This collection contains instructions for building two different snowmen, a gingerbread man and his house, as well as Santa's face and a Reindeer's face, and even a white Christmas tree with pastel decorations he has dubbed a Confetti Tree. While a few of these are what is known as platecraft (building designs using primarily plate pieces), some of them, like the tree and the gingerbread house, are more three dimensional than the others.
There are another six designs in this book that create more traditional looking ornaments that have a symmetry about them, so it doesn't matter how they hang from the Christmas tree. In all of these, he uses some interesting techniques to build outward from a central spire, and they should all provide some inspiration for other, similar builds a LEGO fan can tackle on his or her own.
The last three instructions provided in Volume 2 are models that have a string or hook added to them to make what would otherwise be nice looking stand-alone builds into ornaments. Again, it's easy to see how someone could take their own micro-scale builds and add similar attachments to make their own ornaments. These last three include an old CRT based computer, an arcade crane game, and a container of french fries.
In all cases, the instructions McVeigh presents are clear and could easily be something seen in an official build set. This, coupled with a detailed list of all pieces necessary (including each part's number), makes this an easy book to pick up and build with, provided you have the pieces at hand, of course (and if not, you can find links to order the needed sets on McVeigh's Website or in his resources). Then again, most of the fun of LEGOs is the ability to mix and match the pieces, and given that you might want a wide assortment of LEGO ornaments on your tree, there are some variations you could easily make with what McVeigh provides in The LEGO Christmas Ornaments Book, Volume 2. A change in skin tone can change the look of Santa, or eight reindeer with black noses plus one with a red one can give that Santa a full team. The Mr. and Mrs. Snow figures can have very similar looking clothes, but with some color swaps, they can look different enough to be interesting. The same can be said for the tree and more traditional looking ornaments.
The LEGO Christmas Ornaments Book, Volume 2 isn't a large volume, but what it offers is a nice selection of ideas that could really help to kickstart anyone who is looking to add a bit more of a personal touch to their Christmas tree.
