Old Woodland by Dominic Davison – E&L Corp. – 250 pieces
An interesting and beautiful image by Dominic Davison, and another new company I’ve tried out – E&L Corp. Unfortunately the quality was lacking.
I enjoy the artwork of Dominic Davison, this image is beautiful and calm and I love that it has a frame as part of the picture. I’ve chosen several of his puzzles without knowing he was the artist; his artwork makes for a great puzzle. If only the puzzle quality itself was as nice as the image. 😐
The pieces were extremely thin and easily bent, and there were a lot of pieces with image lift as well. On the positive side, there were a good variety of piece shapes and nice image reproduction. I’ve only done one puzzle, so I don’t want to say that this is representative of the quality of all their puzzles. This one wasn’t great, and hopefully when I find and work a few more of them I’ll be able to get an overview of their quality in general.
Lovely image though, and a nice quick puzzle at 250 pieces. 🙂
Festive Felines by Rachael Hale – Andrews + Blaine – 500 pieces
It’s been so unbearably hot here I’ve decided to celebrate Christmas in July! Once a week this month I’ll have a Christmas/holiday puzzle on the blog. It will be a nice reminder that it won’t always be so bleeping hot outside. 🙂
Festive Felines is our first Christmas in July puzzle, a fun thrift store find by Andrews + Blaine. Unopened! I wonder sometimes about unopened puzzles we find at the thrift stores. Was it a gift that someone really didn’t want? Was it put away and forgotten? Was it with a whole collection of puzzles in someone’s estate? I wonder about these things. Mom found an unopened 6000 piece Schmidt puzzle this week – for $1.99!!! 😮
Anyway, back to this puzzle. It was quite a fun assembly, I do love a collage! It wasn’t as difficult as I thought it would be with so much fur, white, and red – but it was enough of a challenge to be fun.
I’ve done several puzzles by this company, and this is the first puzzle of theirs that I’ve done that I had problems with the pieces themselves. The pieces are a good thickness, fit together very well, and had a nice variety of shapes – the problem is the shapes. In many places the “arms” of the pieces were so thin that even right out of the bag they were bending, and one of them had broken off already.
Many of the pieces had arms this thin or even thinner! That’s just too thin to be able to work with them without breaking pieces. The piece shapes are also a bit obvious in the finished image, making it more difficult to see the details. Andrews + Blaine usually has very nice pieces of a good thickness that fit together nicely. This is the first puzzle I’ve had this problem with, so I wouldn’t let it dissuade you from picking up one of their puzzles if you like the image or find one in a thrift store.
The kittens are adorable and make for a nice puzzle image. There was enough variety in the shades of fur and accessories that it wasn’t too difficult to assemble a section or two at a time. My favorite is the little guy peeking out from inside the gift box. So cute! Did I mention glitter? Glitter puzzle!! It doesn’t photograph well, or I don’t do photographs well – but every section has something glittery. Who doesn’t love a little sparkle?
Neuschwanstein Castle – Masterpieces (Masters of Photography) – 500 pieces
Neuschwanstein Castle was a quick, fun puzzle that had better quality than I thought it would. I honestly don’t understand the fascination with this castle, there are so many puzzles of it from so many different companies! It’s an interesting looking castle in a beautiful setting, I guess because it makes for a pretty picture? Whatever the reason, it does make a lovely image and it was an enjoyable puzzle to assemble.
This puzzle is part of the Masterpieces Space Savers collection. Small boxes approximately half the size of a regular 500 piece box designed to put a lot of puzzle fun in a little box for a little price. The puzzles are either $4.99 or $5.99 at Puzzle Warehouse, which is a great price for a 500 piece puzzle if you ask me. I was impressed with the quality of this puzzle, and I’m looking forward to working on a couple other space saver Masters of Photography puzzles that I have to review. I’m hoping they’re all nice quality like this one. Click the link above to see all the space saver puzzles available from Puzzle Warehouse.
I was surprised by the pieces of this puzzle, they seemed very nice and not what I expected from the space savers box. I assumed (incorrectly) that the pieces would be thin; they were thicker than expected and fit together very well. The puzzle was random cut and had a nice matte finish that didn’t cause glare.
My only issue was the obvious piece cut in the finished puzzle. It makes it a little more difficult to see the details of the picture through all the piece shapes, but doesn’t really detract from the enjoyment of the assembly. I’m reserving judgement until I complete more of this series for comparison.
The space saver boxes are all one piece with a top that flips up. Not ideal for keeping the puzzle after you’ve assembled it; it would be too easy to lose a piece. I would recommend using a zip top plastic bag to store the pieces in the box after it’s been assembled. Also, because the box is smaller the image of the puzzle is smaller – it could be difficult if you need to reference the picture on a puzzle with more detail. On the plus side, these small boxes are perfect for travel. Throw it in your suitcase for a vacation or just a weekend away and you’ve just packed some quality family time. 🙂
I enjoyed Neuschwanstein Castle even though it isn’t an image I would normally choose. It’s a good quality puzzle that was an entertaining assembly, definitely recommended.👍
I received this product at no charge to facilitate this review, all thoughts and opinions expressed are my own.
Here’s an adorable puzzle for all the video game lovers out there. Mom and I had a great time assembling it with the help of my oldest son (who LOVES video games). Another new puzzle company to try too, which I always love. Who knew there were so many different companies out there producing jigsaw puzzles? I sure didn’t!
So, USAopoly, not bad! The pieces were thinner than premium puzzles but extremely sturdy, they fit together well and there was a nice variety of piece shapes. The image reproduction was very good with bright colors and no fuzziness, and there was no image lift on any of the pieces. Pretty darn good all the way around if you ask me.
We worked this puzzle from the bottom up, which is not how we usually do it but the layers of the image just made it so easy. It was a quick assembly with 3 people working on it, and we all enjoyed ourselves very much. My son, who doesn’t usually get involved with my puzzling just had to sit down and work on this one – he just can’t walk past Super Mario Bros. and not stop and see what’s going on. 🙂 When we were finished he wanted to take the puzzle to do again at home and have me glue when he’s assembled it all by himself.
This puzzle reminded my mother and me of playing Super Mario Bros. when I was pregnant with my daughter (over a quarter of a century ago 😮 ). Mom and I would sit and play it together a lot. When my daughter was born and very colicky, she was soothed by the music of the game. She heard it so often when she was in my belly that it was familiar and calming for her! I no longer had much time to sit and play Super Mario Bros., but I could turn the game on and let the background music play to keep her relaxed. This puzzle reminded me of that time so long ago.
All in all an excellent thrift store purchase and a good quality, entertaining puzzle – for 3 generations of my family!
Ice Age Dawn of the Dinosaurs – Mega Puzzles – 100 pieces
Cute puzzle – thrift store purchase – and all of the pieces were there. That’s always a plus. 🙂
I haven’t really given any “bad” reviews on kids puzzles before that I can remember, but this one wasn’t great. As you can see the completed puzzle doesn’t lie flat and the pieces were extremely thin. I haven’t really gotten any Mega Puzzles that have been this lacking before, and I’m hoping this was a fluke. I haven’t done any adult puzzles from this company so I don’t have much to compare it to.
Puzzles don’t always have to be cream of the crop quality-wise (I’d love it if they were though 😉 ). I was having a bad day and resting in bed – and even though the quality is less than optimal it was an enjoyable distraction for a few minutes. The image is cute and any kid who is a fan of the Ice Age movies will enjoy this puzzle.
My Jigsaw Journal 