April 2, 2017 – My Jigsaw Journal

I can’t believe it! All 10 sections of the world’s largest puzzle are complete! What an accomplishment, I am so unbelievably proud of myself! I’ve already posted about Bambi, but I wanted to post pictures of all the sections as well. I don’t know when they’ll all be connected, but I will definitely get that done at some point and take a LOT of pictures! I hate having my picture taken, but I’ll definitely be letting people take pictures of me that day, that’s for sure. 😉

Here are all 10 sections in the order they were assembled….

4032 pieces assembled – 36,288 pieces to go!

Snow White was begun on September 28, 2016 and completed on October 17, 2016. Click here for the full post on that day. I almost wish I’d saved this one till nearer the end. I was overwhelmed when I first started and don’t know if I enjoyed it as much as I could have.

8064 pieces assembled- 32,256 pieces to go!

Cinderella was started on October 21, 2016 and completed on November 5, 2016. Click here for the full post on that day. Ole Cindy here was a difficult section, but I got her done! The picture is quite dark and doesn’t do her justice, you’ll see when the entire puzzle is assembled. 🙂

12,096 pieces assembled – 28,224 pieces to go!

Dumbo began assembly on November 8, 2016 and was finished on November 19, 2016. Click here for the full post on that day. Dumbo was so enjoyable to assemble, and super cute as well!

Peter Pan (the hardest section in my humble opinion) was started on November 22, 2016 and completed on December 5, 2016. Click here for the full post on that day. I think I’m proudest of this section as it was the most difficult for me.

The Jungle Book, my favorite Disney movie, got started on December 7, 2016 and was completed for the FIRST time on December 19, 2016. It was done for about 5 whole minutes before I tried to move the board to take a better picture and it all fell off. Click here for the post from that horrible day. I assembled it for the SECOND time from December 20, 2016 to December 27, 2016. Click here for the post for that day. Thank goodness for digital cameras/pictures!

The Little Mermaid was assembled from December 29, 2016 to January 11, 2017. Click here for the full post. This one was one of my favorite sections to assemble. It looks like all that blue would be difficult but I loved this section!

Fantasia was started on January 14, 2017 and completed on January 28, 2017. Click here for that day’s full post. This section I was dreading the most and I was happy to be wrong about it – it wasn’t nearly as hard as I thought it would be! And if I want to I can assemble this one again because I have an extra section. 😉

Getting near the end now! The Lion King was assembled from February 2, 2017 to February 16, 2017. Click here for the full post from that day. The sky in this section is absolutely GORGEOUS! The pictures don’t even come close, the colors are stunning!

Beauty and The Beast began assembly on February 22, 2017 and was finished on March 8, 2017. Click here for that day’s full post. This was one of two I saved for last because I knew it would be fun! I wasn’t wrong – loved it!

Last but definitely not least – Bambi. I got started on Bambi on March 16, 2017 and finished up on April 2, 2017. Click here for the post on the very last section. I’m so proud!

Special thanks to my wonderful angel of a husband for not having a fit when I spent a bunch of money buying the world’s largest jigsaw puzzle, for building me the board I used to assemble this puzzle and the adjustable table to assemble it on, for helping me figure out how to store all the completed sections, and for all the help, encouragement and patience the past six months. I love you sooooo much!

Also special thanks to my mom for being one of the few people who was always interested in how the puzzle was coming along – or at least pretending to be. Thanks for being part of this project not only with your support and encouragement, but also for being the only person to help assemble each and every section – at least one piece in each image was put in by mom, and sometimes many more than just one! I love you to pieces!

Thanks also to everyone who has followed along while I worked on this puzzle. Thanks for giving me the incentive to make sure I worked on the puzzle every day no matter what – cause I knew you were “watching”. You helped!

I did it! I actually did it! I know it’s a bit anticlimactic since the entire puzzle is not all connected, but for now I’m thrilled with the fact that I have finished all FORTY THOUSAND THREE HUNDRED TWENTY pieces! Wow!

*actually I assembled 44,352 pieces since I’m an idiot and dropped a section after it was completed and had to reassemble it. 😐 Yup. I. Am. An. Idiot*

Bambi was as much fun as I’d hoped it would be, and I had a great time assembling it. Flower was the cutest thing, Thumper was more difficult than he looks and Bambi’s little legs were so skinny! It really was a fun section to put together and I’m so very proud of myself!

I’m a little sad too, this was 6 months of my life. And I’m done, it’s over. There is still the final assembly of the 10 sections to go, but who knows when I’ll be able to do that. But now there’s no more giant puzzle to work on every day. It’s been here for so long I don’t know what I’m going to do without it. 😦 Although, if I find I’m missing it terribly, I always have the extra Fantasia section I could assemble. It has a damaged piece and Ravensburger replaced it for me so I still have the original section!

I’m not sure why I decided I wanted to do an extremely large puzzle, but it seems I picked the perfect time. Until this puzzle was released there weren’t any large piece count puzzles that I wanted to do. If you’re going to spend a lot of money and time on a puzzle it needs to be an image that you like. The other giant puzzles had beautiful images, don’t get me wrong, but they just weren’t my cup of tea.

Less than a month after I decided to try to find a large puzzle to attempt, Ravensburger announced they were coming out with a new puzzle to break the record of world’s largest commercially available jigsaw puzzle. I love Disney movies, especially the older ones, and Ravensburger is my FAVORITE puzzle manufacturer so this was perfect!

It was released in Europe in September of last year, and I ordered it from a puzzle retailer in Germany. It arrived September 26, and the rest is history I suppose. 😉 Actually the history of me completing this puzzle is archived here on my blog!

So thanks to everyone for hanging around and “watching” me work on this project. It was fun and terrifying, exciting and scary, exhilarating and overwhelming – and I kept at it and I did it! 🙂 😮 🙂