Jackson Browne – Late for the Sky

On December 19, 2018December 18, 2018 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles4 Comments

I was very excited to try this new company that makes jigsaw puzzles of album covers – front and back. Unfortunately I was extremely disappointed in the quality and fit, and the entire assembly wasn’t very entertaining.

Surprisingly it had nothing to do with all the black and darkness, it was the poor quality of the pieces – both their fit and the torn and peeling image. The paper used on the front wasn’t heavy or sturdy enough, and at many of the “corners” where pieces meet the paper was torn. Extremely annoying and frustrating!

JB Late for the Sky

It doesn’t matter if the image you’re working on is dark or light, busily patterned or all one color; torn and peeling paper ruins the puzzle in my book.

Jackson Browne Late for the Sky B

The quality of either the paper or the finish on the back cover was better, and there were only a few corners where it was torn. It’s sort of a boring and very dark image, but I was very excited to work on it anyway. I enjoy trying out new brands; testing the quality, seeing if the image and colors match up to the box, etc. Unfortunately I was underwhelmed with this one. I usually don’t like to make a quality determination for certain until I’ve worked more than one puzzle, but I’m hesitant to even give this brand another try.

Working on this puzzle had me thinking of some amazing album covers from my youth that would be make great puzzle images. This is the very first one that came to mind, I loved this whole album!

Journey-Escape-Framed-Album-Cover-Wall-Art-af243bfa-de43-4f0f-b6ec-229555c1c442

I would be “Stone in Love” if I had this as a puzzle, and would welcome it with “Open Arms”. 😎 Don’t Stop Believing!

What album cover would you like to see on a puzzle?

Happy Holidays

On December 18, 2018December 18, 2018 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzling6 Comments

advent advent wreath burn burnt

With only 7 days until Christmas, I wanted to take a moment to wish everyone a joyous, love-filled holiday season. If Santa still visits your house, I hope he brings you a puzzle or two; if not, I hope you’ll treat yourself to a puzzle or two. 🎅

Puzzles are anti-anxiety meds in a box, a mental-muscle workout with a pretty picture, and enrich the lives of puzzlers like us in too many ways to mention. Merry Puzzle-mas! 🎄

Tall Tower

On December 17, 2018December 16, 2018 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles6 Comments

Tall Tower was a tall order! We started assembling it on Thanksgiving Day, and didn’t finish until December 3rd. It was super challenging, but the best part was that I got to work on it with both my mom and my oldest son. 💖

I purchased this puzzle during a sale at Artifact Puzzles earlier in the year, and it took me months to be in the right mood for it. My weird old lady brain makes absolutely NO sense sometimes. Take it from me, getting old definitely ain’t for sissies. 😉

The whimsies for this puzzle are so adorable! I didn’t realize it until I was dis-assembling the puzzle, but some of the whimsy pieces are shaped like images in the puzzle, it’s so creative! Alas, it was too late for pictures to show close-ups of the image and the whimsies. My apologies.

Tall Tower whismies

There were a lot of musical figures, in addition to plenty of animals. It’s so fun to work with them. I truly enjoy the detail you’re able to get with wooden puzzles; you could never make such small, intricate cuts on a regular cardboard puzzle.

This is the first Artifact puzzle I’ve worked with small dropouts in the whimsies, they make the image even more interesting in my opinion (see the top left corner, and the picture below). It’s not a true dropout in the sense that it isn’t negative space that you have to work around, but I still like the look of it. And I didn’t even notice the flock of sheep until we were done and I was taking photographs. Love it!

Tall Tower back

Such an interesting cut! This puzzle gave us quite a mental workout, but it’s always worth it in the end if you’ve enjoyed yourself. Mom did the majority of the work on this one since the puzzle stayed at her house, but my son and I helped too – shout out to my puzzle posse!

Sunrise Colorful Country Quilt

On December 16, 2018December 15, 2018 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles4 Comments

This title makes me wonder why it isn’t “quilts” – plural. Perhaps because I used to be a secretary and I’m always wanting to make things grammatically correct. 🙂 Title aside, it was a very pretty, highly entertaining puzzle.

The quality was very good; thick pieces with a good variety of shapes that fit together well. The nature of the artwork with brushstrokes and the texture on the canvas made the assembly a little more challenging. I enjoy these premium quality Milton Bradley puzzles with the blue chipboard – they’re very pleasant to work with.

The artist, Cheryl Bartley, makes some colorful and interesting images that make for great puzzles. This is the second puzzle of her artwork that I’ve put together and I loved both of them. There’s something about folk art images that I find charming, they make such lovely puzzles!

I love the dog that’s treed the cat on the left, although it almost looks like a wolf to me; and this was my favorite of the quilts, although I’m not sure I have the vocabulary to explain why.

This puzzle was Goldilocks for me – not too easy and not too difficult – it was just right!

Innocent Light

On December 15, 2018 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store Puzzles3 Comments

Mom had a successful thrift store trip this week and brought me this Christmas puzzle that was only 100 pieces. It’s such a pretty image! There’s a lot of glitter, but I wasn’t able to get a good picture of it.

Unfortunately this is an E&L puzzle, and the quality was dismal. The pieces are thin and fit together very poorly. You can see by the picture above that the finished puzzle doesn’t lie flat, but being a used puzzle it might be from our fantastic Florida humidity rather than poor quality. Although at 35 cents, it was still money well spent; even with less than perfect quality I can still enjoy the puzzle.

On the positive side, this is a “Sparkles in Light” holiday series glitter puzzle, and the glitter is adhered extremely well. There wasn’t one speck of it anywhere on the bottom of the box – and that’s a rarity with glitter puzzles that I’ve worked. No festive puzzle dust at all! LOL