Barnyard Dreams

On October 24, 2017 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store PuzzlesLeave a comment

Another in the Childhood Dreams Collection, and I absolutely love them! The images are nostalgic and sweet, and they make for excellent puzzling.

This one really reminds me of my youth. We lived out in “the boonies” and my dad had a John Deere tractor that he absolutely loved. He would use it to split wood, mow the lawn, drive the kids around the property teaching us how to drive it, and pull city people out of the ditch. (They had no idea how to drive on the back roads in winter!) This puzzle brings back fond memories for me. *sigh*

Mom and I worked on this puzzle together, although I think she did much more of the work than I did. We started it together, but it wasn’t complete when I left so she finished it by herself. Great job mom!

Besides the finish being a little too shiny, the quality of these puzzles has been very good. They fit together very well and are a good thickness, and you can see that the image reproduction is beautiful – very crisp and detailed. We have several of these Childhood Dreams puzzles yet to do, and I’m looking forward to every single one of them.

If these are your kind of puzzle images, I highly recommend them. They’re wonderful to work on, and they make me smile. 🙂 🙂

Galaxies

On October 18, 2017October 18, 2017 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store Puzzles2 Comments

This is our first Japanese manufactured puzzle! The quality is excellent, and the subject matter was very interesting as well. Had a great time assembling it, the very last part was a teensy bit tedious, but overall I loved this puzzle. 🙂

The pieces are quite thick and fit together extremely well. It’s hard to comment on the image reproduction as the entire puzzle was very dark, but it was very clear with no fuzziness at all. There are a nice variety of piece shapes too. Excellent quality all around, and I’d love to find more Epoch puzzles to assemble. Isn’t it amazing that these days it’s not too terribly difficult to find puzzles from all over the world? It’s so much fun for me to try all these companies from across the globe!

Most of the lighter sections of this puzzle glow in the dark, and I must say that it’s the strongest and nicest glow I’ve ever seen on a puzzle. It was amazingly bright and clear, but unfortunately it didn’t photograph well at all, and I wasn’t able to get a good picture of the glow. 😦

As you can see from the picture, there were lots of words to assemble, be still my heart! There were explanations of different types of galaxies, superclusters of galaxies, the anatomy of a galaxy, explanations of light travel time, etc. Educational and fun at the same time.

Mom helped a bit with this puzzle, and we had a good time working together, as usual. When I got to the end, though, I was working alone. The dark pieces around the edge of the galaxy shown slowed me down a bit and it was a little difficult at the end. Still, I enjoyed it very much. 👍

Just Married

On October 11, 2017October 11, 2017 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw PuzzlesLeave a comment

There’s something about this image I just can’t put my finger on, but I absolutely loved it and had to get it. It’s the people, it almost feels like they have character. I’m not explaining it properly, but that’s the best I can do. I love these people and this image, and it made for an excellent puzzle! 🙂

The pieces of this puzzle seemed to fit a little better than the previous Anatolian puzzle I did, and the piece shapes are not so obvious in the finished image. The quality was very good, and so far I’ve very much enjoyed the puzzles from this company. There was a good variety of piece shapes that fit together very well, and the image reproduction is quite nice too.

I’m looking forward to getting more puzzles by Ronald West, I absolutely adore his work! There are a couple in stock at Puzzle Warehouse that I’ve got my eye on. I hope to find more. His artwork makes me happy, turn it into a puzzle and I’m doubly happy! 😍

Come To Switzerland By Plane

On October 8, 2017 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store Puzzles2 Comments

I had high hopes for this puzzle. Mom thought it would be as difficult as Chat Noir with all the sameness in color in the top portion. I didn’t think it would be that bad as the sky was 2 different colors, blah blah blah. Long story short, she was partly right. The top portion was quite difficult and tedious. I should have listened to her. Sorry mom.

Eurographics puzzles are usually random cut, and this one is a grid cut. I thought that would make the assembly of the sky easier. Nope. There’s something about the way this puzzle was cut, the pieces didn’t seem to fit together well. In my opinion it made it more difficult to complete the sky, not easier. In addition there are several pieces near the top that have the image scratched off, they look like white specks of color. I’ve never come across this problem with Eurographics before, but it was disappointing. This puzzle was a thrift store purchase, but it was unopened. The outer plastic wrapping was still intact, so it wasn’t an issue with it having been done before.

All in all, I love the image but it didn’t make for the most enjoyable puzzling; and the quality issues didn’t help matters. You’d think we would learn by now, even if we love the image that doesn’t mean it’s the best for puzzling. Even just a few more clouds in the sky would have helped immensely.

Still, I definitely got our 99 cents worth out of this puzzle, it had me working for almost 4 days! Hopefully I’ll listen to my mother next time. (You know, I won’t because I’m super stubborn and opinionated, but I’ll try – that’s the best I can do 😁)

The Victory of Alexander the Great

On October 6, 2017 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles2 Comments

This puzzle was an unopened thrift store find. Who in the world would give away a Pomegranate unopened? I guess I shouldn’t judge, you never know the circumstances. I’m thrilled we were able to find a brand new puzzle for $1.99 though.

The image is not one I would choose for a puzzle, but cheapskates can’t always be choosy. 😁 I considered starting this puzzle at least 5 times before I actually jumped in and went for it. I would pick it up, open the box, look at all the pieces, and eventually decide I wasn’t in the mood for that much of a challenge. I’m not sure why I decided it was time now, but I don’t always know what in the world is going on in my slightly off-kilter brain.

The top of the puzzle was the easy part, and it didn’t take me too long. The sky wasn’t overly difficult, in fact I was surprised how easy it seemed. The bottom half of the puzzle, oh my. There is so much detail! Numerous horses, soldiers, flags, spears and tents – it boggles the mind! It was so dark and busy that it took much longer than normal. It wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t the most fun either. I was pretty proud when I finished, and still am. It definitely gave me $1.99 worth of puzzle enjoyment!