Sweetheart Chessmate

Sweetheart Chessmate by Charles Wysocki – 300 pieces – Buffalo

This was completed almost a year ago, so again (sorry) my memory of this assembly is completely blank. It’s adorable though and I’m sure it was thoroughly enjoyable.

Buffalo is a great brand with a lot of wonderful images to choose from. There are a very nice variety of piece shapes so the assembly isn’t too difficult or too boring. The fit on this puzzle was excellent, as usual. I love a Buffalo puzzle!

*I can tell you how the fit was because this is the last puzzle I did before my extended leave from the blog, and it sat on my puzzle board for almost an entire year before being photographed and disassembled.) An excellent quality puzzle all around.* 🧩

Such a sweet poem. Hubby and I don’t play chess together and we don’t live on Cape Cod, but we are definitely peas in a pod and enjoy each other’s company very much. We just celebrated on 35th anniversary this month. Yay for the high school sweethearts!💗


Tomorrow is my surgery, so I’m not sure how I’ll be feeling afterwards. Here’s hoping it isn’t nearly as bad as I’ve made it out to be in my anxiety-ridden mind. There are several posts written up and scheduled for the next few days. If I don’t respond to comments quickly after Tuesday, don’t be alarmed. I’ll be back, cross my heart and hope to spit! 😯💦

Canine Collage

Canine Collage by Yago Partal – Buffalo (Dog Days) – 750 pieces

Obviously I’m going to love this puzzle for many reasons – great brand, collage, dogs, blocks of color, etc. It was entertaining (or so says my draft folder from last year) and although it didn’t go together very quickly that doesn’t mean it wasn’t thoroughly enjoyable from start to finish.

I think this is the first image by Yago Partal that I’ve done. At least it’s the first one where his name was featured on the box so that credit would be given. If there are any more puzzles like this out there they’ll definitely be on my wishlist.

This puzzle was very good quality; there was one piece slightly bent out of shape but otherwise it was an excellent puzzle.

LOVE this one! It reminds both Penny and I of Ruth Bader Ginsburg – anyone else see it or are we just weirdos?

There’s something about the light hitting this poor guy’s eyes – he looks so sad!

The Wolf of Wall Street! There’s something about this breed of dog, their faces are just too intense for me – it has to be the eyes.

Colorful Destinations

Colorful Destinations by Lewis T. Johnson – Buffalo – 750 pieces

Beautiful. colorful, and quite lovely to assemble (according to my completed puzzles page from last year). Unfortunately the next several puzzle posts will most likely all say something to the effect of “I have no memory of actually assembling this puzzle”. They were all finished last year and in the queue when the puzzling stopped. Sorry.🤷‍♀️

From what little I put in my draft of this post I can tell you that this one was excellent quality – that’s always good to hear, isn’t it? Of course Buffalo puzzles are usually very good or excellent in the quality department, they were one of the brands being purchased most often last year because 1) they have a LOT of images by my favorite artist – Aimee Stewart, and 2) there have been very few issues with their puzzle quality that I have ever had to deal with. I’m glad this one was no exception.

I’m not much of a traveler, and to be honest the only country I’ve visited is Canada. We used to live in Michigan – directly West of Canada. And you didn’t need a passport back in the old days to cross the bridge and visit our neighbors to the North; sometimes we’d go over just to have dinner.

Luckily even though I’m not well-traveled there are gorgeous puzzles like this one so at least we can look at all the fabulous places there are in the world to visit.✈

I absolutely loved this section, figuring out how all those stripes went together had me in full meditation mode. Fantastic!

Another section that was fun to put together, it reminded me of the Colorforms I used to have as a kid. Anyone else remember those?

This was my favorite section, the artwork is fabulous and it really stands out. Stunning, isn’t it? Loved it!


After completing a wonderfully entertaining collage on Sunday, I may or may not have gone to the bookstore and bought myself six more big collages. My youngest son asked for a ride to the movie theater, and coincidentally it is very close to the bookstore where I sometimes shop for puzzles. That’s what happens when I’m left unattended with money in my wallet.

Perhaps the inner puzzle goddess in me was raring to get back to my board and to make up for all the time when I wasn’t shopping for puzzles. In addition to shopping in an actual brick and mortar store there are four different shipments of puzzles on their way to my house. I ordered a bunch of small puzzles that could be worked on while in bed if necessary, and lots of bigger ones too. It may be that I wanted to be sure to have lots of incentive to continue puzzling even if I’m not feeling so great after next week’s surgery, or that I just missed being at the board, or just a severe PADS flare-up. Putting together beautiful puzzles, writing about them, and sharing them with my puzzle posse really does improve my mood and help deal with all the stress of life and dealing with chronic pain.

Whatever the reason, there is NO REMORSE whatsoever. In fact, I’m working on one of my new collages right now – and having a fabulous time. Puzzles (especially collages) truly are my happy place. 🧩😍

In Progress…

Plumes of Color by Eduard – Buffalo – 300 pieces

As I was too chicken to sort or assemble a larger piece count I am currently working on this beauty. It isn’t as difficult as it may look, but it isn’t too easy either – it looks like it’ll be a “goldilocks assembly”.👱‍♀️

Plus, I’m having pretty radical oral surgery in less than two weeks, so I’ve got to get my puzzles-ready-to-post count up before that happens. It’s going to suck, to be sure; but I don’t want to give myself any excuses for staying in bed and wallowing either.

I’ve discovered upon reflection about the last two breaks I took that if there is a post typed up and scheduled I’m more likely to keep at it even if I’m not feeling my best. If I have to get up and write something to post that day it’s more likely that I’ll just stay in bed and do nothing. So, here I am working on smaller puzzles in the hopes that it’ll be quite some time before there’s another mental health break from puzzling.

Ain’t she a purdy puzzle? She’s gonna be stunning all put together!

Rare Birds

Rare Birds by Allison Strine – Buffalo – 500 pieces

After completing Unusual Animals by the same artist, I had to check around and see if there were any other images of hers to be found – thank goodness there were! This was so beautiful, great fun, and went together very quickly because I couldn’t walk away. I adored it!

This Buffalo puzzle had EXCELLENT quality. I know that some Buffalo puzzles are being made in China, but this one was made in the US. The fit was especially nice, it felt great going together.

It was so hard to choose which birds to show closeups of, they were all so interesting. I must have changed my mind at least 10 times. At least. And then I changed it again. 😎

Such interesting facts about this stork! It’s brave enough to fight a crocodile, and then it eats it! Yikes. *Making a mental note to NEVER mess with a Shoebill Stork.* Of course after reading that to cool down it poops on itself, I highly doubt I’ll be getting anywhere near it.

Loved the look of this section, and how the Kakapo’s face looks something like the kiwi it’s perched on. Plus, I wonder why they smell good – that’s so interesting to me – is it their diet or how they preen themselves? Plus they live to be more than 90 years old, that’s amazing!

The Three Wattled Bellbird, that’s another new one for me. And it has a bird call that’s called a bonk – new information for me as well. And it’s call can be heard a mile away? Holy guacamole! (guacamole made from this bird’s favorite food – wild avocado)