Downtown Freemont, Las Vegas, Nevada by Susanne Kremer – Cra-Z-Art (Kodak) – 350 pieces
Thankfully I had a really good time with this puzzle. I don’t usually go for photographic images, but this one was a great picture. You can tell it’s been manipulated, the car in the foreground is the same one as the one already driving down the street in front of it. The license plates are the same! I don’t know if most people would notice that or not, but I certainly did.
The quality was good. That’s as high as I’m willing to go on the rating, the fit was a bit wonky in addition to the shapes where you can tell immediately which way they’re oriented. But it was the kind of puzzle I needed to help get me out of my funk, so extra points for that.
This section stood out to me, why is the sign for check cashing upside down? Its one of those things that pops out of the image, you see the letters on a piece and think you know which way the piece goes but it doesn’t work that way. Normally I don’t use the box image or poster when I’m assembling a puzzle, so I didn’t know that this sign is upside down in the image.
Overall I enjoyed this puzzle just the right amount, which is exactly what I needed after three less than optimal puzzles. If this image speaks to you I can recommend this puzzle. It’s a Cra-Z-Art puzzle, so it isn’t premium quality, but you don’t always need that – you just need something fun.
Midnight in the Garden by Ute Thonissen – Ravensburger – 368 pieces
Um…..you may be shocked to hear this, but I didn’t like this Ravensburger puzzle at all. It’s one of the Escape series and it was my first time with these puzzles; I didn’t really understand the concept and I don’t think the instructions are helpful at all. I won’t be writing a lot about this. It’s another type of mystery puzzle and I don’t like to spoil things for others who may enjoy them, so I don’t discuss solutions or show the entire finished image.
This puzzle made me feel stupid because I don’t think that you are given enough information to begin with, and I found it extremely confusing.
If you just want to assemble the puzzle you can do that, but I have a warning for you – do not assemble the border first. It’s very dark, it’s hard to distinguish if you have the correct piece because all the pieces seem to be interchangeable. It’s frustrating if you try to start with the edges, so just don’t.
I really wanted a fun puzzle to play with today but this was not fun for me. 😥
Blooming Books by Ben Giles – Galison – 750 pieces
This puzzle was both a joy and a pain to assemble, but in the end it felt like an accomplishment to finish it and I was pretty proud of myself for not giving up. This was a gift (who from I do not remember) so of course I wanted to assemble it – if someone takes the time to pick out a puzzle for me, it is always appreciated, even if it’s a brand I don’t care for or an image I wouldn’t pick out for myself. Whoever gifted me this puzzle, thank you!
Galison is a brand that I don’t buy, new or used – for three reasons. First, their lack of variety in piece shape; their regular puzzles only have ballerina pieces (two male/two female ends), it’s boring to work with only one shape and when there are large areas of one color or pattern it makes assembly much more frustrating and difficult. Second, I’m a very tactile person and I don’t care for the “sharp” white backing they use on their chipboard, I don’t like the feel of it in my hands. Third, and most importantly for me, I had a terrible experience with Galison a while back and their customer service (or lack thereof) was almost non-existent. It really ticked me off, and I made a post called No More Galison Puzzles For Me…Ever.
But like I said in the beginning, this was a gift, and even though it’s been sitting in my house for years I wanted to finally assemble it and send it on to the thrift store – I need the room on my puzzle shelves! One good thing about Galison is that their shaped puzzles are truly a random cut, and it makes for a much more interesting assembly. I was actually looking forward to this one.
The pieces were quite thick and the fit was very good. Those are all the pros for this puzzle, unfortunately.
Most people don’t start with the edges on a shaped puzzle, but I do. I can usually find most or all of the edges and it helps me to begin where I normally do with a rectangular puzzle. Unfortunately the edge pieces didn’t always connect which made me have to revise my plan for the assembly. What I ended up doing was work on the border until I got to a place where the pieces just sat next to each other and then I stopped and went through all the pieces until I found enough inside ones to keep that section of the edge together; then I continued with the next part of the frame. It went on this way until the border was complete, and amazingly it wasn’t as frustrating as I thought it would be.
I’ve been much more laid back lately about how I assemble puzzles, just letting my weird brain take me where it wants to go. It’s been good, and I think that helped me with this assembly. I thought I knew how it was going to go, but had to take a detour and figure out another way to get to the end. It didn’t cause me anxiety or upset, I just went with it and it was nice.
You can see from this closeup that the image reproduction was not good on this puzzle, the flowers and butterflies looked like a a bad copy from an old mimeograph machine. On the poster included with the puzzle, however, although the flowers look like they were pasted onto the image of the books, they do not look pixelated like they do on the actual puzzle. It seems as though it’s just a bad reproduction.
Interestingly, I still enjoyed working on this puzzle. I took my time, let the puzzle take me where it wanted to go, and let myself appreciate the ride when I could.
Sigh. I’ve done it again. Without realizing it I purchased another crap-tastic puzzle made in China that steals artwork and does not properly license it or credit the artist on the box. My sincere apologies. Another awful puzzle with letters on the back, a bad fit, no artist credit, and missing pieces.
After it happened the first time I vowed to take more care when buying thrift store puzzles, and I thought I had this time. When I looked at the box, it had an address in Madrid, Spain on the side and I – wrongly – assumed that meant it wasn’t one of those puzzles. I should have been more diligent and read the entire box, and will do that from now on. My only happy thought around this is that this company got exactly zero of my dollars, and what I spent went to a Goodwill store that helps out in my community.
There are three edge pieces missing, all together on one side. Normally I always choose to be positive about things like missing pieces. Not going to happen today. Today I am blaming the company, I bet this thing was missing pieces when it was brand new. I have no actual proof of that, but whatever.
Yep, I’ve got an attitude. Deal with it.
This puzzle was so tall that I decided to actually use the letters on the back to sort the puzzle and to do each half separately so I didn’t have to stand up or lean way over to reach the top and cause more pain. I’ve never done this with a puzzle before; once with a 2000 piece puzzle I laid the image sideways on my board and worked it that way but I’ve not separated a puzzle in half before.
The posted included with this puzzle is RIDICULOUSLY large. It’s exactly the size of the completed puzzle – and that’s too big to be helpful honestly. The only way to use it effectively would be to hang it up on the wall, but not everyone puzzles in a place where that’s a viable option.
The artwork is absolutely adorable, and if I knew how to find who the artist is I would give them credit. It is nowhere on the box, obviously, they can’t really advertise that they stole someone’s work and put it on their sh*t puzzle. If you know who the original artist is, please let me know in the comments so that I can at the very least credit them here on my tiny little blog.
These companies that popped up during the pandemic to take advantage of the puzzle craze that was happening don’t seem to be going anywhere, and there are more of them than ever. I would never knowingly give any of these companies my hard-earned money. It disgusts me that they steal from artists, it ticks me off that their puzzles are so popular these days and that many puzzlers think they are good quality and have no problems at all buying their products. In general it is depressing, frustrating, and enraging.
I can’t tell you what puzzles to buy, it’s really none of my business. But I can tell you how I feel about this disturbing trend and let you see it from hopefully more than one side. I understand both sides, or at least I think I do. I know that I’m lucky to be able to afford the puzzles I buy, and I also know that not everyone is able to spend as much and does their best to get as much bang for their buck as they can. I really do understand, that was me in my younger days when I didn’t have extra to spend on anything. But spending money on these puzzles keeps these trashy places in business, places that steal artwork to make a quick buck. And if the artists whose work we enjoy can’t make enough money licensing their artwork to legitimate puzzle companies then it may end up that we won’t have their work any more. If they can’t make a living at it, why continue to do it; especially when others are profiting from your creations but you aren’t.
This company needs a VERY BIG STRAW. Cause it sucks.
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?
