just unlock the base, flip it over, adjust the headrest and you/the driver is good to go. Created for children with heights 76cm and above, this seat is a scalable product that is the size of hand luggage. Fold and store it in the boot when not in use while still leaving plenty of room for your luggage. Taxie’s flexible form helps drivers provide a better service for families with children and also for parents as one seat will last 12 years and can be used for multiple kids. The clever design maximizes what you get from a product through its versatility – it fits your needs and your car!

Designer: Richard Choi, Emma Chen, Jung Jian Huang, David Kang, and Dennis Yeh

The sustainable alternative to LEGO are these building blocks entirely carved from timber

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Classic toys like LEGO building blocks never go out of style. A quick Google search even proves that there’s a whole web of online stores devoted to selling and buying rare, collectible pieces. There’s one standard 2×4 LEGO brick on the market, entirely made from gold, with a firm asking price of just under $15,000 – to each their own. Then, there’s Mokulock, an alternative type of building block. Carved entirely from sustainably sourced timber and not compatible with plastic building blocks, Mokulock works in the same way as LEGO bricks but is a couple of steps ahead on the road towards sustainable toy production.

Coming from a love for trees and the natural world, the designer behind Mokulock recognized the waste that manifests with forest thinning and decided to make use of the smaller trees that are too thin for architectural purposes or furniture-making. Prioritizing simplicity and organic structure over shiny paint jobs, the Mokulock building blocks maintain their original tree’s finish, without additional finishing oil, chemical paint, or glue. While the different timber species used to create the building blocks of Mokulock vary, a sanded finish that promises a soft feel and splinter-free play is guaranteed. Currently, Mokulock uses timber from Japanese Cherry, Japanese Zelkova, Japanese Bigleaf Magnolia, Birch, Hornbeam, and Maple trees to produce their building blocks, which provide different textures and shades of wood for either smooth gradient or color block building projects.

Mokulock was initially created as a means for preservation and sustainability, but the timber used in producing these building blocks offers some mental benefits for the user as well. In addition to supporting an endeavor that provides a sustainable alternative to a worldwide beloved toy, Mokulock utilizes the soft feel of wood to help enhance creativity, stabilize the autonomic nerves by lowering the blood pressure, regulate an otherwise abnormal pulse, and generally calm the nerves. Then again, we don’t need research to remind us of the comfort that comes when we immerse ourselves in nature and notice the solidity of its surrounding trees, the soothing scent of freshly cut timber, and the warm feel of tree bark.

Designer: Mokulock

Due to the tree’s natural coloring, Mokulock offers a wide array of shades for its building blocks.

A natural camouflage color scheme is achieved through the varying natural gradient of Mokulock’s building blocks.

Just like LEGO building blocks, Mokulock bricks can be used to create large-scale 3D scenes or smaller designs like automobiles or miniature pyramids.

Mokulock stays away from using any finishing oil, chemical paint, or glue in the making of their building blocks to maintain an organic finish.

Some of Mokulock’s building blocks come engraved with quirky scenes and characters for children to integrate into their buildings.