Thoughts of an introverted bookworm and avid jigsaw puzzler
The Farm is a 1000-piece puzzle from Buffalo Games, and the artist is Charles Wysocki. I love this image so much. My favorite part about his artwork are the buildings, so I love that this building is so prominent in the image. All of the signs and decorations on the front add so much interest and make it easier to puzzle than a plain building would be.
At the end of September, my church held an event called Brunch & Craft. It was open to anyone who wanted to come, and we were encouraged to bring a craft to do and, if possible, a dish to share. This is the second one of these we have had, and it was a lot of fun the first time.
My friend Suzanne and I decided to do puzzles during the crafting time. We did two puzzles, and our friend Brianne joined us for the first one before settling down to color. My friend Renee, who lives about 45 minutes away, came with me as well and she was doing some crochet.
I really enjoyed the event. I brought a sausage hashbrown casserole to share and had some other delicious treats that other people had brought as well. I brought four puzzles and let Suzanne and Brianne choose which ones we would do. For the first one, they immediately chose Cats in Quarantine, which is a 500-piece puzzle from Exploding Kittens. I have done it a couple of times already and love it.
The picture above shows it in progress, and here is the finished puzzle:
For the second puzzle, Suzanne chose Waterfall Camper, a 300-piece puzzle from Ceaco. The artist is Stephanie Peterson Jones. I have a bunch of her puzzles and really like her artwork.
This was such a fun event. Usually I get drained being around a lot of people, but I was so focused on our little group and the activity of puzzling that I actually still had a lot of energy after it was done. Renee and I went out for a late lunch/early dinner and then ice cream and hung out for a bit at my place before she went home.
I hope we do it again!
World Landmarks Map is a 300-piece puzzle from Ravensburger. I had bought it a couple of years ago for a puzzle challenge and recently did it again for another puzzle challenge!
The prompt for this challenge was something that reminds you of high school. I wasn’t sure if I had any puzzles with school related items but when I saw this one on my shelf, I had to do it. During my senior year of high school, I took a geography class as one of my electives. Even though the class was mostly full of freshmen and sophomores, I loved it. It was so satisfying to fill in the maps with all the different countries and other geographical items.
Part of the challenge includes an item to add to the photograph of the finished puzzle, and I chose to use my senior high school yearbook. I flipped through and couldn’t believe that my picture had been cut out of it; I have absolutely no memory of doing that and can’t imagine the reason why!
This was a nice, easy puzzle and would be good for kids or families. The quality of the brand is excellent, although they are known for having a lot of blue puzzle dust in their bags.
When I made my recent trip to Illinois, I knew I would miss being able to puzzle whenever I wanted, but I didn’t have room to take many puzzles with me. So, in addition to the one new puzzle I took with me – the PieceRelax one I posted earlier – I took these three mini puzzles.
Here are the puzzle details from left to right:
I have done all of these before, but they were the perfect size to pack and I knew they would at least let me scratch the puzzling itch while I was away from home.
Whimsy Garden House is a 300-piece puzzle from PieceRelax, and the artist is Olivia Gibbs. I love her artwork and was excited to come across this one when I was first checking out the PieceRelax website. PieceRelax puzzles are different because the pieces are plastic and the white borders are interchangeable pieces.
I took this puzzle with me on my recent trip to Illinois and did it in the hotel room one morning. Since it came with a poster, I just took that along with the bag of pieces so it wouldn’t take up much room in my suitcase. And since the pieces are hard plastic, I could just pack the puzzle flat without taking it apart for the trip home.
This was a nice, easy puzzle, although as you get more and more pieces in, it can take more pressure to make the pieces snap fully into place. As a bonus, it came with a free puzzle magnet. I have done one other puzzle from this brand, so this is my second puzzle magnet. I love that they include those with their puzzles.
Here is the magnet:
I would definitely do more by this brand or by the related brand Pintoo.
Vintage Travel Tickets is a 500-piece puzzle from Galison, and the artist is Troy Litten. I picked this up at a puzzle swap recently. I thought it might be kind of tricky, but it was surprisingly easy and very fun.
I have purchased a few puzzles recently that I am excited about. I am trying to get more smaller piece counts because most of the ones I have on my to do shelf are 1000 pieces. I was somewhat successful!
Puzzles in this haul:
Buying puzzles is definitely its own hobby, that’s for sure!
Street Market is a 1000-piece puzzle from Ravensburger, and the artist is Angela Holland. I just love the cozy scene with all of the vendors. There is just so much to look at, and so many great colors and textures.
Because the image is quite busy, most of it was done by a pick and place method. That is just what it sounds like – you pick up a piece, look at the box, and put it where it goes on the puzzle. I was able to put together a few larger areas before starting that, but not a lot.
I have another street market puzzle on my to do shelf, so it will be interesting to compare them once I do that one. It has more buildings and a lot less people. Here is a picture of the box; it’s called Market Day and it’s from Elena Essex.
Kellogg’s Cereal is a 6-pack of 100 piece puzzles from Spin Master Games. The puzzles include Corn Flakes, Frosted Flakes, Honey Smacks, Raisin Bran, Rice Krispies, and Froot Loops.
These puzzles were so cute and fun to build. I actually think they would work well for puzzle chess, so I will probably hold onto them for that. The Honey Smacks puzzle had an extra piece in it, which is better than missing a piece but probably means someone else will be missing it.
National Parks Map is a 500-piece puzzle from Ceaco, and the artist is Stephanie Peterson Jones. I have a lot of puzzles by her, including several food trucks and several happy campers (some of which are featured on this puzzle.)
This was super easy and a lot of fun. I actually did it with my friend Suzanne when she was over one evening. She did the border while I pulled out the pieces for the top and bottom areas. Once we have those done, it was basically pick and place for the rest of the puzzle because of how busy it was.
In So Many Words 