Tag: Collage

Favorite Cereals

On By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles2 Comments

Favorite Cereals by Doug Banks – White Mountain – 1000 pieces

Bright colors, cartoons, collage, relatively good quality – just what was needed for a fun puzzle experience for me. I took it slowly and enjoyed every single piece, I even enjoyed the sorting!

This White Mountain puzzle was pretty good quality other than a slightly loose fit. The image reproduction is excellent, even with closeup images, the piece shapes are the usual WM shapes, and the entire puzzle was joy to put together. Those of us who grew up in the US should be quite familiar with most of these cereals, but they may not be as readily available in the rest of the world. Whether you know the cereals or not though, the image itself makes for a great puzzle.

Has anyone ever seen this cereal out in the wild? I’ve never even heard of it before. My son looked it up for me and apparently she’s a sister cereal to FrankenBerry, Boo Berry, and Count Chocula. She’s a monster, obviously, not sure what kind though. Her cereal is a caramel apple flavor with the usual dehydrated marshmallows. I’m not sure how appetizing that sounds to you, but to me – not so much. I love caramel apples, but if you add milk and marshmallows I’m not sure that adds up to something I’d like to eat. How about you?

Of course I know Cookie Crisp cereal, but I haven’t seen this mascot before. Apparently his name is Chip and he’s the current mascot of the brand and has been since 2005. That tells me how much streaming has taken over my viewing habits. I almost never watch actual television channels anymore, and I certainly don’t have to sit through commercials if I do record something on the dvr. Basically what I’m saying is that I haven’t seen a commercial for this cereal in many years and had no idea that Chip is their current spokes-animal. He’s kinda cute.

This is a great puzzle and even with the slightly loose fit it was fun to put together. It would be a great for a beginning puzzler, or someone who wants to move up to 1000 piece puzzles but is hesitant or thinks they won’t be able to get it done. The bright colors and many small sections could help alleviate any anxiety one might have about a larger piece count. Even so, as an extremely experienced puzzler it was still completely enjoyable, and not always as easy as you might think. This one is definitely recommended.

Fresh Blooms In Progress…

On By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzling8 Comments

Fresh Blooms – Re-marks – 1000 pieces

I’m in a mood today and not feeling very much like doing anything, let alone working on a puzzle. But I know if I haul my butt over to the board and start touching pieces and moving things around it will inevitably improve my mood. And so on, and so on…

Hopefully just telling you about it will help. Whenever I need cheering up talking to my puzzle peeps makes me feel better; you all get it. 🧩💚

It’s down to the last three trays of pieces on this one, so it’s time to decide what puzzle is next and start sorting. I’ve found that because it’s the least enjoyable part of puzzling for me if I sort my next puzzle before the current one is finished it doesn’t seem as bad. If I get sick of sorting I can just move things out of my way and actually add pieces to the puzzle I’m working on to calm my nerves or anxiety; when things are feeling better I get back to the sorting. Once that’s done it’s on to finishing my puzzle and enjoying myself again. As soon as pictures are taken and it’s put away I can jump right into the next puzzle instead of worrying over what’s next and having to slog through laying out all the pieces and sorting it. That way there’s less chance of me curling up in bed for several days and not starting another puzzle, because the next one is ready to go! Gotta do what I can to keep the depression and anxiety at bay, whatever works.

As far as Fresh Blooms goes, it’s almost done and I’ve been having a great time with it. Another quality puzzle collage from Re-marks.

Musicals

On By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles10 Comments

Musicals – Re-marks – 1000 pieces

Musicals went together VERY quickly, even after I tried to slow myself down a bit by taking more breaks; but in the end it was just too entertaining and was finished the day I started it. Oh well, having fun was the point, right? (If you answered yes to that question, go and get yourself a treat – that was the correct answer!)

This was an excellent quality Re-marks puzzle, the fit was very good, the image reproduction was lovely and everything “worked” the way it should. The only thing that was a drawback was the shiny finish, when I was working on the darker sections I had to turn my overhead light off so that I could see what was what. I’ve only got two more Re-marks collages here in the to-do pile, perhaps a shopping trip is in order sometime soon.😇

With these types of collages I usually let you know how many of the books or movies shown I have read or seen, this one was an impressive 24/50! My parents loved music and musicals so I grew up on those wonderful old movies, plus there are quite a few I’ve watched with my kids. Anyone feel like reminiscing?

This is the first musical that I can ever remember seeing. My parents loved this movie and whenever it was showing as a matinee somewhere they would pile us all into the car and off we’d go to see the movie – again. My father, who was and is a big softie, would always cry when they sang Edelweiss, and it took me a long time to understand why. Now I know, and if I saw the movie again now I would probably cry at that scene as well.

Grease was an excellent movie and I have seen it many, many, many times. I also had the double album of the soundtrack, on vinyl of course, and could still sing every song without missing a word, and also tell you which song comes next. I wasn’t in love with John Travolta as many girls were at the time; I identified with Rizzo played by Stockard Channing, she was my favorite character in the movie. She looked a little like me, we both had freckles, and I thought she was the coolest of the cool even if she was a little mean sometimes. I still love this movie, hubby even bought me a 40th anniversary edition of the dvd that came with a little leather jacket for the dvd case.

Grease came out in theaters when I was 10 years old. Oh my gosh, how in the world is this movie 48 years old? Oh my gosh, how in the world is this woman in the mirror almost 58 years old? 👵

Prince was one of my favorite musicians back in the day, his music got me through some tough angsty teenage years. I watched this movie a lot back then, but mostly fast-forwarded to the musical parts (we had a copy on VHS). A few years ago my husband wanted to do something nice for me so he got me a copy of this movie because I was looking for it on the streaming services and I couldn’t find it. Isn’t that sweet of him? Well, it had been some time since I’d last seen the movie, so I watched it from beginning to end – then I remembered how I used to fast-forward through most of it, because the movie is TERRIBLE! The music is great, don’t get me wrong, and Prince Rogers Nelson was a musical genius, but that movie was just awful. It makes me laugh to think of it now; I knew back when I was only a stupid teenager with wildly fluctuating hormones and a not-yet-fully-formed brain that this movie was bad and the only parts worth watching were the songs.😂

So there it is, singing nuns and Austrian families, greasers and female “gangs”, and a horrid movie with great songs. What a collection, huh?

Love Stamps 2

On By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles8 Comments

Love Stamps 2 by Lois B. Sutton – White Mountain – 500 pieces

This beauty went together pretty quickly once I really got going; it was started in the evening and all I got put together was the border and one stamp before I had to give it up and get some rest. In the morning once I got going the pieces seemed to fly into place, it was almost too easy. It was great quality with large pieces that made a pretty big finished puzzle, and almost every stamp was fun to put together. (The red and white one in the lower right corner was a beast for me to do!)

There’s something about this 500 piece White Mountain that felt so different from their 1000 piece puzzles; the chipboard, the finish, the fit – it all felt completely different to me. I liked it very much. That’s not to say I don’t like their 1000 piece puzzles, but they are hit or miss in the quality department sometimes – which I put up with because their catalog of images has so many gorgeous collages. Other than the shiny finish there were no quality issues with this puzzle, it’s most definitely one of their hits.

These were my favorite stamps, though they really were all beautiful in their own way. The heart on the left took my breath away, even when I was just sorting it – isn’t it gorgeous? That would make a challenging but stunning puzzle all by itself. And of course the puppies, always the puppies with me. They are each adorable, but in very different ways.

This is another puzzle that would be great in a larger piece count, although I might need an alcoholic beverage before starting that red stamp in the lower right corner if it had double the pieces!

Beautiful stamps on a great quality puzzle, I loved the love stamps. 💕

Sherlock Holmes

On By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles10 Comments

Sherlock Holmes – Gibsons (Book Club Series) – 1000 pieces

Well, you won’t be surprised to hear that one day my impetuousness took over and on a whim I decided that puzzle shopping was the order of the day. Of course thrift store puzzles wasn’t what was wanted, it needed to be new ones. I needed to see and feel the boxes, turn them over and read them, and see whole shelves full of bright, shiny, new puzzles to decide which ones were coming home with me.

This Sherlock Holmes puzzle found it’s way into my hands and of course there was no letting it go. It’s a collage, but an interesting one and I absolutely love the look of it. Apparently Gibsons has a series of puzzles based on literature and treasured stories, and they all look like so much fun to do! They only had this puzzle at the store, but my online detective work has uncovered others in the series and they all look amazing to my eye; I’ve found Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, Gothic Novels, and a very cute image of book covers. If I hadn’t already spent way too much of my puzzle budget this week they would all be on their way to my home right now.

My blog tells me the last time I assembled a Gibsons puzzle was in 2018, so it’s been a while; but that was a children’s puzzle of only 150 pieces, the last time I assembled an adult Gibsons was in April of 2017! They aren’t a brand I normally buy, but the two puzzles I just referenced were apparently quite good quality, so I’m not sure when or why I stopped buying them. Perhaps it’s just because they’re a puzzle company in the UK and I don’t normally buy cardboard puzzles from there. Honestly, I’m just not sure.

Words were the first thing I assembled after the border, and this little map was part of that. There’s something about the look of it that makes me smile.

I just love the look of this crest, that’s my only reason for showing it to you. Did you know Great Scotland Yard is the name of a street in Westminster, London? I certainly didn’t. There is also a Great Scotland Yard Hotel, which is what this crest is apparently a symbol for.

These little sections are what most people think of when they hear Sherlock Holmes; a deerstalker cap and the quote “Elementary my dear Watson”. Having never read the books or short stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, my only references are television shows and movies. If you said Sherlock Holmes to me it would conjure up images of Jonny Lee Miller as the detective and Lucy Liu as Dr. Joan Watson. 📺🔎

I had a great time with this puzzle. It was good quality and had an excellent image for puzzling – which are basically the things that are most important to me. If you think this might be a puzzle you’d like I highly recommend it.