Fantasy Golf (What If? No. 18) by Geoff Tristram- Ravensburger – 1000 pieces
Obviously I cannot show you the puzzle that I’m currently assembling; it’s a mystery puzzle and showing the image, even just in progress, is a spoiler. Instead I’m sharing the picture on the back of the box. This is the artist, Geoff Tristram; his photo is on the back of every What If? puzzle that he draws, and he’s always dressed up in outfits that relate to the theme of the artwork.
The box says “What If? Golf suddenly became easier to play? Just imagine how delightful a round could be…” From what I can see so far, it’s going to be another beautiful bit of cartooning from the artist, and more fun and funny characters and situations to assemble.
Hubby is off at a golf tournament today, so I’m hoping working on this puzzle brings him good luck. 🍀⛳
*If he wins, we can use the cash prize to buy more puzzles! 😎*
Vintage Summer Books by Aimee Stewart – Buffalo – 1000 pieces
Once again I’m working on a puzzle with an image by Aimee Stewart, and I can’t seem to keep myself away from it! It’s too much fun, and it keeps calling me back. 😊
This picture is only one small bit of the puzzle, because the only way to get a good picture of the whole thing without glare from the lights is to stand the board against the wall the way I do when I finish a puzzle. Taking off all my trays and containers of pieces wasn’t something I felt like doing this morning, so you just get to see one corner. I would apologize, but…I don’t want to.
Finishing up the sorting yesterday I kept having an argument with myself about whether or not this was the puzzle to assemble next. Watching all the pieces line up on the trays, seeing all those flowers and all that greenery – I kept thinking that it’ll be too difficult and maybe I should do something else. As you can see I decided to keep going (or I couldn’t decide whether or not to stop and got caught in a loop of indecision). 🤷♀️
There have been one or two puzzles with Aimee’s artwork that were full of flowers and vines and lots of green things; they were the most challenging puzzles of hers that I’ve done. It looks like this one might get difficult once all the books are done, but for now I’m REALLY enjoying myself!
What are you working on? Any fantastic images that I might want to see? Do tell!
Alice by Romi Lerda – Magnolia Puzzles – 1000 pieces
There’s just something about this artwork – Alice’s face – just something I can’t put my finger on…I love it! Luckily the artist is working with a puzzle company that has excellent quality, so the result is this gorgeous puzzle of a high caliber that I adored assembling.
This was my first Magnolia Puzzle (thanks again Penny for the lend), and I was duly impressed. The chipboard is a good thickness, the fit is exquisite, there are a very good variety of piece shapes, and the image reproduction is stunning with a matte finish that makes for easier puzzling under artificial lights and has a soft, almost silky feeling in your hands. Overall I was extremely pleased with the quality and am looking forward to being able to assemble more of these puzzles.
Because there really isn’t much in this image that needs zooming in on I decided to document my progress as I went…
Starting on the left, that was the result of the first day’s work, including the sorting and laying out on trays. Everything shown completed in that first picture are the sections that I pulled out while laying out the pieces.
It was slow going at times, I was enjoying the silky feel of the pieces and just let the puzzle take me where it wanted to go. In the middle picture I had just finished assembling everything I could find with stripes on it, and it’s filling out nicely.
The last picture is after putting together all of the dark, blue, and most of the gray pieces. The one eye staring out of the image seemed a little creepy at times, but it was still a fantastic assembly that I absolutely loved.
Magnolia Puzzles is based in Turkey, and they are manufactured there as well. They’re on the pricey side, but they’re worth it in my book. I’m not sure I’ll be making a huge purchase from them any time soon, but I would never hesitate to buy one of their puzzles if it struck my fancy – they are beautifully made!
Ice Cream Bars by Charlie Girard – White Mountain – 1000 pieces
Here’s another puzzle that I was very much looking forward to, but it had very disappointing quality. It’s been a while since I’ve done a White Mountain puzzle, and they can be hit or miss – this one was a miss, unfortunately. I wanted to enjoy this, and I did – just not as much as I’d hoped. Oh well.
The image reproduction on this was was quite blurry in some places, and there were quite a few pieces not cut all the way through. The fit was good, not as tight as some WM puzzles can be, but good. The chipboard was a good thickness, and the finish was a bit shiny, but not too much so; it was mainly the reproduction that caused me so much trouble.
So let’s look at some of these ice cream bars and wrappers up close…
Apparently sex sells, even ice cream bars.
I wanted to show the difference in clarity – the Dairy Queen cup is quite clear and the surrounding wrappers were quite muddled and blurry up close – I’m not sure I was able to capture it in the picture though. Perhaps the artist used actual vintage wrappers or pictures of them and they’re just what they looked like. I can’t be sure, but it was frustrating to have some of the image be so blurry in places.
Six Klondike bars for $1.49? Wow. Just wow. And you can also see in this picture that the words are quite clear and the image of the boy and the ice cream bars is fuzzy and indistinct.
The overall quality of this puzzle was quite a letdown; I was hoping for an entertaining collage with good quality that I could just relax and enjoy – this puzzle wasn’t it. ☹
I just finished sorting this morning and quickly put together the logo that goes in the middle – and I got all the pieces on the initial sort – way to go me!
The quality is less impressive than I was hoping for; the pieces are thin, the fit is very loose and there are a LOT of bent pieces. It’s quite different than Harmony Harbor by the same brand that I just posted about two days ago. That puzzle had quite a few bent pieces as well, but the chipboard was thicker, the finish was matte instead of shiny and the fit was very good.
According to the blog this is my first 1000 piece puzzle by this brand, and unfortunately so far I’m underwhelmed.
Apparently this is one of a series of six puzzles with images of classic board games, the others are Guess Who?, Monopoly, Battleship, Life, and Scrabble. They aren’t available online other than on resale sites; you can only get them in-store at Target and they seem to be extremely difficult to get. I wasn’t aware of any of this when I purchased it, and honestly I’m finding it quite frustrating just trying to get any information about this puzzle and/or the series.
Here’s hoping the assembly is less exasperating than the search for info about the puzzle itself. Fingers crossed!🤞
My Jigsaw Journal 