I am completely in love with these 500 piece puzzles from Cra-Z-Art. They are a series of shaped puzzles of various animals/houses/objects/food and they are so much fun! Each of the boxes is a total of around 500 pieces and includes between 12-16 smaller shaped puzzles. I think I’ve done all of them, but there may be one or two that I have yet to find. They’re all adorable and unbelievably entertaining, and great for when you don’t have a ton of time to sit and puzzle – or even if you prefer to sit down and put them all together at once.

I’ve assembled these 12 before, but I received another copy as a gift for Christmas from my puzzle pal Penny, and putting them together again isn’t a burden at all; I absolutely love these small shaped puzzles, and doing any of them again is a joy! 💝

This time around I’m showing each of the puzzles. This box of 12 cottages will be spread out over 4 posts: 1) to show each of the 12 puzzles close up and appreciate the artwork, and 2) to give myself a little breathing room as far as posts in the queue ready to go – I’m finding it hard to puzzle lately, sitting at the table is too painful for me for any length of time. So get ready for 4 days of tiny cottage puzzles, I hope you enjoy them as much as I did!

The flowers climbing up this house are so lovely; my thumb is NOT green, so I don’t know what kind of flowers grow on a climbing vine, but it sure would be pretty to have. They definitely wouldn’t survive a hurricane down here in Florida, but it’s nice to think about them adorning the front of my house. 🙂

I love the color of this little flower shop, and more pretty climbing flowers! Also, keep an eye out for cats, you’ll find at least one in every puzzle. I thought at first the artist must definitely be a cat person, but after a bit of research I’ve learned that she and her husband live in Michigan and only have a dog. I wonder why there’s a black cat in each puzzle. Perhaps as a tribute to Heronim (Harry Wysocki, brother of Charles), another prominent Americana artist from Michigan?

This seems like a perfect puzzle for fall; apples and pumpkins for sale, and a black cat resting on a bale of hay. Of the three cottages shown today, this one is my favorite – fall is my favorite season. Unlike some of the other cottages, this one looks as though it’s been “cut” out of a larger painting. You can see in the border that there was more going on in the background. I’d love to see the rest of the image!