This was a fun and wonderfully challenging puzzle, and I think the finished image is very pretty; it reminds me of my mom who always had yarn or crochet thread with her when she went anywhere. In addition, mom got this puzzle for us at the thrift store – it has her written all over it.
It was one of those Springbok puzzles with a very tight fit, which we know I am not a fan of; but even though the fit was a bit annoying I had a great time putting this together. It took my aging brain a little longer than normal to adapt itself to working with a random cut, but the challenge of it had me completely engrossed.
Thrift stores have so many treasures like this to find, I miss my black belt thrift store shopper – not only was she the best mom ever, she also always found amazing puzzles for us to try. Love you mom. 💖💖
Farmers’ Market – MasterPieces (Trendz) – 300 pieces (EZ grip)
While I enjoyed the bright colors and interesting image, the very shiny finish and extremely slippery backing made this puzzle a bit difficult to assemble and VERY difficult to photograph. It was entertaining to put together, but I ended up with a negative impression of it partly because photographing the puzzle is the last thing I do, and this one was a bugger to take a picture of!
I work under artificial lights, but with my fabric covered board it’s usually easy to get a good photograph – the chipboard backing on the puzzles sticks to the fabric and doesn’t move when I lean the board up against the wall. Taking pictures this way takes care of glare from the lights, and makes it easier to get a picture of the puzzle straight on. This puzzle though, with it’s slippery paper on the backing just kept sliding right off! Since I couldn’t lean the board even a little bit I had to take a picture with the board flat and ended up with quite a bit of glare. It took many pictures and much more time than usual to get a good picture. It was extremely frustrating. 🤬
The puzzle itself had large, thick pieces that fit together well, but unfortunately that’s where my positives end. The backing didn’t have a good feel in my hands, the finish was extremely shiny and caused glare under the lights, and the image reproduction made it very easy to tell that this was a digital collage. I’ve worked many, many, many collage puzzles – I would say that most of them have been digitally altered or assembled – but this was the first puzzle that made it glaringly obvious.
I’ve been going back and forth about whether or not to recommend this puzzle to my readers. On the one hand I enjoyed the actual assembly, but on the other hand I had several issues with the quality (that didn’t involve picture taking). It all depends on what characteristics are most important to you when assembling a puzzle. I found the image to be bright and colorful – and also too shiny with a very obvious digitally altered image. The chipboard was thick with a good fit – although the backing felt odd and almost sharp in my hands.
Overall the puzzle itself had good quality, and I mostly enjoyed the assembly, so it is recommended (even though if I came across another of these Trendz puzzles by MasterPieces I would pass it on by). It’s not my pile of pieces, but it may be yours. 🙂
Details:
Title:Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Farmers’ Market
Artist:Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Unknown
Brand:Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â MasterPieces
Piece count:Â Â Â 300 pieces
Size:Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Approx. 18 x 24 in. (46 x 61 cm)
Purchased:Â Â Â Used, thrift store
Quality:
Board:Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Good
Cutting:Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Good
Image:Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Good
Box:Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Average
Fit:Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Very good
Puzzle Dust:Â Â Â Small amount
Piece cut:Â Â Â Â Â Grid cut
Piece shapes:Â Â Good variety
Finish:Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Very shiny finish, lays flat
Forest Animals by Natasha Chetkova – Cardinal – 100 pieces
Quick little puzzle on a day when I just needed to put a few pieces together. Kids puzzles are perfect for a quick fix for us puzzle junkies. 😉
The completed puzzle didn’t lay flat, there were several bent pieces, and yet it was still fun to assemble. I loved the image too, it was different and I love different.
Cardinal puzzles are fine to get from the thrift store, but if I were buying a puzzle specifically for a child I would absolutely choose another brand – one that takes pride in making quality puzzles. Ravensburger and Melissa & Doug are the first ones that come to mind, but there are plenty of brands out there that do a much better job than Cardinal.
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.
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 by Eric Dowdle – Dowdle Puzzles – 500 pieces
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…
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
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
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
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. 🙂
My Jigsaw Journal 