A few years ago, if you had told me that I would have spent my day putting together a Playmobil Zoo I would not have believed you.  But here we are. So today after fitting together 250 pieces over about three hours, we have a zoo in our living room.   An appropriate time since we’re up to Z on the A-Z photo challenge.

Which Way To The Lions?

This is a play set that Mr. C received for his birthday earlier this month.  This was also just about the time that I gave up on my goal to keep track of all of the various pieces of his toys as they float about the house since the total number of toy pieces has skyrocketed since his birthday.

Playmobil sets are incredible.  Precision engineered high impact plastic pieces that depict every imaginable thing that could be present at the zoo. Every piece is a little work of plastic art.  My only complaint is that the 250 pieces advertised on the box is deceptive.  While you do get plenty of animals, the 250 pieces include the tiny handle for a bucket, the tiny wheels for a baby stroller, multiple parts for the  locks on the animal pens, individual flowers for the tropical plants, and teeny tiny brushes for you to fit into the the zoo keepe’s tiny hands so they can  brush the animals.

Since his birthday was two weeks ago, Mr. C thought it was high time that I put this thing together today.  so he grabbed the box, which is as big as he is, and dumped the contents on the living room floor.  ”Time to play Zoo, Dada!’

I had been putting this off for some time, partly since he had so many other things to play with, and also admittedly since there are 250 tiny pieces to fit together. Here’s a “Before” picture below!

Where’s the handle for the elephant’s food bucket ?

I suppose that another reason for my delay is that my spatial abilities are entirely lacking.  Those sections on the SAT where you were supposed to try to figure out what a shape looked like if it was turned 90 degrees, and then 180 degrees, and then 360 degrees ?  I just threw up my hands and guesssed. I did end up doing fine anyway, so I probably made up for my spatial ignorance in other areas, at least I hope so.

Playmobil sets are sold around the world, so they provide instructions without words, which I suppose makes it easier to understand.  It would be easy for most people, but not for me.  There is only one correct way to install any given piece in a Playmobil set, and I will usually  try every other possible combination before finally finding the one that was illustrated on the directions.  Gates were installed upside down.  I had the roof for the lion’s den over the elephant house. and the baby stroller only had three wheels for most of the day.  The dumping of the parts on the floor resulted in several pieces flying under the sofa and chairs which added to the time involved.  But eventually everything was set up, and we’re only missing the nozzle end of the hose in the elephant house, and the lock to the giraffe pen. They’ll turn up some time I guess, most likely years from now.

Time to Feed the Giraffes

Mr. C was thrilled with all the little pieces.  He washed the elephant with the hose, brushed the zebra with the brushes and feed the giraffe the acacia fronds.   He was especially impressed with the teeny teeny teeny tiny little toy animals that I had to  place carefully on the shelf of the gift shop.

He had a great time.  I suggested that we combine some Lego buildings and Matchbox cars and it looked like his head was going to explode from excitement.

Apparently, there are additional add on sets we can get. Including areas for pandas, meerkats, penguins, and kangaroos.  A whole world of parts for me to step on!

OK kids, lets go back to our Matchbox car, and go home to our Lego house!