Alyverse

Thanks for pointing those details out. Getting new variants does increase the sets' appeal. I missed the glow in the dark spider too, that's a neat touch.

I'm feeling pretty underwhelmed by this first wave. The Ford Anglia is a good offering for those who don't have one but at this point I have a small fleet. The Hedwig in the Privet Drive sign set just looks odd to me. The Sorting Hat is well done but I prefer playsets to sculptural pieces. The Forbidden Forest is a good creature pack but has nothing new in it if I'm not mistaken, and the colour scheme for the trees throws me off. Even the Boathouse, Owlery and Hagrid's Hut have just enough in terms of useful pieces and nice minifigures to get me to pick them up, but they're not must-have day one buys. I think the summer wave is bound to be more interesting and exciting.

I'm away for a couple of days but I will get back to you. Like everyone, I am eagerly anticipating the DA and CMF reveals. It's my birthday and all I want is to see them! I live in Canada and the regular sets still say "Coming Soon" without a date so I'm not sure when I'll be able to get any of this wave but even seeing what's to come is very exciting. I pre-built a Privet Drive MOC and it's just waiting for the stickers and minifigs.

This was one of my favourite builds as well. It's so cozy and charming and your display is a nice little nook. There was a power outage while I was working on it but luckily I had enough candles to keep building, which really added to the effect. I always part out sets eventually but I used the general concept and the circular window when I built the Hufflepuff common room. I even did circular doors to the dorms.

The new sets look excellent! I'm so excited for the reveal of the Diagon Alley because I've been working on a MOC of it this past winter. I started by renovating set 10217 and expanded it to include a whole alleyway worth of buildings. Weasley's Wizard Wheezes was still unfinished when I found out the D2C is coming so I paused that in anticipation of repurposing the pieces that come in the set. I'm really looking forward to the sticker sheet because I haven't done custom signage yet. I hope they include some cool merch to go inside the shops. Diagon Alley street view on instagram

As I wait as patiently as possible for July 1, I laid out what I have for my Hogwarts so far. I recently learned there is a convention taking place in my city this summer so I'm working to get it into a presentable state for then. You may notice the Clocktower is missing, which is because I want to use pieces from the forthcoming set as I build it. You can see the clocktower courtyard off to the left of the quad in anticipation.

I hope it's possible to make a light-hearted joke like "Waiting an extra sixty days for Lego may not be twelve years in Azkaban, but it's sure going to feel like it!" Of course, I understand why they have to implement this kind of measure, but I really think they should include info on staggered release dates in the press release so we don't get our hopes up if we reside in the unlucky region of the world. I've been doing a lot of work pre-building and setting aside parts in anticipation for modding. I even ordered some minifig parts to fill out the cast of the Yule Ball, so I really had to dial my excitement back when I realized I had to add a couple of months to my mental countdown.

I've been experimenting with some ways to improve the upcoming Horntail. I'm using the Thunderbird head as a stand-in and while I'm okay with the shape, it's just plain too small. To try to mitigate this I fanned some horns out behind the head. I've also started a thicker neck and tail, as well as some posable claws for the wings. Then I started working on some stands for the First Task. Photo here: First Task MOC

Last week it occurred to me that other people were probably looking forward to the next Lego Harry Potter wave as much as I am and boy, did y'all deliver with the in-depth, funny and mostly civil discussion. Many thanks to everyone who has contributed their thoughts and information. I thought the first wave was extremely well executed and I'm so pleased TLG is putting a strong effort into it. In addition to some much-needed updates, we've also received some surprises I wouldn't have even thought to hope for, like the minifigs of the founders and now the stag patronus. This is especially helpful to me because my building efforts have mostly been various parts of the Potterverse, with Hogwarts naturally being the centrepiece. I got some of the earliest HP sets when I was a kid and then emerged from my dark ages just in time to snag a good portion of the very last wave. Though I've been working on it for years, my progress has improved a lot since last year's wave due to all the new pieces and a fresh burst of inspiration. The clocktower and Hagrid's hut are both places I've been gathering parts for and begun planning, so it feels serendipitous to get official versions soon. My biggest hope is for some kind of new piece that will enable attaching brick built spell effects to the wands, but I don't see much indication of that happening. As long as the Horntail turns out right, I'll be happy. On a random note, I find the old version of Luna's head works a bit better with the Cowardly Lion CMF headpiece. You can see more of the mouth.