My Darlin’ Daughter

On February 16, 2020March 5, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzling8 Comments

My sweet darlin’ daughter took it upon herself to be the Valentine’s fairy this year and put together gift bags for the entire family – I raised a fantastic girl who grew up to be the most amazing, selfless, thoughtful woman I know. The whole family is doing their best to get through all the “firsts” after losing a loved one, and she decided to try and make our first Valentine’s Day without her beloved grandmother a good one for us all. I’m so proud of her and how she truly wants to take care of us all. 💝

She did a great job, and of course she went a little overboard and for my present I received the most adorable wooden puzzle from Artifact! How sweet is my girl? So sweet!

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This puzzle is just the cutest! The artwork is by Randal Spangler, and I don’t think I’ve assembled any other puzzles with his artwork before. I don’t know where he’s been hiding, but I adore the look of this one and hopefully I’ll be able to find more puzzles with his images on them. 🙂

I’ve only just started working on it, and have already succumbed to my OCD; the pieces are all laid out on the board in very orderly rows. I started with the pieces just all over the board willy nilly, but my brain can’t function well with things in such disarray. And there’s something very soothing about getting all the pieces lined up neatly, I can’t really explain it. My hunch is that many of us who love jigsaw puzzles have a little bit of the OCD, and putting things right by getting the picture put back together gives us immense satisfaction.

The pieces are very squared off and geometrical looking, but that doesn’t mean it’s overly easy, because it most definitely hasn’t been so far.

Catastrophe IP

I love the interesting cut and the squared off connectors, and I’m looking forward to seeing the completed puzzle – it’s so adorable! It shouldn’t take too long, the puzzle is only 182 pieces so it should be completed today if all goes well.

Thank you to my darlin’ sweet baby girl for the amazing gift, I love it – but I love you more! 💗

Window Shoppers In Progress

On February 13, 2020February 13, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzling2 Comments

Shoppers IP — Window Shoppers – Ravensburger – 1000 pieces

This puzzle got started on Tuesday afternoon, but unfortunately there were things that had to be done yesterday that took up the entire morning. When I finally did get home I was wrung out and ready to do absolutely nothing – and that is what I did.

Life is constantly trying to insert itself into our puzzling time; the family wants food, clean clothes, a tidy house – so rude!

Hopefully I’ll be able to get back to it today and make some more progress. I was enjoying myself before quitting time came. 🙂

Puzzle Giveaway!

On February 10, 2020February 10, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzling24 Comments

Sewing Collage – Milton Bradley (Big Ben) – 500 pieces

I find myself with an extra copy of this puzzle that I completed last year, and so I’ve decided to hold another giveaway. 🙂 It’s a new, unopened copy of Sewing Collage, a 500 piece Milton Bradley/Big Ben puzzle; you can read my post about this puzzle by clicking the link above.

I assembled this puzzle in September of last year and had a great time with it, and now if you’re the lucky winner you could have a great time assembling it too! All you have to do is comment on this post, and you’ll be entered in the drawing. I will use a random number generator to decide the winner and will post the results one week from today, Monday February 17, 2020.

Good luck!

Proud Lion In Progress

On February 7, 2020February 7, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzling4 Comments

Proud Lion IP — Proud Lion by Martin Nasim – 300 pieces

Usually for a 300 piece puzzle it gets finished the day that I start it, but this one has been on my board for 2 days now. It’s been a horrible week, but I’ve made it a point to get myself into the puzzle room at least once a day and do SOMETHING with a puzzle; whether it’s sorting pieces or putting a few of them together, as long as I got a little bit accomplished it helped.

I started with the more difficult side, the brush strokes make it a bit more of a challenge – but there’s fun in the harder ones, and every piece placed is a little victory. And once that side is finished the bright colors and interesting patterns on the opposite side should make for much quicker assembly.

So this beauty is still in progress, but hopefully I’ll be able to stay awake during the day and get it finished. You can’t really tell from the picture, but it’s a beautiful image, it’ll be gorgeous when it’s done. 🙂

A Box of Peace and Calm

On February 4, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzling8 Comments

I have been having one of the worst days in quite a while – full of pain, anxiety, stress, and just in general a terrible day. It was even too much for me to get my regular blog post out this morning, my apologies for the delay, it truly has been an awful day.

But even with everything going on, as long as I could get myself into the puzzle room and sit down in front of the board, everything negative starts fading a little bit into the background. I open a new puzzle, see the pieces and colors and hold them in my hands, and the world seems a little less stressful. What better hobby could there be? I can’t think of one.

Even just a few minutes with some puzzle pieces takes my mind off of everything else, and things seem a little more tolerable. I opened a box, and there’s peace and calm for me inside; I get to bring order to the chaos, put together a beautiful picture, and in doing so find much relief from the stresses and anxieties of the day.

I love jigsaw puzzles. 💟