Retro Dogs

On January 16, 2018 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles3 Comments

Isn’t this an adorable puzzle? Look at all the cute puppies! My oldest son gave this to me for Christmas, and my daughter helped me put it together on Christmas Day while waiting for Christmas dinner. A super fun puzzle that was made even better because I got to work on it with my baby girl.

Easy to sort, easy to assemble, adorable dogs and a great finished image. Re-marks makes some great collages. There were lots of words to assemble, which is always fun for me, and I also loved that my dog’s breed is represented there too (a cute little Boston Terrier, second from the left in the bottom row).

I’ve really been having a good time with the 300 piece puzzles lately, and glad that one of my Christmas present puzzles was 300 pieces too! I still enjoy larger piece counts, but there’s nothing quite like a smaller puzzle that’s still a little bit of a challenge that can be finished in one day. So fun!

The quality was pretty good; thick, sturdy pieces that fit together well. I enjoy the larger size of the 300 piece puzzles, and I enjoy being able to finish them quickly. This one was quick, fun, and cute as a barrel of puppies! Definitely recommended. 🐶

Mountain Vigil

On January 15, 2018January 15, 2018 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store PuzzlesLeave a comment

My black belt thrift store shopper knows what I like, and bought this puzzle just for me, because for some odd reason I love puzzles with quilts. I don’t know why I like them so much, that’s just how it is. This was such an interesting quilt puzzle, I had the best time assembling it! Unfortunately it was missing 2 pieces, bummer. 😐

This puzzle was mostly the normal Sunsout quality – good thickness, variety of piece shapes, nice image reproduction. But it was also interesting in that it was grid cut instead of random, and the fit was much less tight than normal – I enjoyed both of these things. Normally I find the fit of the “regular” rectangular Sunsout puzzles a bit too tight but the fit of this puzzle was just about perfect. Also, most Sunsout puzzles I’ve done have been randomly cut but this was grid (ribbon) cut; I don’t know if I’ve ever done a grid cut Sunsout puzzle. I like both random or grid cut puzzles – I swing both ways. 😉

The artist, Rebecca Barker, likes quilts too as all of her puzzles are “quiltscapes”; with a quilt at the forefront and a secondary scene it blends into in the background. They’re so interesting and colorful, I love them and hope to find more. This one was a joy to assemble and even easier than I thought it would be, especially the background scene of the proud stag and his family. Just beautiful!

This puzzle is out of print, but if you find one I definitely recommend it. It was fun and interesting from beginning to end. 👍

Cardinals and Birch

On January 14, 2018January 14, 2018 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store PuzzlesLeave a comment

Mom and I assembled this puzzle together just before Christmas. It was relatively quick and fun, and an excellent quality puzzle. It makes me smile when I look at it, because Mrs. Cardinal up there looks a little cranky to me! I wonder if hubby did something to tick her off. 🙂

I enjoy the Buffalo puzzles, especially the 300 piece ones. The size of the pieces is nice, makes for a good size finished puzzle and they fit together extremely well. They’re thick and sturdy and the image reproduction is really lovely. The tree bark made this puzzle a little bit of a challenge, but it’s nothing for me and my puzzle buddy – we made short work of it. We enjoy the challenge as long as it’s not too frustrating, and work together really well.

Cardinals seem to be a very popular subject for jigsaw puzzles, a quick search at Puzzle Warehouse brings up 43 puzzles with cardinals, and an additional 31 cardinal puzzles that are out of stock at the moment. Holy Songbird Batman! That’s a lot of cardinals! 🐦

They’re a beautiful bird, and it’s fitting that they’re in so many puzzles. If you’re a fan of cardinals and you come across this puzzle I highly recommend it – we had a great time assembling it.

Garden Traditions

On January 13, 2018 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store PuzzlesLeave a comment

This was a fun puzzle that went together pretty quickly. Again, it wasn’t a puzzle image that I would buy new, but it was definitely one that we’d buy at the thrift store. As usual, I enjoyed it immensely and ended up liking the image much more once it was all assembled.

A 500 piece Ravensburger is just about the perfect size puzzle for me when I haven’t been feeling well. I can only sit for a limited amount of time and a 500 piece is 4 times easier than a 1000 piece (according to conventional wisdom) and therefore doesn’t seem to require as much thought or time studying the pieces. I can pull the pieces for a section and put them together relatively quickly, giving me a sense of completion and making it easier for me to walk away for a while to take a break from sitting or standing to work on it.

I enjoy the 500 piece Ravensburger puzzles in both the smaller and larger piece sizes. The larger size seems to go together more quickly for me, but they’re both quite fun if you’ve got a good image. I’ve done a couple Jane Maday puzzles in the past month or so and find that they’re quite fun to do and just the right amount of challenge. I hope we find more of her puzzles at the thrift stores. 🙂 There’s an adorable 350 piece puzzle of hers from Cobble Hill called Christmas Train that I’ve seen on Puzzle Warehouse’s site, it looks like a great puzzle for next Christmas!

My Space

On January 12, 2018 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store PuzzlesLeave a comment

Absolutely gorgeous puzzle, but much more challenging than I’d assumed! The water in the background was easy enough to find and assemble, but the rest of the pieces took much more focus and attention. I was planning on this little 300 piece puzzle only taking an hour or so. Wrong!

The quality of this puzzle was fair. The finish was fairly shiny and caused glare even on the lighter color pieces, and the tabs were very easily bent, and all the pieces were ballerinas (2 prong/2 hole). On the plus side, you can see that besides the shine the image reproduction is beautiful, and the pieces fit together very well. It still shocks me sometimes how each piece with blobs of smudgy colors fits together to make such a lovely image. Taking the picture gives you a completely different look at the finished image, and it’s surprising how a slightly different perspective changes things.

I didn’t enjoy this puzzle as much as I’d hoped, but I still had fun with the assembly. Most of it was done in bed because it was a bad day for me and sitting wasn’t possible for more than a few minutes at a time. I’m glad I still have my old white board that I can use in bed for assembly – it comes in very handy!