Selfies – Part 1

On July 31, 2020July 31, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles3 Comments

Selfies 1-1 — Selfies by Howard Robinson- Cra-Z-Art – 125/500 pieces

Another fun and fantastic set of smaller shaped puzzles from Cra-Z-Art. If you hadn’t already figured it out I’ll say it plain as day – I love these puzzles! 💖

Cra-Z-Art, sometimes under the name of Lafayette Puzzle Factory, has many sets of these shaped puzzles, and I find them to be fun to assemble – and perfect for me when I am unable to sit at my puzzle table. I can take a group of pieces and assemble them on trays in bed. Perfect! Each smaller puzzle has a colored backing so that if you prefer you can separate them and assemble each puzzle one by one. Or, if you like, you can disregard the colored backing and assemble them as a regular 500 piece puzzle. Either way they’re extremely entertaining. I’ve assembled them both ways and found them to be engaging, beautiful, and lots of fun!

This set should be called “Underwater Selfies” if you ask me, but who am I to tell a puzzle company what to title their puzzles? According to the box, these are just Selfies. They are all the artwork of Howard Robinson, who is probably best known in the puzzle community for his animal selfies images. They’re all so well done, and adorable – very hard to resist in my opinion.

Selfies 1-2

Meet Bernard and Helen. They’ve been together for a while, and you can tell. Helen is the one on the left nearer the top, and Bernard is the grouchy looking one on the right, closer to the bottom. Bernard is the manager at a food mart selling algae, plankton, and small crustaceans; and Helen is a renowned artist. At the moment, Bernard is cranky because Helen spent the day watching her shows and celebrating the moments of her life with several cups of International Foods French Vanilla coffee. They’re having a tiff at the moment, we should politely back away and leave them be.

Selfies 1-3

I have no idea what species of fish this is, so his name comes from my impression of his countenance; to me there seems to be a youthful look about him. His name is Timmy. Timmy is still in school, but he’s planning on graduating next year if all goes well. He has a part time job after school delivering meals to local shut-ins and he also likes to help his mom making dinner every night. He plans on attending the Cordon Bluefin Culinary School after graduation and becoming a chef. Timmy has plans – big plans!

Selfies 1-4

This is Dakota, she’s the oldest of three girls. She’s a professional cheerleader for the local water polo team, and in her spare time she likes to watch makeup tutorials on YouTube and try out the lessons on her friends and younger sisters – Daniella and Dorinda. Her aim is to be a professional makeup artist (although between you and me, she unfortunately isn’t very good at it). Here’s hoping she finds a career path that’s a little better suited to her. Perhaps a trainer at the local pilates studio? Who knows!

These underwater selfies were lots of fun to put together, and I highly recommend giving any of these sets a try if you haven’t already. They’re good quality, with beautiful artwork, and most especially they’re enjoyable to assemble. 🐬

Do I Look Merry?

On July 29, 2020July 29, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store Puzzles5 Comments

Well? Does he? As the pet parent of a Boston Terrier I can tell you that this look says “Why are you doing this to me? Can we please get this stupid picture over with?” So the title I’ve given this silly, sweet puzzle has been shortened from what it is in my mind. When I look at it, what I hear in my head is “Do I Look Freakin’ Merry to You?”.

This is the second – and last – Christmas puzzle I assembled for Christmas in July. I normally try to do a few Christmas puzzles every July, but I just wasn’t feeling it this year. But the fact that this adorable image is a Boston Terrier and that it was only 100 pieces made the decision pretty easy. This is my kind of Christmas image!

Brother Sister Design Studio is a brand/trademark of Hobby Lobby. As I don’t shop there for personal reasons, this is the first puzzle from this brand that I’ve assembled. For a store brand it was better quality that I thought it would be – I would characterize the quality as good. Although as I’ve only assembled this one puzzle I cannot make a final determination on the brand’s overall quality.

I enjoyed the assembly very much, mostly because of the adorable image; and I was surprised by the detail you could make out in the reflection from the dog’s eye…

Do I Look Merry 1

You can see the room where the picture was taken in this reflection! It jumped out at me while I was assembling the eyes, so I had to take a closeup to show you. The image reproduction was the best part of the quality in my opinion, although the finish was quite shiny and made assembling the darker parts a little more difficult under the artificial lighting at my puzzle table.

So, as this pup would probably say, “Happy freakin’ Christmas in July.” 🎅

Childhood Favorites

On July 27, 2020July 26, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles13 Comments

Brace yourselves everyone, you’re in for a shock – I LOVED THIS PUZZLE! I know, it’s unbelievable, isn’t it? Who’d have thought that this collage (my favorite type of image) of book covers (I love books and reading) in puzzle form (my absolute favorite hobby) would be such great fun? I know, it bowled me over too! 😉

I was quite a prolific reader as a kid, in addition to being quite a tomboy. Playing outside and getting dirty was so much fun for me, and I was always climbing the big tree in the backyard with a book in my pocket. I’d get to the good branch and sit there, out of sight of my sisters and my mom, and spend as much time as I could reading. I love to re-read books too, and I couldn’t tell you how many times I’d re-read my favorites books – sometimes as soon as I finished a great book I’d flip right back to the beginning and start over again!

So put my love of books together with my love of puzzles, and add that it’s a collage – that’s puzzle bliss for me!

The fit of this Re-marks puzzle was a bit loose, and the piece shapes are quite prominent. The loose fit can be a bit of a pain to work with, but it wasn’t so loose as to be much of a problem. Otherwise the puzzle was good quality; the offset grid cut made for a more interesting assembly and the chipboard is a good thickness. Overall, other than the fit, the puzzle quality was very good.

Childhood Favorites 1

Charlotte’s Web was one of my favorite books as a child, not only because of the story, but also because I loved the illustrations. They were done by the same man who did the illustrations of the Little House series of books. Speaking of Little House on the Prairie, why aren’t any of those books shown here? I ADORED them as a child, and still do – I just re-read them all a couple of months ago!

Childhood Favorites 2

Most girls in the US have a memory of this book. I know I sure do. Ain’t it great being a lady and dealing with menstruation?

Childhood Favorites 3

My sister told me about this book when I was younger, and it sticks with me to this day. What a fabulous story, told by a talented author! Just looking at this book cover makes me want to get myself a copy of this book and re-read it; it’s been a few decades since I last read this one.

I wonder to myself sometimes if you guys get tired of me doing so many collages, I’m not ashamed to tell you that I worry about stupid stuff like that. I’m an accomplished worrier. I try to keep telling myself to just post the puzzles I do and not fret about doing puzzles to make others happy or to give them more variety – but I’m not always successful in convincing myself.

Happy puzzling everyone! I hope you’re still finding and assembling some fantastic puzzles!

Avocado Doug

On July 26, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles2 Comments

I absolutely loved this image and thankfully the assembly was as much fun as this silly and adorable image. The quality was great, with an excellent fit – I never hesitate to buy Buffalo puzzles, thank goodness they have so many great puzzles to choose from.

Honestly, I have to admit that when I bought this puzzle I though the costume was a pea pod. It was only when I looked this puzzle up to see if I could find a title (because there was no title on the box other than Doug the Pug) did I find that the title was Avocado Doug. I was pretty embarrassed that I didn’t see it! In my own defense though, I don’t like avocados so it’s no surprise that it wasn’t the first thing that popped into my head.

The couch is quite a large portion of the image, and it made the puzzle a bit difficult. There were so many pieces that were a pale cream color! Luckily, being the puzzle goddess that I am (sometimes) it didn’t take too long to get it done. 👸

Avocado Doug 1

My favorite thing to do when the fit is tighter than normal is to stand the puzzle up on it’s end and take a picture. I don’t know why I like to do that, I just do. It makes me really, really happy – and we all need a little happy these days, don’t we?

Disney Friends In Progress

On July 24, 2020July 24, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles2 Comments

I’m slowly working my way back up to larger puzzles; I just completed a 100 piece from Vermont Christmas Company and now the piece count is doubled for this 200 pc. adorable Disney image. The background of the diner makes it fun and a little more challenging, in my humble opinion, and although it’s a Ceaco I’m hoping to enjoy it anyway.

Hopefully you’re all working on fun puzzles at the moment. Happy puzzling everyone! 🧩😍