Pixar Posters

On February 2, 2020February 1, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles7 Comments

I know, it’s a Ceaco, what in the world am I doing assembling a Ceaco so soon after the Christmas debacle? It was a gift, and I love the image, so why not? I can’t very well have a bonfire and torch all the Ceaco puzzles I have here…..although…….🤔.

The fit was terrible, it was very loose and even moving three connected pieces was pretty hard to do. On the plus side the pieces were a workable thickness and the image reproduction was very good. Again, this is one of those times where the image overcame the quality and I enjoyed myself anyway. It’s a collage, there are lots of words, and each of the posters is bright and fun. I had a great time with it, despite it’s issues.

*I tried to be impartial and just judge the puzzle on it’s own merits, and I think I was, but I’m still a little perturbed at the brand in general and so I may have been specifically on the lookout for any problems.*

These were my two favorite sections to assemble, though pretty much all of them were fun. I loved the movie Brave – Girls rule! – and it was the first section I put together; all that red hair was the most logical place to start after putting together all the words and titles. Coco was much more entertaining to assemble than I thought, and although I haven’t seen the movie I found myself enjoying it very much. My son tells me I should see it and that it was an excellent movie that I will love; he and I have VERY different tastes in movies, so I’m not so sure about his recommendation. 😉

My kids are older now and so I haven’t seen many of the newer Disney-Pixar movies. Of all the movies shown here I have seen just over half of them, nine out of seventeen. There was a time not so long ago that when a new movie came out on DVD (or VHS) that we would all take a trip to the store and get ourselves a copy; then we’d go home and watch it together that evening – or sometimes we couldn’t wait and we watched it in the afternoon. I have great memories of watching Disney movies with my kids, and so perhaps I haven’t watched the newer ones because my kids are all adults, off living their own lives, and not always available to watch movies with mom.

Pixar Posters 3

This is the last section I put together, only because everything is blue, and most of the pieces just looked blue – even the teeth! It was still good fun though, especially because at the end of the puzzle when the pieces are dwindling down to nothing it gets more and more exciting. You’re almost there, and every piece you find gets you that much closer to the end, and you’re finding each one faster and faster – almost more quickly than you can put them into the puzzle!

As many puzzles as I’ve done, the end is still as exciting to me as it ever was. Getting down to the last few pieces is entertaining, full of anticipation, fast-moving, thrilling, dramatic, and always fun. I hope it never gets old.

Surf Shark Bar

On January 31, 2020January 31, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles4 Comments

This was a quick little puzzle I was able to assemble in bed when I wasn’t feeling well. It’s one out of a multipack of 12 puzzles, and I’ve found that the 150 piece puzzles in this set are terrible quality. The fit is bad – so much so that you can’t put together the edges until the rest of the puzzle is put together.

I knew when I bought these puzzles that they wouldn’t be the best quality, but it was the images that made me buy it anyway. All of the artwork by Iralu makes for fun puzzling and are the kind of illustrations that you don’t normally see on many puzzles; it was worth it for me to brave the less than stellar quality. (But on the plus side, the 300 piece puzzles have been much better quality than these 150 pieces.)

Even with the awful quality, I still enjoyed most of the assembly. I don’t regret buying this set of 12, because I’m having a good time putting them all together.

None of the 500 piece puzzles in this set have been put together yet, and I’m hoping that their quality will be more like the 300 piece ones. I don’t know why I haven’t gotten to them just yet, but I’m looking forward to them very much. Honestly there are so many puzzles here to be done that it’s becoming truly difficult to decide which one comes next. There are so many that I absolutely want to do that choosing between them is getting quite difficult. I need to get these giant stacks of puzzles pared down somehow! I’m puzzling as fast as I can, but it never seems to even put a dent in my to do pile. Please don’t suggest that I stop shopping for puzzles, that’s just silliness and it would never work! 😉

Viva Las Vegas!

On January 30, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store Puzzles2 Comments

This puzzle was more fun than I expected – don’t you love it when that happens? I do! I can’t count the number of times that I’ve been wrong about a puzzle, thinking it will be easy and it ends up being hard, or vice versa – or thinking it will be fun and it ends up being a drag, or vice versa. It seems I’m almost never right on the money about how enjoyable or difficult a puzzle will be, but it’s still fun being happily surprised. 🙂

I love the colors, which gave it just the right amount of difficulty, I think it made it a bit easier than it would have been without the extra color.

Las Vegas 1

I was surprised at the detail in this puzzle. This section is only about 20 pieces out of this 750 piece puzzle, and you can see how detailed the image is. There’s even a McDonald’s there on the strip!

This was a thrift store purchase, and even with a missing piece and several chewed pieces I still had a great time with it. You can see above that somebody’s pet (or child) enjoyed a chew on several of the pieces. And the image is so detailed that you can’t even really see the missing piece, that’s a bonus too in my book. 😉

Even with chewed up and missing pieces I still enjoyed this assembly much more than I thought I would, and it was a well made and great quality puzzle. Everything doesn’t have to perfect for me to enjoy a puzzle, this is a perfect example of that.

Cats Around the World

On January 28, 2020January 28, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store Puzzles7 Comments

We were sorting through some of mom’s puzzles, and my daughter said to me “here’s one with a lot of cats”. My response was “Ugh, no thanks”, but then she said it was funny, so I had to take a look at it. I’m glad I did because this is not only a funny image, but was an entertaining assembly too.

I haven’t done a Dowdle puzzle in quite a long time, when did they start using just the one piece shape? And why in the world are so many companies using only one shape? It’s really frustrating, do they think that’s what we like or want? News flash puzzle companies – we like variety in shapes even if it’s only within a ribbon or grid cut – only one piece shape is BORING to work with.

This puzzle came with a legend that names all the cats and tells where they’re from…

Cats 1

Starting at the bottom in the middle and going around clockwise…

Sheriff “Cat” Masterson – Dodge City, Kansas
Audrey Hep-PURR-n – Belgium
Trojan Mouse – Greece
Fat Cat – Wall Street, New York

Cats 2

Starting at the top left and continuing clockwise…

“Mew”-stafa – Egypt
Mr. “Meow”-gi – Japan
MVP (Most Valuable Pussycat) “Go Kitty Wampus!!!”
“Feline” Nightingale – England
Yassir Ara-“cat” – Saudia Arabia

Cats 3

Starting at the top left again, clockwise…

Guillermo del “Gato (gato is Spanish for cat) – Mexico
Maurice “Chat”-velier (chat [pronounced shot] is French for cat) – France
Bat Cat – Gotham City
Coot Cat – Magnum P.C. (Pussy Cat) – Hawaii, USA

Cats 4

Starting at the top in the middle and continuing clockwise…

Captain Cat Sparrow – England
Lady Lib-PURR-ty – a gift from France to the United States
Big Lou – known for his cat calls – New York City
Chaim “khah-Tool”-evsky (khah-Tool is Hebrew for Cat) – Israel

Just for clarification, the explanations of the words for cat in different languages were part of the legend, and I copied them exactly.

While I was disappointed in the lack of variety in piece shape, I still enjoyed the puzzle and especially the names and silly faces of the cats. Chaim khah-Tool-evesky makes me laugh every time I look at him, that grumpy face is hysterical! Feline Nightingale’s cranky face is pretty funny too – the ones that make me laugh made this puzzle completely worth it. Just looking at the picture of the puzzle makes me smile. 🙂

Review: Birthday Candle

On January 26, 2020January 26, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Puzzle reviews2 Comments

This image was too funny to pass up, how could you walk by this puzzle on the shelf and not give it a try? That face!

I’ve found that the newer Sure-Lox box means better quality, so I was confident buying this puzzle. I’ve been impressed with the new quality, especially on their 300 piece puzzles. The chipboard is thick and both the fit and the image reproduction are excellent – look at the bright, beautiful colors, and the sharp focus on the cat!

I decided to sort and assemble this a different way, and documented as I went. It was put together at night when sleep wouldn’t come – as per usual these days. Insomnia = lots of puzzle time.

Birthday 1

After the edge was complete I started with the the cupcake and candle, and it went together quickly. I love the colors, it’s all so bright and cheery.

Birthday 2

Next to be assembled was all of the background; it took a little more time and since I put the box away I was only using the colors to find my way. Shapes were of no help because all of the pieces were ballerinas. It didn’t make it too difficult with this image though; the colors were all the help I needed.

Birthday 3

Next I put in all the pieces with both cat hair and background color. Assembling the puzzle this way, from the outside in was quite entertaining and although it doesn’t lend itself to most puzzle images it was fun to try it on this one.

Birthday

All that was left was to fill in the cat, it was the most difficult part, obviously. After the eyes, nose, and mouth the whiskers were the next to be put together; they were brilliantly white and easy to pick out. Once those were all done all that was left was just fur, which is notoriously difficult; but because there were only 300 pieces to begin with there weren’t that many pieces left, so it went pretty quickly.

The image was great fun, the background colors made it interesting, and I loved the process of assembling in from the outside in and documenting it as I went. Hopefully you, my readers, liked it as well. Meow! 😽

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