Author: Stacey at myjigsawjournal

Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood

On By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles3 Comments
Mr Rogers
Mister Rogers Neighborhood – Aquarius – 500 pieces

The top half of this puzzle was much easier than the bottom; I knew it might be a little challenging, but I had no idea how much. Fortunately I did enjoy it as much as I’d hoped, and the background colors were my favorite part – obviously. 🙂

It’s fun when you receive puzzles as gifts, they may not always be what you might have chosen yourself, but most of the time they end up being more fun than you thought. I almost always give them a try; someone cared enough to pick out a puzzle just for me, it would be thoughtless of me to dismiss it just because I didn’t pick it out myself.

Most of the difficulty in this puzzle lies with the picture they’ve used; in the background Mister Rogers is in sharp focus, while in the foreground The Neighborhood of Make Believe is out of focus and quite blurry.

You can see the difference when the pictures are side by side, it’s quite striking actually. Still, I don’t believe the fault lies with the reproduction, it’s the picture itself.

This image brought back memories, I recall watching the show when I was young, mostly the opening scene where he would come in singing and changing his sweater and shoes. I also recall the Neighborhood of Make Believe with King Friday who bellowed and didn’t always think first before speaking, and Daniel Tiger who was very shy and sweet. (Daniel was my favorite 🐯)

I’ve watched the documentary about Fred Rogers, and I’m looking forward to the movie starring Tom Hanks. Mister Rogers was a kind, loving man who cared deeply about children and spent his life educating, uplifting, and championing them. I don’t know if many outside the US are aware of him or his show, but I certainly watched and loved it as a child. 💗

My Free Puzzle

On By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzling10 Comments

BOX.indd

This is the update of the 12 Nightmare Christmas Puzzles advent calendar set – I got my free puzzle, and it’s shown above. To say I am underwhelmed doesn’t cover it, I’m a little disgusted too.

First of all, I don’t care for the image; it’s a little dark (the actual box image seems darker) and it’s just not my cup of tea. Secondly, the set was 1200 pieces, and I get a 300 piece puzzle to make up for the horrible experience I had? I realize that I returned the puzzle to the store for a refund, and therefore don’t really need a 1200 piece puzzle as recompense, but seriously? An ugly 300 piece puzzle is supposed to smooth everything over?

I am done with Ceaco. I will no longer purchase any of their puzzles, no matter how beautiful or interesting the image is – not even if they end up with exclusive rights to all future Aimee Stewart images. (Please Aimee, don’t do that to me. You’re my favorite puzzle artist!)

One person no longer buying their puzzles is just a drop in the ocean, and I’m sure it won’t even be a blip on their bottom line. But it doesn’t matter, not to me. There are plenty of puzzle companies with excellent customer service who I’d much rather spend my hard earned money on.

You’ll still see Ceaco puzzles here on My Jigsaw Journal for a while, I’ve received some as gifts and there are still boxes and boxes of puzzles at mom’s house to go through. She was constantly at the thrift stores finding puzzles for us and I’m certain there are quite a few Ceacos there to be assembled too.

I may relent at some point, but right now I seriously doubt it. I’m still pretty pissed about the whole thing.

Review: Circles Strokes

On By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Puzzle reviews8 Comments
Circles Strokes
Circles Strokes by Kirsten Hinte – Milton Bradley – 750 pieces

I do so love blocks of color. 💖 This puzzle was a lovely respite from holiday images (it was finished on December 22), and even though it was a bit difficult I enjoyed the unique image and the gold foil accents. It’s such different and interesting artwork, and you know how much I love things that aren’t the norm.

As I do many times, after purchasing this puzzle I opened the box to look at the pieces; then, as I do, put it away because it looked like it would be pretty difficult. Several times the box came out when it was time to choose the next puzzle, and it went back in the pile every time. Luckily, this time I jumped at the chance to do a puzzle without snow or Santa, and started sorting before giving myself a chance to question how challenging it would be.

This is a special Gold edition Milton Bradley puzzle, and I found the quality to be quite good. Nice, thick chipboard with a good fit, wonderful colors, and beautiful gold foil accents. I wish pictures could capture the gold foil, it’s really quite beautiful.

Some of the colors were easy to pick out, and once I started getting things assembled the pieces became more familiar and it was easier to notice the subtle differences in color. It’s like most images, the more you do the more you become familiar with it; the more familiar the pieces become, the easier it is to see what you’re looking for. It provided a good challenge though, and kept me intensely focused only on what piece was next and which color goes where.

If you’re looking for something out of the ordinary and this image is one that strikes your fancy, I can definitely recommend this puzzle. I found it to be very good quality, with an image that made for a challenging and engrossing assembly. 👍

Details:

  • Title:                  Circles Strokes
  • Artist:                Kirsten Hinte
  • Brand:               Milton Bradley
  • Piece count:     750 pieces
  • Size:                  Approx. 27 x 20 in. (69 x 51 cm)
  • Purchased:      New

Quality:

  • Board:               Very good
  • Cutting:             Very good
  • Image:               Excellent, gold foil
  • Box:                   Average
  • Fit:                     Very good
  • Puzzle Dust:     Small amount
  • Piece cut:          Grid cut
  • Piece shapes:   Very good variety
  • Finish:               Slightly shiny finish, lays flat

Overall Rating:      Very good, recommended

True Love

On By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles8 Comments
True Love
True Love by Myrna – Sure-Lox – 500 pieces

This puzzle is just too, too adorable. It’s a little bit odd though, did you notice the owl in the window? It took me a while to see it at first, in fact the only reason I noticed it was that I was trying to figure out where an eye went! And if this tableau is about the True Love our pets give us, tell me, who has a deer as a pet? That’s just a little weird.  Cute, but weird.

True Love 1

French bulldogs are my absolute favorite breed, how adorable is this little one? I just want to cuddle with him/her for hours and hours!

True Love 2

There’s something about that sad face underneath the shower cap, I can’t really explain it – it just makes me laugh.

I’m off to have a painful wisdom tooth removed this morning, so I’ll probably be loopy and in bed all day, with no puzzling going on at all. Please put a few puzzle pieces together for me today, I won’t be able to. 🧩

Helpful Garden Paws In Progress

On By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzling4 Comments
Helpful IP
Helpful Garden Paws by Jenny Newland – 550 pieces

After I finished Art City yesterday my brain and my body were both exhausted. I spent the rest of the day in bed taking many naps, and was worried that I’d have no in progress update to share with you all today. 😥

Unfortunately an upsetting thing happened in the evening, and even though I was still exhausted (I’m certain adding antibiotics to my pain regimen is part of the problem) I couldn’t turn my brain off enough to allow me to sleep.

As usual, when I can’t sleep it’s off to the puzzle room, and I was able to sort the entire thing and actually got quite a bit of it assembled too. Every cloud has a silver lining, yadda yadda yadda.

There were plenty of small sections that were easy to separate during the sorting, but other than the white kitten I didn’t try to sort any of the animals. There are many, many pieces of fur left on the trays, but I hope as I’m putting this one together that the different animals will become a little more familiar and it won’t be too much of a chore to get them assembled.

This puzzle was a Christmas gift, and I was going to apologize for how long it took me to get to assembling it – but it’s only been just over two weeks! How in the world does it feel like Christmas was forever ago? My life is whizzing past me at breakneck speeds; perhaps that’s just what happens when you’re over the hill, you’re on the down slope and speeds pick up. Yikes.

To that end, there are eight more puzzles I received as gifts, and to the two lovely ladies who gave them to me, it might be a while until they’re all assembled. The two Christmas themed puzzles may have to wait until December, but the remaining six will find their way onto my table in due course. I promise that I love them all and will absolutely be assembling them, but it may take a while.

My life complicates things all the time, and it gets in the way of my puzzling. Rude. 🤨