Dreaming of Puzzles

On December 8, 2019 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzling8 Comments

The oddest thing happened to me yesterday. I was taking one of my many mini naps throughout the day and started to dream about a puzzle I assembled quite a few months ago. I remember feeling frustrated about the fit, and annoyed with myself for placing a few of the pieces incorrectly, and was in the process of switching them to their proper positions when I was startled awake by a loud noise in the other room. I opened my eyes and realized that I was holding my hands as if I had puzzle pieces in them, and my hands were moving as if to switch the pieces.

This story is peculiar for several reasons. First, I’m not a person who remembers my dreams. I wake knowing that I had a dream, but can never remember what they’re about or what happens – even when startled awake. So to remember not only exactly which puzzle I was working on but also how I was feeling in the dream is extremely unusual. Secondly, acting out a dream is not something that has ever happened to me before that I can remember (and hubby says in the 31 years we’ve been married he’s never seen me do it). This is especially true with the medications I’m currently taking. With these meds when I do sleep I wake in exactly the same position as when I nodded off; once in the past week I fell asleep holding a tv remote and woke 7 hours later with it still in my hand.

So my puzzle friends, I’m wondering if that dream meant something. I don’t know that dream interpretation is something I put much stock in, but the fact that I was dreaming of a puzzle completed almost 6 months ago and acting it out seems quite bizarre to me.

Have you ever dreamed of working on a jigsaw puzzle? Have you ever mimed your dream while you were having it?

Frosty Treats

On December 7, 2019December 7, 2019 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles2 Comments

This 300 piece puzzle was great fun, more difficult and time consuming than expected, but still entertaining and beautiful to look at.

When my daughter found the Doug the Pug puzzles, she also brought me this and another 300 piece collage of dogs. She really is an enabler, and she’s quite good at it too! Do I have an awesome daughter or what!? I’ve only got the dog collage left, and my supply of smaller piece count puzzles is dwindling quite low. I may have to send her out on a puzzle finding mission very soon, she seems to know what puzzles I’ll enjoy even better than I do. 😎

Buffalo does a good job with their 300 piece puzzles, these were all excellent quality. The pieces are thick, the images are gorgeous and sharp, and the fit is very, very good. The colors on this puzzle are amazing and make for some delicious looking popsicles. They look absolutely luscious.

It makes me hungry for some frozen treats, we old ladies with hot flashes love frosty treats! When my inner child is playing with matches I’d love to dive headfirst into the freezer and cover myself with anything that would cool me down – but it’s nice to eat popsicles too I suppose.

Frosty Treats 1

Perhaps I need to get out more; I’ve never seen popsicles with kiwi or oranges in them! The colors are beautiful, and it looks like they would taste lovely. Mmmm. 🍧

YEAH In Progress

On December 6, 2019December 6, 2019 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzling6 Comments

Yeah IP

YEAH is finally back in progress. I started it at the beginning of the week, but trying to assemble all the edges first through the fog of some serious pain medications was just too much for this poor old lady’s aging brain.

Luckily, though I’m still peering through the fog, it finally came to me this morning to try to assemble each letter separately and stop trying to make this puzzle conform to how I usually do things. Normally the edge is where most puzzles begin, but this puzzle is a rebel and doesn’t wish to fit into any boxes of how a puzzle is supposed to be. Stop trying to change her! Just let her be herself!

*Now that I think about it, this medication may be just a bit TOO strong. 🥴

Ok, back to the puzzle. Once the decision was made to assemble it letter by letter the progress is going along much more quickly. THIS (or the other spelling) was a 400 piece puzzle, YEAH is 500 pieces; so it may take me a little longer. But who knows? One letter at a time seems to be speeding up the process, so perhaps it’ll be done sooner than you think.

Enjoy your Friday everyone, and happy puzzling! 🧩

London In Snow

On December 5, 2019December 5, 2019 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles3 Comments

It’s my first Christmas puzzle of the season, completed the day after Thanksgiving. Not because I was in any rush to do Christmas puzzles, which regular readers know are definitely NOT my thing; but because I’ve been in a slump lately and need to get some puzzles done and ready to post. Luckily I had 4 Wentworth micro puzzles here, and they’re not only going to be part of the holiday season here on My Jigsaw Journal, but they’re going to save me with some quick and easy completions. 🙂

Wentworth Wooden Puzzles are beautifully made with excellent quality, and I absolutely adore their micro puzzles. They are tiny little puzzles (30-40 pieces) that are easy to carry and quick to put together when you’re in need of a puzzle fix. All PADS sufferers know that feeling when all you want to do is be left alone for 10 minutes so you can get your hands on some puzzle pieces and be swept up in which piece fits here and where does that color go – it’s puzzle bliss. We are all in search of a few minutes of meditation with a puzzle, and these micro puzzles are the perfect thing for it!

This image is perfect for a micro puzzle, because it looks like it would be quite difficult in a larger piece count. The top half is all shades of white and grey, and the bottom is a sea of reds and yellows. I don’t know that it would be one I’d choose to assemble if it were anything larger than a 300 piece cardboard puzzle. That said, it’s truly beautiful artwork by Richard Macneil, and it made for a excellent micro assembly.

London whimsies

My favorite here is the whimsy of the Queen, the extra detail that Wentworth adds to their whimsies makes all the difference; you know exactly who that is with all the added lines, it’s lovely!

All Grinchy-ness aside, I enjoyed this assembly, as I do for all Wentworth puzzles. It has beautiful artwork, is well crafted, and gave me a few minutes of uninterrupted puzzle time that ended with a completed puzzle. Heavenly!

*There is one coming up that I’m dreading a little bit though, it’s a micro puzzle – one of their extra difficult ones with tessellating pieces – that I’ve attempted to assemble before and had to give up on. It brings back memories of Winter Aspen – YIKES! I’m determined to master it though; but I’m not sure if I want to save it until last or just do it and get it over with. Whichever one I choose, wish me luck!

“This” and Other Spellings

On December 4, 2019December 4, 2019 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles5 Comments

I specifically bought this “word” because I would be able to spell something G-rated with it for the blog. My Jigsaw Journal is about jigsaw puzzles first and foremost, and in a smaller sense it’s about me too. This is the perfect puzzle to show both sides of the blog: the strictly jigsaw puzzle side is “This” and the part about me is the other, more R-rated word “S**t”. (Although I don’t consider it that bad of a swear word to be honest, but some people might and I don’t want to offend anyone.)

Since the naughtier word is the one actually shown on the box, I will show the letters arranged in the correct order. This is just a warning for those of you who might not want to see it, at the bottom of the post I will put a bit of empty space and then the picture. I wanted to give you a heads up, if you’re not interested, stop reading once you see the empty space. 😉

Usually when I get a puzzle from a company that makes many other products the puzzles are quite poor in quality. This Knock Knock puzzle though had wonderful quality; the pieces are a good thickness, the fit was very nice, and the image reproduction is excellent with beautiful colors and gold foil. It’s only the first puzzle from this brand that I’ve done, but I’m quite impressed with it and hope that the second puzzle I purchased is similar in quality. Their line of Four-letter puzzles isn’t all cuss words, they also have the words Sexy, Love, Yeah, and Crap. There are only two actual swear words. My second puzzle is Yeah, and I’m looking forward to it!

As my puzzle friend Penny described it when I sent her a picture – it looks like 70’s disco. I didn’t make that connection when I was assembling it, but she’s right, it absolutely looks like a disco puzzle…

This 1

I loved both the quality and the puzzle in general. Since all the letters had the same colors, it was quite difficult at the start. All these similar pieces, where to begin? I started with the S because I could see where the colors bent. Then I focused on the white stripe that runs through each letter, and I could see it curved in the S and where they met in the H and the T. Once I got going it became easier to see what I should be looking for, and it took a bit of sorting to see which bits went with which letter, it stayed difficult till the end. If you’re planning on assembling this, be prepared – it’s pretty challenging!

All in all I’m quite pleased with this purchase. I hadn’t bought any puzzles online since around April until this one. The quality is very good, the puzzle itself makes me smile, and I’m pretty darned proud of myself for getting it assembled. I’m very much looking forward to putting the next one together, I bought YEAH because I loved the colors and the way the letters looked. All the Four-letter puzzles they have are different in color and shape, and I’m hoping the next word is as entertaining as this one was. 🙂

Empty space coming up, don’t go any farther if you don’t want to see the swear word. For the rest of you guys, meet you at the bottom of the post!

This-Shit

It’s just funny to see this word spelled out with a puzzle. I love it! There was a naughtier word available, THE naughtiest word actually; but you can’t spell anything other words with it. I just adore this puzzle, it was very naughty fun! 😈