Balconies in Bloom

On May 11, 2020May 10, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles10 Comments

I’ve had this set of 12 puzzles in a multipack since way before the world stopped rotating, and I sometimes forget that it’s sitting under the puzzle table. I’m glad I decided to find myself a 300 piece puzzle to assemble, because this one was really fun to do.

I put the box away and assembled it without help from the image, and had a fantastic time. It makes me want to put together the rest of the puzzles in this multipack because I just love the artwork! There are still four 500 piece puzzles, two 150 pieces, and one more 300 piece. They aren’t the best quality, but I knew that before I purchased them; it was all about these images by Iralu. You don’t see artwork like this on puzzles usually, and I absolutely adore it. 😍

I decided to show each of the balconies separately, they’re all pretty cool looking…

Balconies 1

Each one is very detailed and deserving of it’s own picture. There is coffee, wine, and/or cigarettes on every table.

Balconies 2

Everyone smokes in this tableau. Perhaps these are French balconies?

Balconies 3

This is my favorite of the four. You know me, I love the colors – especially the purple chairs! And I’m great with coffee at all hours of the day, keep it coming! ☕

Balconies 4

Wine AND coffee. Hmmm. Not a good combo for me. I’d much rather put some whiskey in my coffee – I am partly Irish after all. I’m not allowed to drink with all the pain meds I’m on, but an Irish coffee sounds really good right about now. 😎

Stranger Things

On April 22, 2020April 22, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw PuzzlesLeave a comment

Stranger Things was a fun but challenging puzzle, and even though the pieces were a little on the thin side, overall it wasn’t too bad in the quality department. The image reproduction was excellent, and it made for quite an entertaining puzzle – I loved putting together the fireworks!

Normally I find that Cardinal doesn’t have the best quality, they make many of the puzzles that you find in the dollar stores here in the US. It seems to me that quality is less important to them than quantity is. But this puzzle looked as though it was a special edition, and even the box was nicer than normal. The pieces were thinner than I’d have liked, but the fit and image reproduction were both excellent…

Stranger Things 1

The image was crisp and clear, even down to the very small sections. I was surprised at how detailed these faces were and how clearly you could see them, considering this is only a few pieces out of 300.

I haven’t kept up with the show; I started watching it in 2016 (the year it was released) and watched a few episodes of that first season. I enjoyed it, but things got in the way and I just haven’t gotten back to it. Therefore, I have no idea what’s going on in this image. Apparently there’s a monster, and things are happening at the mall – sounds like the plot of an 80’s movie to me. 😉

Even though I have no clue what’s happening in this image it was still an entertaining and challenging assembly; and in these times of puzzle shortages, with prices going up, almost any puzzle will do if you’re running low. (I’m not even close to being close to running low, but you get what I”m saying.)

Daddy’s Down Time*

On March 4, 2020March 3, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles3 Comments

Another fun image from my box of 12 puzzles by the artist Iralu. I love his bright colors and fun sketch-style drawings. They aren’t the best quality puzzles out there, but I just couldn’t resist the artwork. None of the images in this set have titles, so I am naming them as I go; since the lady in the tub puzzle was named Momma’s Me Mood, I have titled this Daddy’s Down Time*

The 300 piece puzzles in this set are better quality than the 150 piece puzzles in the same box. They’re a little thicker and fit together MUCH better, and I have no idea why that is – it makes no sense to me. I would think that they would all be manufactured in the same facility – shouldn’t the quality be the same?

Anyway, this was a fun one and I enjoyed it very much! I don’t really recommend buying puzzles in a multipack box set, the quality is usually questionable. But if you find one with artwork that you can’t live without I say go for it – everything doesn’t have to be perfect for you to enjoy putting the puzzles together. 🙂

Forest Animals

On February 5, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store Puzzles4 Comments

Quick little puzzle on a day when I just needed to put a few pieces together. Kids puzzles are perfect for a quick fix for us puzzle junkies. 😉

The completed puzzle didn’t lay flat, there were several bent pieces, and yet it was still fun to assemble. I loved the image too, it was different and I love different.

Cardinal puzzles are fine to get from the thrift store, but if I were buying a puzzle specifically for a child I would absolutely choose another brand – one that takes pride in making quality puzzles. Ravensburger and Melissa & Doug are the first ones that come to mind, but there are plenty of brands out there that do a much better job than Cardinal.

Surf Shark Bar

On January 31, 2020January 31, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles4 Comments

This was a quick little puzzle I was able to assemble in bed when I wasn’t feeling well. It’s one out of a multipack of 12 puzzles, and I’ve found that the 150 piece puzzles in this set are terrible quality. The fit is bad – so much so that you can’t put together the edges until the rest of the puzzle is put together.

I knew when I bought these puzzles that they wouldn’t be the best quality, but it was the images that made me buy it anyway. All of the artwork by Iralu makes for fun puzzling and are the kind of illustrations that you don’t normally see on many puzzles; it was worth it for me to brave the less than stellar quality. (But on the plus side, the 300 piece puzzles have been much better quality than these 150 pieces.)

Even with the awful quality, I still enjoyed most of the assembly. I don’t regret buying this set of 12, because I’m having a good time putting them all together.

None of the 500 piece puzzles in this set have been put together yet, and I’m hoping that their quality will be more like the 300 piece ones. I don’t know why I haven’t gotten to them just yet, but I’m looking forward to them very much. Honestly there are so many puzzles here to be done that it’s becoming truly difficult to decide which one comes next. There are so many that I absolutely want to do that choosing between them is getting quite difficult. I need to get these giant stacks of puzzles pared down somehow! I’m puzzling as fast as I can, but it never seems to even put a dent in my to do pile. Please don’t suggest that I stop shopping for puzzles, that’s just silliness and it would never work! 😉