Set Review - 30101 Friends Skate Boarder

As an incentive for our girls to do chores around the house, we offer stickers for child labor.  Most chores are worth 1 sticker each but sometimes an extra can be earned for doing something big without being asked.  Once enough stickers are racked up we give them a value of about a dime each to redeem for prizes.  This occurs about once a month.  LEGO Friends polybag sets make nice redemption prizes as the price point is usually about four bucks.  So for doing about ten chores a week they can have a new LEGO set.  One of the more recent sets won was this Friends Skate Boarder polybag.

When I first saw the set I almost put it back.  It's just a random collection of pieces.  But I had to remind myself that it's for the children.  So I picked it up, it was later redeemed and immediately opened and assembled.  I was right, it's just a small collection of random pieces.

A few of those pieces make a bistro table.  I grew up with Classic Space so all I could think about was miniature rocket ships.  A few more bits make a planter (I believe) with some flowers in it.  Must be a hybrid flower as two of the stems contain one color but the third is a separate color.  Thankfully there are two extra flowers and an extra stem to make two plants, one of which looks like a deer chewed it.  The final bit is a fire hydrant for no known reason.  It can all be held together on a piece of decorated plaza sidewalk.

Having Mia on a longboard is kind of cool touch though.  My oldest daughter is a bit of a tomboy and this appealed to her.  "See, girls can do boy stuff."  "Mm-hm.  Maybe someday you'll be able to ride a skateboard while eating an ice cream sundae.  But in your case it might be hard to eat the ice cream because you'll be wearing a helmet.  Bad Mia."  Oops, LEGO.  You're promoting disdain for safety here.

The highlight of this set was dad creating some sort of rocket car by precariously affixing the 4x6 plate atop the skateboard and attempting to build some sort of cockpit around it.  For the girls, this creation was more fun than the little bits and bobs in the set.

I suppose this set would make a nice addition to a larger Heartlake City layout.  But without cars and dogs to avoid, there wasn't a whole lot of sustained fun for the target audience.  At 28 pieces and 1 minifigure this set doesn't feel like a raging deal.  Depending on your build style it's not that much of a parts pack either.  I can't really tell you what's right for you but it made a good prize for my girls.  Beyond that, who knows?


Give Mia something more to interact with: