Review: Harvest Festival

On January 22, 2019 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Puzzle reviews4 Comments

Harvest Festival is a colorful, entertaining, and gorgeous puzzle that I enjoyed immensely! It combined the fun of working with such an interesting image with the challenge of a semi-random cut – and to top it off it was a very good quality puzzle. 🙂

Tidemark puzzles are a new to me company, and I was pretty impressed with both the image and the quality. The pieces are semi-randomly cut, a good thickness, and fit together quite well. The image reproduction is bright and colorful with crisp lines and very little glare. Their catalog is quite small with only 8 images to choose from, but if one of them strikes your fancy you should give it a try. (Most of them are a little muted for my taste, but there may be something you’d love to assemble.)

The wavy lines of color weren’t easy and got a little tedious on the last day of assembly, but I still love the image and am super proud of myself for sticking with it.

harvest festival 1

The artwork by Jonathan Green is so striking that I couldn’t help but enjoy myself; bright colors in a puzzle make me happy, and don’t we all need a little more happiness in our lives? I know I do. 🙂

Details:

Title: Harvest Festival
Artist: Jonathan Green
Brand: Tidemark
Piece count: 1000 pieces
Size: Approx. 19 x 27 in. (48 x 67 cm)
Purchased: New

Quality:

Board: Very good
Cutting: Very good
Image: Very good
Box: Average
Fit: Very good
Puzzle Dust: Moderate amount
Piece cut: Semi-random cut
Piece shapes: Good variety
Finish: Slightly shiny finish, lays flat

Overall Rating: Very good, recommended

Cupcake Heaven

On January 16, 2019January 16, 2019 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store Puzzles2 Comments

My first completed 1000 piece puzzle of the year. I chose it because it’s the kind of puzzle image that makes me happy – a collage with bright colors – and I wanted the first puzzle of the year to be awesome and entertaining.

Cupcake Heaven had 7 missing pieces and a devious random cut that had me using more brain power than I’d bargained for. If the puzzle was complete and the fit were less spongy it would definitely be one I’d assemble again. It wasn’t always easy to be sure the pieces were in the correct places because the fit was odd.

Even though it had missing pieces and a wonky fit I still enjoyed myself, which was the aim all along. Everything doesn’t always have to be perfect – life certainly never is! It’s what you do with what you’re given that counts in the end.

Cupcakes for everyone! 🙂

Review: Vintage Baker

On January 14, 2019 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Puzzle reviews16 Comments

I’ve been wanting this image for a while now, but I’m thinking I should have waited to find it from a company whose quality I was familiar with. Terrible fit, horrible to work with, too shiny causing lots of glare – quite disappointing. 😦

Holdson Puzzles are made in New Zealand, and although I’d heard good things about the quality I found myself pretty let down by this puzzle. The finish was very shiny, the glare was hard to work around and the fit was awful – so loose that you couldn’t even pick up two pieces together. I work on a fabric covered board so it’s a little more difficult for the pieces to slide around, but these pieces managed it well enough somehow. On the positive side the chipboard was a good thickness and the image reproduction was very good.

I love the look of this vanilla bottle; not only is it cool looking, but it also shows the detail in the artwork and the quality of the reproduction.

vintage baker 1

The handwriting in the recipe below looks like my Grama’s, although I know it isn’t. I have noticed that many older people’s writing seems almost identical. Of course schools used to teach things like penmanship and cursive writing. Sigh. I’m old.

vintage baker 2

I try not to make a final decision about new brands until I’ve worked at least 2 or 3 of their puzzles. I’d work another Holdson puzzle if we found it in a thrift store, but I’m not going to go out of my way to buy one retail. If I find one second-hand perhaps it’ll be great quality. Who knows?

Details:

Title: Vintage Baker
Artist: Aimee Stewart
Brand: Holdson Puzzles
Piece count: 1000 pieces
Size: Approx. 19 x 27 in. (49 x 69 cm)
Purchased: New

Quality:

Board: Very good
Cutting: Good
Image: Very good
Box: Average
Fit: Poor
Puzzle Dust: Moderate amount
Piece cut: Grid cut
Piece shapes: Good variety
Finish: Very shiny finish, lays flat

Overall Rating: Fair, not recommended

Movie Posters

On January 8, 2019 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles4 Comments

My son and I assembled this in just about 2.5 hours on New Year’s Eve! That’s what happens when you assemble a puzzle with someone who is LASER FOCUSED on the task at hand. (If you were wondering, the laser focus wasn’t me; I kept getting distrac….. oooh! Look! Something shiny!)

This beauty is already glued and ready for framing to hang in his room. Best of all, we had a great time assembling it and when we were done he put on his copy of It Happened One Night and we watched it together. I have the best kids.💝

There were 2 different movies that each had 2 posters in the puzzle – one of them was Casablanca, and the other was It Happened One Night. I wonder why they got double billing:

Of the 38 posters (from 36 movies) astonishingly I’ve only seen 2 of them! Gone With the Wind, and It Happened One Night. I know, I know. How can I not have seen Casablanca? Honestly, not interested in seeing it. 🤨

My son’s favorite of the movies shown is North by Northwest…

Movie Posters 3

Talk about great image reproduction, you can even read those tiny little words. Wow. Fantastically fun puzzle!

Review: Desserts

On December 13, 2018December 13, 2018 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Puzzle reviews4 Comments

This post is sponsored by eeBoo.

Desserts is one of those collages puzzles that is so much fun to assemble that I find it difficult to walk away. Back when I could sit for long periods of time this is exactly the kind of 1000 piece puzzle I could have finished in one day – I absolutely LOVED IT❣

eeBoo puzzles have excellent quality, and I have thoroughly enjoyed every one that I’ve assembled. Their catalog is full of bright, interesting images and I find them extremely entertaining to construct. The pieces are pleasantly thick and sturdy, with a good variety of shapes, and the fit is excellent. The image reproduction is stellar, with clean lines and bright colors; my only small criticism is that the finish is quite shiny. If you’re working under artificial lights glare can be a problem, even with the lighter colored pieces. Overall though, they are wonderful quality puzzles. Click on the link above to check out their current puzzle line. (I’m so looking forward to their spring 2019 releases, they have some AWESOME puzzles coming out – including a round 500 piece Votes for Women puzzle that looks amazing!)

The square 1008 piece puzzles they carry have all sides pointing towards the center, they’re great for assembling with family or friends – there’s no bottom or top, whichever side you’re working on is the right side. 😍

Desserts eeBoo Day 1

Desserts eeBoo Day 2

There are only 2 in process photos because I was too caught up in the assembly to stop and take pictures – these are at the end of days one and two, day three had me finishing it. Each small section led to another and I didn’t want to get up from the puzzle table!

The green teapot was my favorite part of the assembly, and the gorgeous cake in the center came in a close second. It didn’t make me hungry for desserts though, it made me hungry to get another puzzle!

Desserts 3

One of the many things I like about this brand is that not only do you get a small poster of the image to use during assembly, they also have an unobstructed image on the back of the box – whichever works best for you. I really dislike it when puzzle companies cover the image with logos and piece counts, and other trivial stuff – we want to see what the WHOLE puzzle looks like! eeBoo gives you the entire image two different ways, and this puzzler is extremely grateful!

I enjoyed this puzzle so much more than I thought I would, it was an absolute delight. It gets two cake slices WAY up! 🍰🍰

Details: