Castle!

This super cool LEGO castle my brother built has a bunch of cool brick techniques I'm going to show you.

 Neat entrance, swords held up by horizontal clip bricks. Flag attached by a 1x2 handled bar plate. Two inverted 1x2 slope bricks to create an arch.

 Whoa, wait a sec. Why are there two crests? Make up your mind castle.

 The second story.

 The King sits on his throne.

 A lookout in the tower. No, I have no idea what the golden thing on the left is.

 Cool brick work on the bottom. Some 2x4 inverted slope bricks give the appearance of some supports.

 The side of the castle.

 Other sides.

 Wait, wait, wait. First two crests, now a guy has samurai swords? (I guess they're ninja swords, since I think it's from a LEGO Ninjago set.)

 Cool feature. two 1x2x3 sloped bricks create the triangle shape.

 The front of the tower is actually headlight bricks and a 1x4 tile.

 Built in headlight bricks and a 1x2 tile give the blank stretch of wall texture.
Two 1x2 slope bricks and two 1x2 inverted slope bricks create this diamond shape.

 The vine is attached by a brick with side stud.

 What happened when I tried to remove the top so I could get a picture of the treasure chest. Whoops.

 Here's the chest.

(I put it back together, no worries. He'll will never know. Unless he reads this. Oh well.)

Abandoned Castle

My brother recently created this LEGO castle ruins.

 Over grown, worn down by nature, covered in vines...

 A spider. Alright, you go first.

 Close up of the trees and plants growing inside.

 The top tower, covered with moss and plants.

 Some worn down, rotting. wood

  An old stone doorway.

 Vines creeping up the old stone walls.

 Exposed studs for a worn, crumbled look.

 Two brave explorers checking out the ruins. (My brothers comment after seeing the post "No! The girl lives in the castle and is a sniper who kills all who enter! The guy is her mortal enemy!)

This creation is a cool example of using different shapes and colors of bricks for texture effects. See what you can come up with!

Pirate Ship

Pirate ship! (The blue is my brothers comments on this post, purple is me.)

 WHAT ON EARTH?!
Is that Yoda's head?!! Don't blame me, my brother built this. I'm just taking pictures. Eh... Why did you add Yoda's head? I don't know.

 The pirate behind the wheel.

 Cannon. (It actually fires!)

 I removed the cannon so you can see the barrel full of cutlasses and a pistol.

 Every pirate worth his salt needs a parrot! Worth his salt? What does that mean?

Microscale Cats!

I whipped up these quick, four piece kitties since we don't have any actual LEGO cats.

 There are a few variations I made, my brother added the tail on one.
All you need to build them is

• 1 1x2 slanted brick
• 1 1x1 plate
• 1 1x1 rounded plate
• 1 1x1 vertical clip tile (Or a 1x1 slant, or anything else to use for ears.)

 The tail is a 1x2 plate with a handled bar on the short end, with a thingymabobber attached. It might be called a robot claw or hand or something like that.

 Three little kitties! They can be any color you'd like. I stuck to the pieces I had. The one on the left is a tabby, light gray with dark gray stripes.

Kitties!

 One has a clip plate for ears, the other has a slope, which makes it look as if its ears are folded back. You can use whichever option you wish, though in my opinion, the clip plate looks better.

Meow. Meow. Meow. Meow.

Arcade Machine

Time for a tutorial! (Joe's commentary after I made the post is in blue.)

 Pieces Needed:

• 2 2x2 slanted bricks
• 1 2x4 plate
• 1 2x2x2 slanted brick
• Those two 2x2 rounded/slanted pieces that I have no idea what to call them.

 Attached the slanted bricks to the plate, slanted parts pointing towards the middle. Hey! You did it wrong! This thing *points* is supposed to support this thing! *points*
Yes, I realized after the fact that the plate is on top of the slanted bricks, not under. Whoops.

 Stack the tall slanted brick on top of one of the other slanted bricks, slanted end pointing to the middle.

 Now add those gold pieces like so for the controls and top.

 Ta-da! You have a retro video game machine! (Stack of quarters (Metallic gray 1x1 rounded studs) optional.) They're not quarters! They're studs!

Hey, I just realized! Those studs do look like controls!

Doctor Who LEGO Set!!

 Attention all Whovians! There is now an official LEGO set for Doctor Who! It came out in time for Christmas and we just got our set today, thanks to some Christmas money.
    It comes with the TARDIS, the console room, two Daleks, 11, 12, Clara, and a weeping angel.

 The control room.

 The TARDIS opens up and attaches to the control room to form the entrance. It even has the round things!

You can see in the picture that we're missing one of the 1x2 grilles.

 The outside of the TARDIS.
 For you non-Whovians out there, the TARDIS is a spaceship that's bigger on the inside. It travels in time, and anywhere else. The name is an acronym for Time And Relative Dimension In Space. It has a chameleon circuit that allows it to blend into it's surrounding, but it landed in the 60's and got stuck as a Police Box.

 Close up of the console. So many buttons!

 The control panel on the railing. The one on the other side is the same.

 To open the TARDIS, you remove the top (attached by just two studs) and flip up the police box signs.

 Then, you can pull it open and attach it to the console room.

 This technic piece plugs into the technic brick under the door.

 Even the under side of the console has details.

 The console is several sections, held on by clips.

 Now onto the minifigures.
Here is the twelfth Doctor, played by Peter Capaldi. He features his typical scowly face and attack eyebrows, his purple jacket and his old screwdriver.

 Here is the eleventh Doctor, played by Matt Smith.

Bow ties are cool.

 And here's Clara, companion to 11 and 12.

 Clara and Eleven have alternate expressions, though twelve keeps the same face.

 Eleven comes with a fez!

I wear a fez now. Fezzes are cool.

If you are wondering why I am referring to the characters as numbers, the Doctor is a Timelord, an alien who can change his appearance to avoid death. 11 and 12 are different incarnations of the same person.
 The set also includes a weeping angel, which first appeared in the season three episode 'Blink' which if you aren't a Whovian, is a good one to start with.

 The angel's head turns around to reveal its scary face!

Don't blink!

 The set also comes with two Daleks.

EXTERMINATE!!

 The TARDIS can also hold a minifigure!

 Two studs outside the door allow a minifigure to be attached and the TARDIS can be closed with it inside.

 Unfortunately, the front doors don't actually open. It opens up in the back to attach it to the console room.

 One more shot of the Doctor and Clara in the TARDIS!

The set is available on Amazon for 70 dollars. (I got it on sale for 60) If you love Doctor Who, this is definitely worth the purchase! Me and my brother have been playing with it all afternoon after assembling it.