Now is the time to buy Pooh Duplo sets by Lego. Lego's new preschool line is now viewable (www.lego.com - click on the Preschool button near the bottom of page), and it doesn't include the Hundred Acre wood sets, as yet. So stores will be clearing these sets out to make room for the very extensive new Explore line.

You can find this set and other Pooh Duplos at many Big Lot stores for more than half off the suggested retail price.

Tigger's Slippery Slide, #2985 (you can reference these sets by number at Lugnet.com's Lego Set Database) is one of the smaller sets but it contains some big play values.

The slide is the best piece in the set. It's red, curvy and will attach to other Duplo blocks to create an great ride experience for Tigger or any other Duplo figures or blocks. This slide is featured in the far more expensive Lights and Sound Rescue set (retails at around $50), where it is part of the fire station.

Still, in order to build the ultimate Hundred Acre Wood, it's necessary to buy more sets. Therein lies this product line's greatest drawback. If you buy several, you will end up with umpteen Poohs, as he is featured in almost every set. Fortunately little kids hardly ever mind, and duplicate Duplo Pooh figures can be given away to friends, sold on Ebay, or stored for the inevitable occasion when he gets LOST. And what kind of Hundred Acre Wood, even one as fully modular as Lego's, is missing a Pooh! I ask you!


By the way, Lego seems to be trying to avoid this problem with their other licensed preschool line, Bob the Builder, which features the man himself in only a few of the sets (more Bob is planned for 2002-3, and I was pleased to be able to get the new Wallpapering Wendy recently).

Now on to the other pieces. The wonderful thing about Lego's Tigger, is that you can attach him to your Duplo sculpture by not one but two feet- arranging him either vertically or horizontally, as befits his nature of constant motion. Pooh, meanwhile can sit, but he can only affix himself to a brick with his feet, standing or bending (to see the butterflies on an included 2x1x2 printed brick). Pooh has one hand in front and one in the back so that he can pull his cute blue wagon behind him. The wagon can carry Duplo bricks or other cargo. You can also build surprisingly large structures inside the wagon as there is a 2x2 building space inside.

The quality of these figures cannot be overstated. Despite my efforts, we have managed to acquire one or two plastic Tigger figurines from other manufacturer's playsets (thank you, Once Upon a Child for your 25 cent bin). These are cheap, breakable and subject to being bitten. The paint flakes off and the figures can crack. Lego's figures, on the other hand, like most of their products, are not subject to breaking by anything less than a sledgehammer. In fact, the Pooh figs are even sturdier than most Lego characters. They also look more like the cartoon characters than other toys.

There is a brown tree (used to support the slide), a yellow trunk piece (2x2x2), a rounded purple (purple is the signature color of this line) sign reading "Winnie the Pooh", a rounded green "shrub" piece, which also symbolizes leaves on the tree, and a few other 2x2 and 2x4 bricks to round out the set. There are also 2 flowers, one yellow, one green, that have a 1x1 peg at the top and bottom. My child loves to build long "flower towers" out of these and the others she has from other sets.

Happy sliding!


Recommended: Yes

Amount Paid (US$): 8
Type of Toy: Blocks
Age Range of Child: 3 to 5 Years