Black Sheep Wool Farm

On June 22, 2018 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store PuzzlesLeave a comment

Here’s another in the Home Sweet Home series from Ceaco and Roger Nannini, the pieces are thinner and easily bent, but the fit was excellent and the artwork made for a really fun assembly.

I’ve changed my tune about Ceaco puzzles recently, and am more likely to give them a try than I was before. I wish they used better chipboard that doesn’t split and bend so easily; but they have a lot of beautiful images to choose from and the fit is very good.

For some reason I really enjoyed the symmetry of the animals in the foreground. I don’t know that I can really explain why this pleases me, but it does.

The assembly was a little more challenging than I thought it would be. I started with the sky (that’s my usual starting place), and then assembled all the words. Buildings came next and they were really fun to put together. There were so many trees in the background it added a bit to the difficulty, but it was still a fun assembly all around.

This is a thrift store puzzle that has been assembled many times before, but if you find a newer one I would recommend giving it a try. The artwork makes for a fun puzzle!

Garden Shed

On June 21, 2018 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store Puzzles7 Comments

This is a beautiful puzzle that was a little bit challenging, but altogether lovely to assemble. The artwork is charming, the quality was excellent, and the entire experience was entertaining.

I don’t always care for images with so much pastel or muted colors; but this one was quite fun to assemble. The number of different flowers made me really pay attention to patterns and shades, and added to the difficulty level. I enjoyed the artwork and the color palette very much, and would love to find more puzzles by this artist. I have done one other puzzle by Geraldine Aikman, but the color palette was brighter with more primary colors.

These premium Milton Bradley puzzles have very good quality. The pieces have a good feel, are made with thick chipboard and fit together very well. There are a good variety of piece shapes, and the image reproduction is true to the image on the box. Regular readers know I don’t usually comment on puzzle boxes, but these boxes have a “premium” feel and aren’t made of the relatively thin cardboard that you find on most puzzle boxes.

I love the detail on the inside of the shed – including the cat!

For a puzzle with only 300 pieces, this one offered enough of a challenge to keep my mind engaged and keep me occupied for a few hours. Exactly what a puzzler like me enjoys! I know 1000 piece puzzles are the “norm” and the most popular piece count, but at the moment I’m mostly doing 300 and 500 piece puzzles. I’m glad there are plenty of excellent choices in those pieces counts to keep me happily puzzling for quite some time.

Review: Rooster Express

On June 19, 2018February 5, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Puzzle reviews, Thrift Store Puzzles4 Comments

Rooster Express by Charles Wysocki – Milton Bradley – 300 pieces

I love a Wysocki image that isn’t the norm, ones that maybe only have one house instead of many; or ones that feature something different, like this rooster. This puzzle is the perfect example of that.

Most puzzles by Charles Wysocki we’ve done are produced by Buffalo Games, every once in a while I come across one from another manufacturer. This beauty is made by Milton Bradley. The quality is very good; with thick pieces, excellent image reproduction, and a beautiful fit. It was a joy to assemble!

I assembled it a little differently than usual, I started from the top and put together the sky, buildings, and fields. Then I went to the bottom and assembled the road, wagon, and rooster. After that all that was left was the grass, which didn’t take much time at all. It was over too quickly! It was more fun than I thought it would be, those are my favorite types of puzzles. 🙂

Details:

Title: Rooster Express
Artist: Charles Wysocki
Brand: Milton Bradley
Piece count: 300 pieces
Size: Approx. 18 x 24 in. (46 x 61 cm)
Purchased: Used, thrift store

Quality:

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

Overall Rating: Very good, recommended

The Petting Zoo

On June 13, 2018 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store PuzzlesLeave a comment

This was a quick puzzle that I decided to put together without looking at the box; I guess I needed a little bit of extra challenge. There were plenty of animals and little details to help out with the assembly, and lots of words to put together too!

The quality of this puzzle was quite good; the pieces were very thick and the fit was exceptional. I’ve found that the large EZ grip puzzles from MasterPieces have much better quality than their regular puzzles, the chipboard they use is thicker and more dense and makes for an excellent tactile experience. The cut is random, which makes for interesting piece shapes and also makes you look more closely at the pieces and colors to find what you’re looking for.

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I really enjoyed all the little details of this image, all the horse’s stalls have their names above them, and each of the pens had signs on them as well.

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I love the art of Art Poulin, I’ve done several of his puzzles and enjoy the Americana/Folk images he produces. They bring to mind images of simpler times, when none of the kids had cell phones or tablets and were happy to spend time at the petting zoo interacting with the animals and being in nature.

It seems as if I’m becoming one of those little old ladies talking about how great things used to be – and I haven’t even turned 50 yet! 👵

Doc’s Pond

On June 1, 2018 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles2 Comments

This is another puzzle where the picture isn’t my usual, but as free is my favorite price it isn’t one that I would pass up. It was given to us by a friend of my mother’s who only does 300 piece puzzles. Usually they keep them for years and keep track on the box of each time it’s assembled. I don’t think they cared much for this one, it seems to have only been put together once and then given to us.

Most of the EZ grip 300 piece puzzles have very thick pieces, these did not. They were sturdy, but not overly thick. They’re actually the nicest Sure-Lox pieces I’ve worked with before. They fit together well and the image reproduction was good. There was only one piece shape, which I am not fond of – especially with an image like this one where there is so much greenery.

Sure-Lox puzzles are on my list of puzzles we don’t buy, not even from the thrift stores. All the pieces are what I call ballerinas, and when you add that to the thinness of the pieces and how easily they are bent – I just don’t find them worth my time. I assembled this one because I wanted to work with one of their large piece puzzles to see how they compared. The pieces were sturdier, which is a plus in my book. But still the thin pieces with just one piece shape – I wasn’t overly impressed.

It’s a pretty puzzle that fit together well, but that’s about all the praise I have for it. It was a quick assembly, and not too difficult. A fun afternoon of puzzling.