The Portrait

On June 22, 2017 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw PuzzlesLeave a comment

What if Leonardo Da Vinci never painted the Mona Lisa? Would he still have become a famous artist? What would he be famous for? I don’t show the entire image for these types of puzzles because I don’t want to spoil the fun of solving the puzzle for anyone else. When I was just starting to find and order these puzzles I Googled one of them and clicked on a link and was presented with the finished image – I didn’t want to see that!

As usual, I completely enjoyed working this puzzle; Geoff Tristam’s artwork and sense of humor are on display here and make for an excellent puzzle. I love the added difficulty of not having a reference image to work from, it makes me pay attention even more than normal to the pieces and where they might connect. The What If collection by Ravensburger hits the mark every time and I always find myself happy with the end result.

I’m going to have to make sure I type up my post for a completed puzzle on the day I complete it! I finished this puzzle almost 2 weeks ago and I’m just writing it up now. It’s been so long, and I don’t take a picture of the entire puzzle – I’ve almost forgotten the finished image! 😮

This was one of the slightly more difficult What If puzzles I’ve completed. Usually you can tell what the background might look like or what people are wearing from the image on the box, but not so with this one. The box image shows Da Vinci painting portraits on the street long ago, and the finished image is in a more modern setting – not even close to the same background or people. Still, I was up to the challenge and enjoyed it thoroughly!

I love Ravensburger puzzles, the quality of the puzzles themselves is stellar, and they have an excellent catalog of puzzles to choose from. They are one of the companies I never hesitate to purchase if I like an image because I know I’ll be getting a quality product.

The What If puzzles are completely entertaining with an extra challenge to keep you puzzling. I highly recommend them!

Final Assembly Day!

On June 18, 2017April 21, 2020 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, World's Largest Puzzle Progress27 Comments

The World’s Largest Jigsaw Puzzle is finally put together! It was amazing to see the entire puzzle assembled, all 10 sections completed and connected. WOW! You can know the measurements in your head, but then seeing it in person is another thing altogether. It’s a beautiful puzzle, and it fit together perfectly; it was stunning in it’s enormity – I can hardly believe I did all that!

This is myself, mom, and my 3 children. Not the best picture, but at least it gives you scale, that’s one enormous puzzle! When you look back at the pictures I took along the way, the every day updates, each section looks like your average size puzzle, nothing too extraordinary. This picture gives you a much better appreciation for just how large each section actually is!

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So everyone there who was taking pictures was supposed to send them to me too, so I could pick the best ones for the blog. Of course no one has so far, so unfortunately the pictures I have aren’t the best ones from the day. The one above is a good one taken by a friend of my parents (although I’m unclear why my oldest son is crouched like a frog – he’s just got to be himself I guess!)

My husband arranged for a professional photographer to come and take pics of the puzzle, so I’m hoping when I get those they’ll be awesome pictures to share. 😎 We left the puzzle at the church Saturday night, and are going back to get more pictures today and to package it back up into it’s 10 sections. Hopefully in a day or so everyone will have forwarded me all the pictures and I can pick the best ones to show.

I was so nervous and anxious all morning! I can’t explain exactly why, but I was worried that a section would fall apart or something would go wrong. (I’m a worrier – an almost Olympic level, award winning worrier) But everything went smoothly thank goodness! It’s hard to believe that this puzzle took up 6 months of my life! 😮

I have to say I’m pretty darn proud of myself! This is quite the accomplishment, and not a lot of people can say they’ve actually assembled the world’s largest commercially available jigsaw puzzle! I can – I did it!!

Again, tons of thanks to my dad and husband for doing all the heavy lifting and carting things around for the big day. And to mom for helping me make cookies and refreshments for everyone who came out to see the puzzle; to my 3 wonderful kids for showing up for mom’s weird puzzle day and being good sports about it. Thanks also to everyone who showed up to share my accomplishment today, it meant so much to me!

I’m hoping to have more pictures of the completed puzzle in the next few days to share with everyone, but at the very least I wanted to get a few of them in today’s post – because I promised I would.

I’m wiped out! Exhaustion has set in, I overdid it getting all of this set up and accomplished and will definitely be paying for it for the next few days – but it was worth it! This is not something that happens every day, so I wanted to enjoy it, and I did. I completed the Guinness World Record Largest Jigsaw Puzzle! I’m proud of myself, grateful to all my family and friends for their help, support, and encouragement; and thankful that I have this blog where I can share my puzzles with you.

I may be posting lots more pictures of the puzzle in the next few days, bear with me. I’m a proud momma who wants to show off her adorable overly large baby to everyone! 😉

One week to go!

On June 10, 2017 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzling, World's Largest Puzzle ProgressLeave a comment

One week from today we’re assembling Disney’s Memorable Moments! Friends and family have been invited, hall has been reserved, and I’m super excited! 🙂

I’m really excited to see every section put together and although in my head I know the measurements of the finished puzzle, it will be a different thing altogether to see it firsthand. Each section as it was completed seemed like an enormous puzzle on it’s own, and connecting them will be quite an awesome sight. 😮

I’m hoping to have an excellent picture that I’ll be able to put on the home page of the blog to replace the advertising image. Honestly though, how in the world do you get a good picture of a puzzle that’s 23 feet long and lying on the floor? I’m thinking we’re probably going to have to take a ladder. A camera rigged drone? (That made me laugh just thinking about it) Hopefully there’s a picture that turns out good enough to use here. I want a picture of myself lying or sitting on top of the puzzle, luckily the puzzle is so big the camera will have to be far enough away that it won’t be too close to my face. 😉

So if you’ve kept up with my blog and watched my progress on the “World’s Largest Jigsaw Puzzle”, it’s finally going to be completely assembled on Saturday June 17, 2017! Most likely I’ll post an update and pictures on Sunday, so stay tuned. 😎

The Pet Parlour

On June 4, 2017June 4, 2017 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw PuzzlesLeave a comment

Pamela runs The Pampered Pooch Parlour, but she dreams of diversifying and branching out to bigger and better things. What If her dream became reality, would things go wild? What would her shop look like then? This is what you have to puzzle in Ravensburger’s What If #6 The Pet Parlour.

If you read this blog regularly you know I love Ravensburger puzzles and that their quality is excellent. This puzzle is no different. It’s nice after working other puzzles to start a puzzle you know is going to be good and whose quality you don’t have to worry about – it’s like coming home. It makes me happy. And yes, I know, I need to get out more. 😐

This puzzle looked like fun to me, and it was even more fun than I thought it would be! I really enjoyed it very much, and of all the What If puzzles I’ve done so far (1-6) I would say this one is definitely my favorite! The concept is funny, the artwork is exceptional and it makes for a wonderful puzzle. If you’re not sure about the What If concept and you want to try it out, start with #6 – it’s tons of fun. 🙂

The Village Hall

On May 22, 2017 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw PuzzlesLeave a comment

I was in the mood for a Ravensburger puzzle, and this one looked like fun – it was! Again, I don’t take a picture of the entire puzzle because I don’t want to ruin the fun for anyone. So much of the enjoyment I get from puzzles like this is working out what’s going on and who goes where. I don’t want to spoil someone else’s fun!

In this puzzle, the caretaker at Grimley Hall is certain his new booking system is foolproof. But what if he didn’t take enough care and what if the Hall were double booked, or worse? As usual the result is comical and makes for a great puzzle.

Sometimes I’m just in the mood for a puzzle with quality I know will be excellent and I can just chill out and have fun with the assembly. Ravensburger is always available for that! This puzzle was no different and it was nice to sit down and get lost in the puzzle and tune out the world, even if only for a few minutes at a time. The pieces just feel good in your hand and you can put your mind in puzzle gear and not think about anything else.

As usual the art of Geoff Tristam is excellent and funny with bright colors and clean lines, and humor that I love. Also if you’re not familiar with the What If puzzles, on the back of each box is a blurb about the artist and he’s dressed up for a picture relating to the puzzle. On the back of this box he’s dressed up like the caretaker and he even has a ledger for bookings! I adore cartoon puzzles, and Geoff Tristam’s artwork is some of the best. 🙂

I highly recommend trying the What If puzzles. The quality is exceptional, the artwork is excellent and it’s wonderful exercise for your brain.