MIRACLE

A couple of days ago I had started to unpack the nativity set in my living room and was thinking about another Christmas season of using the broken one armed Jesus ornament as the centrepiece.

As I was unwrapping the individual figurines (I bubblewrap my nativity stuff) I unwrapped what I thought was just one of the smaller models, maybe one of the sheep but it wasn’t.

There it was, a brand new unbroken baby Jesus!

For the last couple of Christmases I have griped about how stores don’t sell individual nativity pieces (and nobody on ebay seems to either) and asked around everywhere to get a replacement. No such joy, until this recent comeuppance.

I won’t question how this mystery replacement model found its way into a sealed up cardboard stable and twisted itself in bubblewrap at the bottom of a large decorations box…

Fact is, if I actually bought a replacement Jesus or had one given to me I would have remembered something like that. There also is no way anyone would have gone to so much trouble to plant this on me either considering how I store my decorations very tightly.

To me, this is an unexpected Christmas blessing and miracle. I feel this is certainly a small happy event I have to share with all I know.

God has a great and generous sense of humour

TMNT: FESTIVE FURY

I had the idea last Christmas to make up some custom TMNT decorations through the Mini Mutants line and maybe attempt to army build some trooper characters along the way.

I think in the end the decoration idea took a different turn and became a multi-purpose figurine idea that I could share out with local friends and family. (Although I want to next Christmas possibly do this again and expand a bit a more.)

I’m not sure how far I can class these TMNT as customs or if I can class them at all, but custom is an easier word to use than modification =).

I dubbed the name Festive Fury because it soulds almost like Fist of Fury (say it fast) and also because... its 'Festive' :)

The project itself was easy going and non cost-effective with using pound shop props (the tinsel tape, the black/white snowflakes, copper wire, keychain loops, and packaging bags) and all in all not so time-consuming either.

This is a small fans project I enjoyed throwing together. I hope it certainly cracks a few smiles anyway.

MEGATRON CHRISTMAS ORNAMENT

Megatron arrived this Sunday gone in true Christmas post fashion. This is one decent ornament indeed, and recommended to those who have a big Christmas tree to hang him as Megs is a little hefty. The design itself looks like it is based on the excellent Revoltech Megatron figure. Thanks to Rose at Ninja Pizza for grabbing this one for me.



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ASSEMBLED

I got round to assembling those Brave Knockoffs into thier giant gestault form. Not bad... Shame about the clash of colours but still something that stands high, dominant and mighty like all gestaults should :D

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BRAVE SERIES KNOCKOFFS

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These rather splendid Brave Series knockoffs arrived in the post yesterday. For those who don’t know, Brave has been described as the spiritual successor to Transformers in Japan during the 90s. Anyone who liked the overall design of Transformers will like definitely like Brave.

These great counterfeit figures were found in Staples (yes the stationary store) by my good pal Phil Ayres (you can read his many TF reviews HERE). This knockoff is that of the character God Max. There is a combined form of all three of these toys for which I currently have no instructions for, however I’ll cover that in another entry.

Individually these are not bad. Each has a handheld weapon and the transformation is easy. Out of the three, the jet (Jet Max) is the least interesting and most generic looking, but he does play a part in this trio as a gestalt piece and flyboy. The other two, one (Dush Max) being a cool red sports car and the other (Drill Max) a drill tank (looking very like Killbaison and Drillhorn of Transformers: Victory, and possibly a homage) have an interesting chest weapon gimmick that is activated by a small lever on the hip area.

From this link HERE you can see the original toys and their combined form, the weapons also combine too make a double bladed sword.

There could be more Brave Knockoffs doing the rounds, and these 3 are probably the start.