Today I got a little treat! A few days back I saw a listing for three jigsaw puzzles for only five dollars on the Facebook Marketplace. Two 500 pieces and one 1500, all three lovely images.
I just had to snap them up! I’m most excited for the stormy lighthouse because the image is simply stunning, and the vertical panorama is unique. But all of them are great quality, very thick pieces, and they snap together tightly too!
I’m enjoying a nice cup of coffee on the couch and pulling the pieces apart! Very nice Friday so far!
Howdy howdy! It’s been a while since I’ve posted any puzzling news, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been puzzling! I’ve been working on a veritable flock of Cardinal puzzles, among others!
‘Boats’ 500 Piece, by Cardinal‘Boats and Sea’ 500 Piece, by Cardinal
Joining my last puzzle ‘Boats and Sunset’, are these two other lovely boat puzzles. My intention is to frame the three of them and hang them in our master bathroom! I felt like the nautical theme will go great in a room with so much water involved!
‘Colorful River Stones’ 500 Piece, by Cardinal
After that was this lovely, which I intend to hang over my desk. I love these sorts of paintings, such bright colors really bring out the vibrancy of nature.
‘Fresh Vegetables’ 500 Piece, by Cardinal‘Colorful Corn’ 500 Piece, by Cardinal
And lastly these two food related puzzles, which I intend to hang in the kitchen. Unfortunately, of all the puzzles I’ve done so far, the corn one is the very first I’ve encountered that’s missing a piece. Alas, I cannot seem to find a contact to request a replacement- Cardinal Games seems to be a bit all over the place on the internet, and half their stuff links to other another sub company (or something) called ‘Spin Master’. Their support only seems to be for the their board games division. Oh well, the puzzle itself was only a dollar, I’ll go this weekend and see if I can find another copy of it to filch a piece from! Such a shame their puzzle division seems almost an afterthought- bit more effort o their part, and a bit thicker cardstock, and they could really be fantastic!
In other puzzling news, I started and gave up on my FNAF puzzle…
I knew it would be a challenge, but I’m a HUGE Five Nights and Freddy’s fangirl, and this is the only FNAF puzzle I’ve managed to come across. I saw another person post a picture, and they’d mentioned it was an absolute nightmare to work; and they were right!
This is all just TEETH! OMG! Sorting it was awful, and even then, despite my best efforts the whole puzzle sorted into 3 large piles, and a smaller pile of just teeth. The entire puzzle in three piles. That doesn’t even feel like it’s sorted! I fiddled with it for a while, finally decided I was just not having fun, and gave up. I repackaged it all sorted, so I can break it out again in the future, but man… It’s a really tough one. I’m not sure I’ll ever do it.
I will admit, I did also have a reason for wanting to clear my puzzling board…
A birthday gift from my friend arrived! He took a piece of my own artwork, and put it on a puzzle! It’s an older piece, from 2012, but it’s still my favorite that I’ve done; though we did have to upscale it a bit to make it fit, which resulted in a bit of loss of clarity…
But it’s always been a dream of mine to produce artwork for puzzles, and now I’m even more determined. I already feel like I’ve learned so much for making good puzzle art (not that an upscaled piece of old art is a fair comparison!), like a way higher density of detail, and a larger variety of color changes and textures to aid with placing pieces. It’s been fantastic fun to work so far, even with the slight blurriness of the pieces; Ravensburger is always incredible quality, and their custom puzzles are no exception!
“Melody of the Night” 1000 piece Aquarius, art by Leonid Afremov.
Fun fact: I’ve had this puzzle sitting on my to-do shelf for months… You see, back when I first started puzzling maybe 5 or 6 months back now, I ordered this puzzle, along with my PortaPuzzle board. I’ve always adored Leonid Afremov’s art, and what better way to finally get a piece of it to hang on the wall than to spend a few days having a blast putting it together?
The truth is, once it arrived, I balked at it. There’s so many colors! And it’s so indistinct! Surely, it’ll be way to hard to do! After completing that Peter Pan 1000 piece in a single day though… I was ready for a challenge!
Once I got into it though, it turned out not be nearly as hard as I’d worried it’d be! I certainly wouldn’t say it was an easy puzzle, but I think all the puzzles I’ve done so far got my puzzling chops ready to work something tougher! Following the colors along seemed to work well for me!
Aquarius seems to be a pretty fantastic brand as well! Hardly any puzzle dust, beautifully clear printing, and the cardboard is fantastically thick. The pieces fit well together, and I was able to slide a posterboard underneath it in one smooth go to move it off my board; usually I have to fight with the puzzles a bit to get in moved! I’m even more excited to work my 3000 piece Power Ranger puzzle now, as it is also by Aquarius. Hopefully the experience is the same!
Speaking of being excited for a puzzle though….
I’ve been hunting for these for two or three weeks now! Some people on the puzzle facebook groups had posted that they’d found these at Walmart. They aren’t even listed on Ceaco’s own website yet, or Walmart’s either. I finally hit paydirt last night- still missing the third new one, which is the second of the three I was most ecstatic to get (the Mickey Mouse one is a bit plain, but still awesome!). The Villain’s puzzle is now on my board! I’m a huge Villain’s fangirl, so I couldn’t resist doing it next!
Puzzled Pickle 