DIY Lego Table {with IKEA LACK}

You may remember back in my March Review that my hubby & I took a trip to Minnesota over spring break. On that trip we stopped at my shopping mecca: IKEA. We were purchasing some smaller organization items and decor for our kids' "new" rooms... and of course a little more than that. I mean, if you only get one trip a year to shop at your favorite store in the world, you have to make the most of it, right? :)
Along with the rest of creation, our kids are really into Legos right now, but they're not allowed to bring them downstairs (because the dog likes to eat all things toy-related). But, in case you've never tried it, it's really difficult to build on carpet! So we had this great idea to create a Lego table like this one here: Lego Meets Lack, but on a smaller scale to suit our space.
They've not been collecting too long, so we don't have massive quantities of little blocks all over the place, nor are there tons of any one color -- just a few kits here and there -- which actually translates into millions of the tiniest bricks and buttons known to man. (Thanks, Lego, for all those ridiculous teensy squares, circular pieces, & flowers to "decorate" with that are now the bane of my existence.) But we don't need a ton of storage space for Legos... yet.

For our intent & purpose, we decided to go with a smaller, inexpensive LACK side table. We have a couple white ones in our home already and have used them as living room end tables, coloring tables, kids' dining when we have guests over, etc., so we new they'd cut the mustard for this project too. We picked birch effect for the kids' space.

LACK side table, birch effect ($9.99)

After our mini-spree at IKEA, we crossed the road to the Mall of America to visit the infamous Lego store. My husband picked out a small bucket of blocks in specific colors (not sure if these were more for him or the kids...) and I grabbed some baseplates for building. The plates are 10"x10" and four plates fit perfectly on the top of the LACK table, so we chose to get three green and one blue. You know, land and water. :)
NOTE: The building plates are $4.99/each pretty much everywhere, so, if you don't have a Lego store near you, you can still order them online. (I love Amazon for all things shopping online.)

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Then came the long journey home. I may have been a bit on the tired side for that leg of the trip, and things can get kind of weird when I'm tired... at least right before I crash. I guess I'm kind of like a toddler in that sense. Hmm. Maybe that should disturb me. I think it disturbs my husband... but I digress. After a brazen show of car dancing, karaoke, voracious junk-food snacking to refuel, and crash power nap, we were home! Then came my second favorite part: assembly.

Now, I'm not going to lie and say that I got everything put together straight away. I mean, it was late by the time we finally reached our humble abode and there were three children to consider. So the project may or may not have lain like this in our office-in-progress for a few days...

However, as I have previously shared, I eventually get up the gumption to start and/or finish something, and so, naturally, I began by assembling the table.

Then I whipped out my handy-dandy glue gun & simply hot-glued the four baseplates on like so:

And voila! A completely finished DIY Lego Table all in about one hour, and it only cost about $30.

The kids have LOVED it! It currently resides in my son's room and all three children use it almost every day. 

**In full disclosure, I should mention that the hot glue did not hold up more than a month. I'm not sure if the glue was just not hot enough to make a good bond, if it was the surfaces being adhered, or what, but with so much regular use the building plates came off the table top. Thankfully, there is no damage to the table or the baseplates, so I think it can be easily remedied. Maybe I'll try craft spray adhesive (definitely more messy & permanent) or just use 3M mounting putty (less work and temporary/movable). In the meantime, my kids aren't complaining. They just keep building as if nothing is wrong!**

We keep the Legos in one of the larger plastic storage tubs (Brick Box) that we bought the girls' for Christmas. I have all the kit manuals in the smaller Brick Box we got for our son. Both boxes tuck neatly under the table with plenty of room to spare.

I hope you get to try out something similar for your household's Lego play and storage! Let me know what you come up with... there are TONS of great ideas online! Just Google "Lego table" and be amazed at the plethora of DIY options that come up.

Happy building!