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LEGO Ideas Pop-Up Book Nativity Scene

You might remember that last year for the holidays, Jason Allemann from JKBrickWorks.com showcased a Nativity Scene insert he designed for the #21315 LEGO Ideas Pop-Up Book (which was a project submitted to LEGO Ideas by Jason himself). Since then, Jason received quite a few requests for building instructions for the Nativity Scene, and as the holidays are upon us again, he kindly published them a few days ago.

In the video below, you can see the Nativity Scene insert inside the #21315 LEGO Ideas Pop-Up Book cover. If you don’t have this set yet, I highly recommend it. It features two different and interchangeable fairy tale stories: Little Red Riding Hood, and Jack and the Beanstalk. The set is designed in such a way that the inserts can be removed easily, and you can even install your own custom built inserts. See links at the end of this post for some ideas, and you can see the Nativity Scene insert in action in the video below.

Instructions and parts list for the Nativity Scene insert are now available at Jason’s website at JKBrickWorks.com. The parts list includes all the pieces you will need to build the Nativity Scene. The element and design IDs can be used to find parts on LEGO’s online Pick-A-Brick or Bricks-and-Pieces services (note that not all of the parts may be available). The BrickLink part IDs and links can be used to purchase the parts at the online LEGO marketplace, BrickLink.com.

The instructions show you how to build all of the individual components for the Nativity Scene. Inserting them into the LEGO Ideas Pop-Up Book should be straightforward, but in case anything isn’t clear, Jason demonstrates how the parts fit inside the book in the video above. Also, note that there is a lot of opportunity to further customize the Nativity Scene, especially with animals and minifigs. If you don’t have the specific animals (the goat is particularly rare and expensive as it has been retired), you can just swap them out for whatever animals you have available, or even build them from parts. Jason also used plain minifig parts for Mary and Joseph in the instructions, and it is best to just customize them using whatever pieces you have on hand. Another customization you can do is to place a starry sky printout behind the scene to make the black mechanism for the rising star less stark (or you can also swap the pieces out for white or light-gray).

Building the Nativity Scene insert for the #21315 LEGO Ideas Pop-Up Book can be a nice family project, and it can also become an interactive centerpiece in your holiday decorations. If you like it, head over to JKBrickWorks.com for the instructions. You might already have all the parts you need, or if you are missing some, there is still plenty of time to order them before the holidays. And, as I mentioned the #21315 LEGO Ideas Pop-Up Book is still available at the LEGO Ideas section of the Online LEGO Shop.

What do you think? Do you have the LEGO Ideas Pop-Up Book already? Did you create your own custom inserts for it? And what do you think of the Nativity Scene? Do you plan to build it? Feel free to share your thoughts and discuss in the comment section below!

And you might also like to check out the following related posts:

{ 12 comments… add one }
  • Nofakebricks November 21, 2019, 10:55 AM

    We tried to build this last year but ran into some problems. I can’t remember what it was, but anyway, with the instructions it should be much easier.

    • Hayato November 21, 2019, 11:00 AM

      My kids built this last year from the video Jason posted. It wasn’t exact as we didn’t have all the right pieces, but it worked fine. They had fun filling the book with animals. 😀

  • rainey November 21, 2019, 11:28 AM

    How incredibly generous of him!!!

  • FrenchToast November 21, 2019, 11:50 AM

    Thanks for posting this. We have the book, and it doesn’t seem like you need a whole lot of pieces to build this. And I like your idea of putting something black behind it to hide the technic beams. A nice starry sky would be perfect.

  • hushpuppy November 21, 2019, 12:17 PM

    Man, I just looked up the price of those goats on Bricklink. Wow! Why are they so expensive?

    • Håkan November 21, 2019, 2:01 PM

      Only released in a single set with a mold now discarded, and popularity increased later. Ostriches are pretty expensive, as well.

      (Goats are also a natural fit for themes such as Medieval Castle and Rural Farming, which might be popular builds for AFOL:s.)

      • brickmaster November 21, 2019, 4:01 PM

        I think admin said that the mold got damaged and they just didn’t replace it. Too bad because goats can be used for so many mocs.

        • Håkan November 21, 2019, 4:37 PM

          Yeah, exactly. But there have been many discarded molds throughout the ages, and all parts aren’t popular enough to warrant such high prices…

        • admin November 22, 2019, 10:08 AM

          Yes, the mould got damaged and was never replaced.

  • Adam III November 21, 2019, 3:39 PM

    I wonder if it would be possible to add some lights. Either a lightbrick that could turn on when opening the book, or some small LED lights.

    • admin November 22, 2019, 10:08 AM

      Sure, I don’t see why not. You could incorporate a trigger that would push on the light-brick when you open the book. Or just add some non-LEGO lights.

  • LegoMom November 22, 2019, 10:06 AM

    My kids would fill this scene with dinosaurs. We may need to make a bigger book!

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