Tag: Mini Puzzles

Vivienne on Vacation*

On By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles4 Comments

Vivienne on Vacation* – Unknown – 150 pieces

Isn’t this adorable? I have no idea where this puzzle came from, but I have two mini puzzles in test tubes with no brand name, no titles, just photographic images. When a smaller puzzle was what I was looking for this seemed like a good image for the summer. I’ve named her Vivienne, and she is obviously on vacation. 🌞🕶

The quality is very good, although the pieces are thinner than MicroPuzzles they do have an excellent variety of piece shapes; MicroPuzzles has only one shape, but both of them are good quality puzzles that are entertaining to assemble. The finish on this one is quite shiny, so much so that I had to turn off my overhead light to properly see the darker parts of the image. Other than that I have no issues with the quality at all – what a pleasant surprise!

There isn’t a lot to say, other than that I enjoyed this one very much and the image makes me smile when I look at it. Again, I have no clue where I got this one, but I’m glad it was in my stash.

Untitled In Progress…

On By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzling4 Comments

Untitled – Unknown – 150 pieces

I was waiting on a Puzzle Fairy delivery yesterday, so I didn’t want to start any larger piece count puzzles. A micro puzzle is always good for a good time, so this untitled puzzle from an unknown manufacturer seemed like an excellent choice – an adorable puppy face is almost always sure to make me smile, and there are several adorable puppy faces in this one. (Plus, there’s that sweet Boston Terrier in the corner, how in the world can I be expected to pass that up?) 🐾🧡

This way I was still able to put some puzzle pieces together yesterday to center and relax me, but whatever puzzle will be my next inspiration won’t have to wait long at all for me to finish this little guy and have the board ready for more pieces.

Wish I knew where these mini puzzles came from, but honestly there are no clues whatsoever in this aging brain of mine.

*The puzzles arrived, but it was later in the afternoon and I wasn’t even able to open them until this morning. So many puzzles and so much inspiration – thank you Puzzle Fairy! 💚🧚‍♀️

Sailing to the Tunes

On By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles4 Comments

Sailing to the Tunes by Soma Folk Art – Wentworth Wooden Puzzles – 40 pieces

This gorgeous image was entertaining to put together, but I was wishing I had gotten this one in a larger piece count; the colors were beautiful, it’s just stunning – but it was over too quickly! I haven’t worked a Soma Folk Art image before and after looking them up I would love to do more. The artwork is so bright, colorful, and not what we usually see for jigsaw puzzle images. Love it!

You all know how I feel about Wentworth; I’ve done well over a hundred of their puzzles – small, big, shaped, easy, difficult, ones with tessellating pieces, etc. If you want to hear about their quality, please look up any of my other posts about a Wentworth puzzle because honestly after spending four days in the hospital with my cranky, elderly father I’m too exhausted to type up too much about this puzzle right now. Apologies.

This speckled counter was the only place available to work any puzzles in dad’s room, and it doesn’t make the best backdrop for showing these whimsy pieces. Apologies again. Loved these whimsies. Namaste. 🙏

*No, my dad isn’t back in the hospital. I wrote this up when I assembled the puzzle, back in June.*

Seattle

On By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles2 Comments

Seattle by Eric Dowdle – Dowdle Puzzles (Mini Wooden Puzzle) – 250 pieces

This was much more enjoyable for me than I thought it would be at the beginning, don’t you love it when that happens? After putting the border together I thought this puzzle was gonna be horrible, the fit is so loose! Once I got it onto my puzzle board where the fabric helps keep it from moving too much and once I started assembling the image it got so much better.

These mini wooden puzzles from Dowdle are adorable, but I can’t say the quality is optimal. When I take a picture of a wooden puzzle I take time to “smush” it together as much as possible first (smush being a technical term 😉), so that it reduces obvious piece shapes and you can see the artwork more clearly. I did that here, but you can see – especially in the sky – that there are quite large gaps and it does not fit together snugly at all. In addition, all the pieces are the standard ones you would find in a grid cut cardboard puzzle which is a little boring for a wooden puzzle and there are no whimsies. All that being said this was still entertaining to put together, and when Penny sends me more after she’s finished them I will definitely be assembling them.

Mostly the main reason for how much I enjoyed this little guy was Eric Dowdle’s artwork, I love his images although many times they make for challenging assemblies. With this mini puzzle it was so interesting to study the pieces to see what’s happening and where something might go, and with each piece I found my brain sent me some dopamine and I was happy. That’s why I puzzle!

Loved this little plane with the banner. I’ve never been to Seattle, but I’m sure it’s lovely.

Most people know about the fish market in Seattle, if you don’t then you should google it – one of the images that comes up looks quite like this little section including the clock, “farmers market” sign and one that says “meet the producers”. It was difficult to zoom in this close on such a small puzzle, but I did the best I could.

My momma always told me to try and show how big or small some puzzles are because you can’t really tell in my pictures, so this next picture is in her memory….

She was right, of course. You can’t tell from that first picture how mini this mini puzzle is without something for comparison. This little guy really is a little guy!

Extremely loose fit but still entertaining, the artwork was absolutely beautiful and detailed and made for a very nice assembly.

Hummingbird’s Treasure

On By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles2 Comments

Hummingbird’s Treasure – MicroPuzzles – 150 pieces

This little beauty was more difficult than it looks, but so much fun! After seeing just how many MicroPuzzles were here that still needed to be assembled, when I was looking for a smaller piece count puzzle I decided to look through my mini puzzles to find an image that spoke to me. This gorgeous hummingbird carrying a puzzle piece caught my eye and I’m so glad it did. It’s just beautiful. 😍

The image made for an interesting assembly. There were several times that I placed pieces that I was sure were correct, but they were not. If I had picked up the pieces and checked the back I would have seen that it wasn’t the correct placement, but I don’t always do that. Many people these days seem to be calling these “false fits” online, I do not. I call it putting a piece where it doesn’t belong. If a piece can fit into a spot that doesn’t mean it belongs there, many pieces can be made to fit in many places. A true false fit is when there are multiple pieces that are exactly the same shape and can fit perfectly in more than one spot. Placing a piece incorrectly is just that, not necessarily a false fit; you have to look at both the image and how the pieces fit together. False fit seems to be the new buzzword for puzzlers lately, and my hormonal menopausal brain finds this very annoying.

Thus endeth today’s rant.

I placed several pieces incorrectly in this puzzle; the darkness of the image in some places along with the shiny coating made it difficult for these old eyes to know for sure if the placement was true. Of course it became obvious when I tried to place adjoining pieces that I was wrong, but I found the challenge to be entertaining. This build was very enjoyable for me.

Of course when the fit is right we always try to get a picture of the puzzle on it’s edge, which hilariously (to me, anyway) has been named the “Stacey Stance” by fellow puzzle blogger Puzzle Momma, who is also my puzzle bestie Penny. I’m flattered! Getting this picture is more of a challenge when the image is oriented in portrait style like this one, but I got it done.

I absolutely adore this image, it’s so dang pretty!😍