Afternoon at the Park

On February 28, 2019 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store Puzzles8 Comments

Such an adorable puzzle! It’s also an image with hidden animals, some you can see in the image as it is, and some you can only see when you look at the glow in the dark image. Most of the glow was no longer visible, even after sitting it outside in the sun for about 20 minutes there was almost no glow at all. It doesn’t really matter though, it was still a cute puzzle that was entertaining to assemble.

The quality was quite good, it had an offset grid cut and pieces that were a good thickness and fit together very well. It was a bit shiny, but the image reproduction was otherwise very good. I had a great time with the assembly. 🙂

Afternoon at the Park 1

I started with the easiest pieces to find, and the gorgeous puppy.

Afternoon at the Park 2

I’m getting close to the end here, and it was a bit more difficult than I’d assumed. Difficult doesn’t mean it wasn’t enjoyable though, I like having to concentrate and focus all my attention; it’s part of what’s great about puzzling for me. It turns off my brain to almost all other thoughts and I’m only thinking about shapes and colors and what goes where. It’s almost like meditation.

Afternoon at the Park 3

The pug’s face was almost the last thing I assembled, but look how cute it is! Can you see the hidden kitty in his fur?

The Old Candy Shop

On February 20, 2019 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store Puzzles4 Comments

This puzzle is a great example of why you need to see the puzzle box close up and the puzzle assembled. I’ve seen this image many times before and thought only “Eh, it’s okay I guess” , but it was much more detailed and fun to assemble than I’d imagined. What an excellent puzzle!

This is one of the lot of puzzles I got from my Facebook Marketplace purchase and I wasn’t overly excited about assembling it – and boy was I wrong. It’s so interesting to me how I still cannot tell what puzzles I’ll enjoy and what puzzles I won’t. I’ve assembled a LOT of puzzles, I work on them every single day if I’m able, but still they constantly surprise me!

The quality was very good, this was the first 300 piece White Mountain that I’ve done. You can see in the above picture that the piece shape isn’t obvious and it almost looks like a picture. The fit was wonderful and the large pieces were very easy to work with. They had the typical WM shapes and thickness. The image reproduction is absolutely gorgeous….

The detail is amazing, and look how wonderfully grandma’s face is captured; it’s a gorgeous image, and was thoroughly entertaining to assemble! I haven’t done many Steve Read puzzles, but I’ll definitely be on the lookout for more of his work. I absolutely adored this one!

Picnic Raiders

On September 25, 2018 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles2 Comments

I assembled this puzzle after resting for several days from a car trip/medical procedure. Funny that it’s in the queue for today, since this afternoon is another 3 hour trip to a doctor, gee doesn’t that sound like fun? 😐

I don’t always like Buffalo puzzles, the pieces seem so uniform and uninteresting; I have to be in the right mood to work a larger piece count from Buffalo. Luckily the 300 pieces they have don’t give me the same feeling, and I very much enjoy them. This cute little one by Steve Read was adorable, interesting, good quality, and just the right amount of challenging.

The puppies are the best part of the image, in my opinion. Puppies make me happy, although Boston Terrier puppies would have been even cuter if you ask me. 😉

Dolphin Cove

On November 16, 2017November 16, 2017 By Stacey at myjigsawjournalIn Jigsaw Puzzles, Thrift Store PuzzlesLeave a comment

I’m not normally one for ocean or jungle animals puzzles, although I’m not sure I could articulate why; they just aren’t my favorite. Still, it was a relaxing and wonderful quality puzzle – which I suppose is the point. Relaxing entertainment, right? I think I chose this one to assemble because I wasn’t feeling like my brain was working well enough to work a 1000 piece puzzle. Some days I just don’t feel like all the gray cells are firing properly. 😐

This image is bright and full of movement and color, an excellent image for puzzling. It took longer than I expected, but it wasn’t because of the image, it was my fault. Either I didn’t feel much like puzzling at the time, or I just wasn’t feeling well. Whichever was the culprit, it took me a couple of days to get this one done.

The fit was looser than normal for a Ravensburger, but it wasn’t too terrible. Although I usually take things like that with a grain of salt if it’s a thrift store purchase and I’m familiar with the brand. Good find though, and all pieces present and accounted for!