Things I Ate as a Kid by Charlie Girard – White Mountain Puzzles – 1000 pieces
I love collages, images by Charlie Girard, and bright, fun colors on a puzzle. This puzzle has all of those things, but for some reason I didn’t enjoy this puzzle as much as I’d hoped I would. I can’t put my finger on why that was, but you can’t fall in love with every puzzle I guess.
There was nothing wrong with the puzzle itself, even with it being a thrift store purchase it still had very good quality. There isn’t anything wrong with the image either, when I saw the box I was very excited to start assembling it. Doesn’t it look like fun to you?
It sure looked like fun to me, but for some reason I can’t quite put into words I didn’t have as much fun as I’d hoped.
Perhaps I just wasn’t in the right mood, or perhaps I just wasn’t feeling well. I think the problem was definitely with me, and not with the puzzle itself. We can’t love every puzzle, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t give this one a try if you have the chance. It was good quality, and perhaps you’ll be in the exact right mood to enjoy this one to the fullest. 🙂
Women March! by Jennifer Orkin Lewis – Eeboo – 500 pieces
Super busy images aren’t usually my thing, but this puzzle was a lot of fun. A puzzle about the women’s march, with artwork by a woman, made by a woman-owned puzzle company – we ladies are pretty awesome!👸
This is only the second eeBoo puzzle that I’ve assembled, and I’ve been extremely impressed with the quality. The pieces are thick, with an excellent variety of shapes and the fit is wonderful. The image reproduction is bright and colorful with no fuzzy or blurry areas (unless it’s part of the artwork). My only problem is with the finish, it’s quite shiny and can cause lots of glare under artificial lights.
The edge pieces were very easy to pick out for assembly, but I ran into a problem. While putting it together I used the quote around the edge to help me find the correct pieces, and became convinced that I hadn’t pulled them all. After a quick search with no results I skipped the spot and continued around the edge. The problem wasn’t a missing piece, it was that one of the words is spelled incorrectly! I was looking for the next letters in the word, but they weren’t there. 😱
The word is missing two letters, and those were the ones I was looking for and couldn’t find. It’s easy to overlook a misspelling, especially when you come to the word and know what it’s trying to say – sometimes we skip right on past it without registering the error. That said, someone should have caught it somewhere along the line, shouldn’t they? (It caused me a bit of frustration trying to figure out if I’d lost a piece) Still, these things happen, and I’m sure someone else who’s assembled the puzzle has found it too. I emailed the company to let them know, although I don’t know that there’s much that they can do at this point.
These are my favorite signs, and there were so many of them to put together. I loved it! My regular readers know how much I enjoy having plenty of words to assemble. The only other “larger” image in the puzzle was the capital building, and once that was put together the assembly got a bit more difficult. The rest of the image is a sea of people and faces, and basically I had to examine each piece/face and figure out where it fit in. Time consuming, but still entertaining.
Although the women’s march was extremely political, that’s not why it’s here; this blog is strictly about puzzles. I bought this puzzle because I believe in the women’s movement – I believe in women and think we should all be treated as equally and humanely as anyone else – but most of all it looked like it would be great fun to put together. It was!
As far as political puzzles go, I’m bipartisan – I like both random AND grid cut! 😎
Bombs Away! by SunsOut is an adorable puzzle that was great fun to assemble, and an excellent way to unofficially kick off autumn. It’s still pretty warm and humid here, and it doesn’t feel much like fall; but it’s my favorite season so I wanted to get myself in the mood with a seasonal puzzle. This one was a great choice!
SunsOut puzzles are usually good quality, with thick pieces that have an excellent variety of shapes. Normally their puzzles are randomly cut, but this puzzle was more what I would call semi-random; the edges of each piece don’t line up exactly, but the pieces are cut in lines as opposed to completely randomly. The image reproduction is very good, with beautiful fall colors and a slightly shiny finish. The fit of SunsOut can sometimes be extremely tight, but this one was more a normal snugness. The fit itself seemed a bit “spongy” rather than snapping into place, but I didn’t find it distracting. All in all, the quality of this puzzle was very good. Click the link above to check out all their puzzles currently in stock at Puzzle Warehouse.
After assembling the edges, I started with the sign – words are some of the most entertaining things to assemble for me. The sky and grass were next, and they went together more quickly than I anticipated. The face of the jack-o-lantern was next and then it was on to the naughty cat atop the wheelbarrow. The dogs took a bit more concentration than I thought they would, but they were still lots of fun to put together. Interestingly I found the pumpkins less difficult than the wheelbarrow, although I’m not sure I could say why that was. Overall the assembly was challenging (the brush strokes added to the difficulty) but loads of fun and the finished puzzle is just too darned cute!
This was my first puzzle by Tom Wood, and I very much enjoyed the artwork. The brush strokes made for a little more of a challenge, but the finished image is beautiful and perfect for kick-starting the fall (even if it isn’t official until September 22). He’s known for his playful portraits of cats and dogs, and I think he captures their personalities extremely well…
Look at those faces! One is so sweet and non-confrontational, the other is naughty and looking to make trouble – typical dog and cat if you ask me. I’m looking forward to working more images by this artist, and his puzzles have plenty of cuteness to choose from. Click here to see all the puzzles available by Tom Wood at Puzzle Warehouse – and if you’re looking for other cute autumn/Halloween puzzles, check out Boo Cat – it’s so sweet!
Bombs Away! was an entertaining puzzle that I had a great time assembling. Unfortunately it’s discontinued and there are only a few left so if you’re wanting to put together this fall themed puzzle you should order very soon.
Details:
Title: Bombs Away!
Artist: Tom Wood
Brand: Sunsout
Piece count: 550 pieces
Size: Approx. 15 x 24 in. (38 x 61 cm)
Purchased: N/A, sent for review
Quality:
Board: Very good
Cutting: Very good
Image: Very good
Box: Average
Fit: Good, slightly spongy
Puzzle Dust: Moderate amount
Piece cut: Semi-random cut
Piece shapes: Very good variety
Finish: Slightly shiny finish, lays flat
Overall Rating: Very good, recommended
I received this product at no cost in order to facilitate this review. All thoughts and opinions expressed are truthful and 100% my own.
Neon Signs by Lewis T. Johnson – White Mountain Puzzles – 1000 pieces
Here’s another puzzle from several years ago, and I distinctly remember this one. It wasn’t that difficult in my opinion (other than the edges), and is a GORGEOUS finished image! Thankfully this picture isn’t too horrible, at least compared to some of the others I’ve been posting. 😎
White Mountain 1000 piece puzzles are larger than most, and I find that I enjoy working with the larger pieces. The finished puzzle seems almost like more of an accomplishment too, it’s an impressive size. Sometimes there can be a problem with image lift or many still connected pieces, but usually I find them to be a good quality puzzle.
The edges were super difficult and took a lot of time, but the rest of the puzzle was a joy. It’s listed on the page of “challenging” puzzles on the White Mountain website, but other than the edges I didn’t find it to be very difficult at all. I love the look of the neon against the black background, and working on each of the signs was great fun – hubby even wanted to help! The fit was beautiful, and the finished puzzle would look great framed.
Mom wanted to put this together too, so when I finished I numbered the edge pieces starting in the bottom left corner and going around – to give mom a leg up when she assembled it. She was very appreciative, and even did the same for me when she worked a puzzle with a difficult edge. Every little bit helps. 😉
This puzzle is still in production, so if you like the look of it – I say go for it! It’s not as difficult as you may think. I found it to be entertaining and relaxing; so much so that I still fondly remember the assembly of it more than 2 years later. ❤
This was a very fun, cool little 3D puzzle. I don’t know why I wanted this one so much, I’m not really a basketball fan. It just seemed like it would be extremely entertaining to assemble, and it was!
This was the first new 3D puzzle I’ve assembled, and the quality is excellent. The previous ones I’ve assembled have all been from the thrift store and seemed quite the worse for wear. They may have been taken apart too roughly; the pieces fit together tightly and care must used when taking them apart. The plastic pieces fit together extremely well, and even though there are only 54 pieces it took a little bit of time to assemble.
These 3D puzzles are numbered on the back, and below each number is an arrow showing which direction the next piece should go. I use the numbers to sort into groups of ten, and then turn over each group for assembly.
The basketball was a little challenging to assemble for obvious reasons, but I enjoyed myself very much. 😁🏀
My Jigsaw Journal 