White Mountain "Precious Days": Reality vs. The Picture in My Mind

"Precious Days," White Mountain, 1000 pieces, 24 x 30 inches

I love this puzzle; I swear that I do. And this is how it still looks in my mind when I think about it. 

But a harsh bit of reality struck me a few minutes ago when I snapped this "in progress picture."  Suddenly, I realized that the last 225 or so pieces are going to take a bit longer to place than I thought  when I sat down to the puzzle board two hours ago. But it's going to happen sooner or later, I guarantee you that.

With approximately 225 pieces of sky and sparsely-leaved trees to go

"Bacintyme Boulevard" by SunsOut vs. "US Capitol" by Puzz3D

"Bacintyme Boulevard," SunsOut, 1000 pieces, 16 x 34

After spending three days trying to assemble one of Puzz3D's three dimensional puzzles...and failing miserably...I decided to start a puzzle today whose image calms me. This painting by railroad artist Greg Garrett perfectly captures what so much of America looks like to those of us willing to venture off the congested interstate highways as often as we can. I take an extended road trip or two every summer (can't wait for this year's drive) exploring different sections of the country in detail, and I avoid interstate highways like the plague. So for me, this is a "comfort" image, a little safe space in my head. 

But it won't be enough to calm my feelings of frustration with the whole 3D experience totally, so I'll have more to say on that whole experience tomorrow or Saturday - with pictures. I will say right now, however, that Puzz3D packaged the most misleading set of instructions I have encountered with any product requiring home assembly - ever. And that "ever" has now morphed into "never."  Never again will I purchase anything from Puzz3D.

Tweety, Daffy, Bugs, Sylvester & Friends

"That's All Folks," 1000 pieces, Aquarius Puzzles, 20 x 28

My current puzzle is one featuring some of my favorite cartoon characters from way-back-when.  I have always preferred the Looney Tunes cartoons of the day over those of the slicker, sweeter Disney ones, so this one jumped off the shelf and into my hands when I spotted it at Hobby Lobby a few weeks ago. 

Aquarius consistently produces high-quality puzzles, and this one is no exception. On this particular puzzle, though, the colors are the thing: bright primary colors faithfully reproduced to closely match those on the box. As I've often noticed, however, the Aquarius boxes have a little quirk about them in that the cover photo never seems to be cropped to match exactly the actual image produced by the puzzle pieces.  That can be more than a little confusing sometimes.

Anyway, the basic sorting is all done, and it's time to start assembling the end pieces - and, if things run the way they usually do, I'll be going back into the sorted stacks to find the five or six end pieces I missed on the first pass through.

Working on "Pet Day" from SunsOut

Currently, I'm working on this 1000-piece puzzle from the SunsOut puzzle company.  I check in periodically at the local Tuesday Morning outlet to see what they have on the shelves (this is, by the way, a great place to get brand new puzzles at about a 40% markdown).  As you can see from the box cover, the pieces are "larger size," meaning that the finished puzzle is 27 inches tall and 35 inches wide.  

I was intrigued by the realistic faces and body-types of this image from Susan Brabeau, and it has not disappointed me. I've been fooling with it for a couple of hours each of the last four days, and it's almost half-done now.  I like the variety of piece-shapes and sizes, and the colors are pretty close to what is represented on the puzzle box (that seems rarely to be the case), and that helps me sort pieces with some idea about where the various little stacks will end up fitting.  My only complaint to this point is that some of the pieces fit together so loosely that it doesn't take much to unlock them without realizing you've done it.  

Here's a look at where I am at the moment - probably won't work on it much more today because I'm watching the Astros vs. Padres game right now, and my guys are struggling to score runs tonight, making it hard for me to concentrate on the puzzle.