This is a VERY interesting puzzle that I found in the trunk of my mom’s car. She bought it at the thrift store, but didn’t have a chance to show it to me before she went into the hospital. It was extremely entertaining, and she would have loved working on it with me; I would have loved working on it with her too.

It’s called The Moving Puzzle, and is made by the Great American Puzzle Factory. On the box it says “The never-ending, always moving jigsaw puzzle!!” On the back of the box it tells you that there are two ways to approach this tricky image. You can assemble the picture so that it matches the image on the box top, then change your picture by moving the pieces from top to bottom, left to right and so on. Or, you can pick any piece and build your puzzle from it, all the pieces will fit together and the image will grow in all directions, it doesn’t have to be a rectangular puzzle.

I assembled it the first way to begin with. The picture above is the puzzle assembled as it is on the box top; then I started moving things around…

Then I moved many things around and changed the puzzle to be rectangular again, I’m showing it next to the original way it was assembled so that it’s easier to see the differences…

Coral Reef by Lambert and Samborski – Great American Puzzle Factory – 294 pieces

It’s a pretty cool concept, and it was fun to move things around and make the image change. I will say though that everything doesn’t always line up exactly right. If you assemble it to look like the box top the image is fine. When you see where things can move and start changing the puzzle the image doesn’t always line up perfectly. (Just an observation from a puzzle nerd who looks closely at those things 🤓)

At only 294 pieces, it would be great for kids too. This one will end up at the school my daughter works for, and I hope those children enjoy it as much as I did.

It’s a great quality puzzle; the pieces are extremely thick and the colors are lovely with very nice image reproduction. There is only one piece shape, and I cant really comment on the fit because they really only snug up next to each other, they don’t interlock. It wasn’t much of a problem for me because my puzzle board is covered with fabric, but if you work on a slippery surface it would most likely be quite frustrating.

Mom always found the most interesting puzzles when she went thrift store shopping. If you find a Moving Puzzle, give it a try – it’s a different puzzle experience, that’s for sure.