Pig House

On April 29, 2020April 29, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store Puzzles14 Comments

I hemmed and hawed about assembling this puzzle, it’s probably been at my house for two years, perhaps even longer. It’s a thrift store find of mom’s that looks like a fun image, but with it’s muted colors I knew that it would be difficult. Of course you never know until you get to assembling, but it turns out I was right; the truly random cut and muted colors made it quite a challenge.

The Great American Puzzle Factory is no longer in business, but I don’t think it could have been because of their quality. I’ve done several of their puzzles, and they’ve all been very good. The pieces were very thick, with an excellent variety of shapes and an excellent fit. The image reproduction is very good as well, the muted colors seem to be true to the original artwork.

Pig House 1

La Pension Porcinee – the pig boarding house. I love the whimsy of the artwork and the simple and silly things all the pigs are doing. One is out walking the poodle, and there is a piglet blowing bubbles on the front steps while two old timers are in rocking chairs on the porch.

Pig House 2

Bath time – cleaning up with a big bottle of Hogwash – love it!

Pig House 3

Two honeymooners, expressing their love for one another while a cat hides under the bed. It’s not something you think pigs would be doing – traveling from Cincinnati! 😉

Pig House 4

Here we see the deliveryman bringing “food” into the kitchen. I’m certainly glad I don’t live close to this boarding house!

This puzzle is 34 years old – from 1986. It seems odd to me that the year I graduated from high school is that many years ago. That can’t possibly be. My math must be wrong. Right?

Go with the Flow

On April 28, 2020April 28, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles4 Comments

Cue the fireworks, there was finally a puzzle in this series with all of it’s pieces. Congratulations Ceaco, it seems you finally did your job. Correctly. For once. Well done.

This one was much harder than I anticipated, and it seemed more difficult than the previous two puzzles from this series – but that is only perception and not something easy to quantify. It has been more than four months since I completed the second puzzle in the series, so it seems quite a challenge to remember all the way back to the beginning of January. And remembering the first puzzle that I put together in August of last year seems almost impossible! It’s harder for me anyway, I’m old and on lots of pain meds, my memory ain’t what it used to be.

Even though it was difficult I didn’t mind at all, it kept me completely focused on the puzzle and not on everything else going on in the world and in my house. That’s one of the reasons working on jigsaw puzzles is such a popular form of entertainment – even more especially right now – it’s almost a form of meditation. Your brain is only concerned about what shape, color, or pattern is next and there’s no room to think about your worries or stresses; it’s only the puzzle and what piece fits in next.

Blissful meditation.

Lucky Charms

On April 26, 2020April 26, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles6 Comments

So now we’ve come to the end of the set of cereal mini puzzles, and the last of them is my favorite of the six cereals – Lucky Charms. For a sugar-hungry kid like I was, how could the cereal with dehydrated squeaky marshmallows not be my favorite?

I’m sad that this multipack set is over. Having some 100 piece puzzles around to assemble in between larger ones was nice, and now the smallest puzzles I have are 300 pieces. Not that they aren’t entertaining, because they most definitely are; but the 100 piece mini puzzles are great for when you only have a few minutes to puzzle and don’t want to sort and start something larger.

Lucky Charms have been around longer than I have, and I still remember the commercials from long ago. The marshmallows have changed over the years, but I still remember the roster as Lucky the Leprechaun used to say in the commercials, “Pink hearts, yellow moons, orange stars, green clovers – and new blue diamonds!”🎶Frosted Lucky Charms, they’re magically delicious!🎶

My mom always said that I was never really interested in tv shows when I was young, but as soon as the commercial break started I would stop what I was doing and run into the room to watch every single commercial. Then apparently when we went grocery shopping I would walk down the aisles next to her cart and perform the commercials for the products on the shelves. That must be why, almost 50 years later, I can remember the order of the marshmallows.

I was a weird little kid. 🤪

What’s the Temperature?

On April 25, 2020April 25, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store PuzzlesLeave a comment

It will be no surprise to anyone that I had a fantastic time with this puzzle. I love collages, but the downside of them is that they are over too quickly because I can’t seem to walk away. Even if I sit in the chair at my puzzle table until the pain makes me stop, I end up resting for only a little while because I just have to get back to it!

This thrift store puzzle was complete, which isn’t something I can say about every puzzle bought second-hand. It was well loved, and it looks as though it’s been assembled several times; many of the tabs had the image lifting off from repeated assembly and disassembly. Otherwise, it was still in relatively good condition.

What's the Temperature 1

This made me smile, you almost need a magnifying glass to read it, but between the degrees of temperature it tells you why you should go fishing. At the colder end it says “Oh yay! Pre-frozen fish”, “Frozen worms aren’t slimy”, and “Wouldn’t sweat if we fished today”. At the warmer end it says “We fish, we get a tan, what d’ya say?”, “Too hot for anything but fishing”, and something like “Get the fish pre-baked today”. I’m not one for fishing, but I think this may be the cutest thermometer I’ve ever seen.

What's the Temperature 2

Looks to me like this is some sort of “snake oil” medication, but it makes for a cool looking thermometer. My son says “Dr.” Ramon looks like the Monopoly Man. 😄

What's the Temperature 3

You can see above many of the tabs with the image sticking up. It’s a thrift store puzzle that has been assembled before – you can’t say how many times – and there’s quite a bit of image lift on this puzzle. It makes the end of puzzle “massage” a little less satisfying; you can feel them sticking up and you have to try not to rip any of the image off while it’s getting it’s rubdown.

And when’s the last time anyone heard of Ken-L Ration dog food? Looooong time!

I started this one in the morning and finished before bedtime. Perhaps I need to see if I can find some 2000 piece collages – are there any of those out there? I’m sure there aren’t right now, but once we’re able to find puzzles again I’d love to get my hands on two or three — or twenty-seven of them. 😇

Crystal Cove II

On April 23, 2020April 23, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store Puzzles6 Comments

This is not an image I would normally go for, but after assembling the Stained Glass Songbirds I wanted to see if this image – also from the Amazing Nature Series – would be as striking. It’s very pretty, but as it wasn’t the same artist it didn’t have the same stunning color usage, and this had such a large amount of blue that it seemed to overpower all other colors.

I think I was spoiled by Stained Glass Songbirds. The artwork of Ciro Marchetti and his color usage was so unbelievably beautiful that all others pale in comparison. It was my hope that being in the same series the artwork would be comparable. It isn’t. But it isn’t fair to the artist of this image, Christian Riese Lassen, to compare his work; it’s comparing apples to oranges. This image is beautiful on it’s own.

Crystal Cove 2

The top of the water wasn’t easy, but was much easier to assemble than below the water.

Crystal Cove 1

The fish weren’t too difficult, but the water and the dolphins took much more time and brain cell usage than the top half of the image.

It makes me happy to have found such good quality puzzles from the thrift stores. At the moment, when the world seems to be on pause, venturing out to the thrift stores for a little bit of puzzle shopping isn’t an option. I am hoping that when we’re all allowed out again that there will be MANY puzzles to choose from at all the thrift stores. All those puzzles that have been sold out at all our favorite online and retail shops have to go somewhere, right?

My hope is that many of those people who have taken up assembling jigsaw puzzles during this time will donate their used puzzles when we’re allowed out again. Spread the Puzzle Love ❣

Perhaps I should be saving my pennies; not for a rainy day, but for the shower of used puzzles that will hopefully be falling on my local thrift stores once things return to some sense of normalcy. ⛱