Mid-Century Modern Dream Home by Diane Dempsey (Cobble Hill 1000)

Another fun Diane Dempsey mid-century modern style illustration, from Cobble Hill. A fast pleasurable solve.
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Canvas, Cloudberries

My first Cloudberries. I’ll admit, I don’t get it — I had the impression that Cloudberries was sort of a cut above, but it feels like basically any reputable cardboard puzzle company. There were actually more than one or two false fits in this cut. Plus, at least half a dozen pieces where a cardboard […]
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Happy Halloween, Ravensburger

Really enjoyed this Halloween puzzle by Ravensburger, “Happy Halloween“, art by Demelsa Haughton, 1000 pieces. Zeniba and Bastet also enjoyed it.
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Dia de Muertos, Ceaco

Ash and I did a fun 500-piece “Dia de Muertos” cat puzzle, by Ceaco, which were pleased to discover is actually headquartered in Massachusetts. Correspondence to Holyoke! Made in Newton! Cool. However, this puzzle doesn’t seem to be available directly from the Ceaco website; just from various retailers like amazon, target, wal-mart, etc.
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World of Bridgerton, Manjit Thapp, Laurence King

Wow, this was so fun. Like a collage puzzle, with many discrete elements, but in a scene. Also, very interesting for the perspective — since it’s a three-dimensional room using classical perspective, there were ways to assemble the architectural elements based on size, angle, etc. This was my first Laurence King (that I remember) and […]
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I Moose Be Dreaming, StandOut Puzzles

I loved this artwork & grabbed his “StandOut Puzzles” (their website is down but their instagram is live) 750-piece puzzle, “I Moose Be Dreaming“, with art by Erin Brekke Conn …. and man it was hard. The entire painting is pointillism! With that difficulty, the seven extra pieces that they threw in — that appear […]
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Alala Love, New York Puzzle Company

While on a wooden jigsaw kick, I haven’t been doing my backlog of cardboard puzzles …. so I did one that I’ve been wanting to do for a while — “ʻAlalā Love”, a 500-piece puzzle illustrated by Caren Loebel-Fried, from the New York Puzzle Company‘s “Cornell Lab of Ornithology” series. It doesn’t look like the […]
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Geode, Nervous Systems

A fun blue geode puzzle from NERVOUS Systems, via Hoefnagel. Another reviewer described this puzzle as easy, a review at which Ash and I looked askance, but, once we got going, it was — well, not “easy”, but very doable. (Much easier, at any rate, than the Wongo elephant it was paired with!) Bastet anointed […]
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Diego Rivera Detroit Industry, Nautilus

Hello to my friend Art Keene! Who lent me this beautiful wood puzzle version of Diego Rivera‘s “Detroit Industry” (actually, one of Rivera’s numerous Detroit Industry murals). Hard! And already the cats have tipped it over. Well, one cat — Bastet — and also, it was my fault for putting it in a tippable place. […]
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finally finished! Some Things Are Scary by Liberty Puzzles

This Edward Gorey “Some Things Are Scary” image is one of my favorite images, so I was excited to get it as a Liberty Puzzle. So hard! Why was it so hard? My puzzle accomplice thinks it may be due to pieces having a similar pattern even when they had different, yet similar, shapes. Also, […]
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Desert Owl by Shachi Kale (Hidden Piece)

My first puzzle by Hidden Piece Puzzles — “Desert Owl” by Shachi Kale. Loved the art — beautiful, with wonderful colors and patterns — and really enjoyed the cut. The uneven border was done really well. The whimsies were fun — not too overwhelming, and all thematically appropriate. There were a bunch of cacti, and […]
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Nancy Drew (Cobble Hill 1000)

I really enjoyed this collage of Nancy Drew book covers. Very relaxing!
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Taj Mahal from ELMS

Loved the Taj Mahal puzzle from ELMS, via Hoefnagel Puzzle Club. I’ve been poking away at this for a few days, and it was a pleasure from start to finish. Definitely in the “busy” end of the spectrum, but I loved the busy-ness — none of it was pointless or forced; it was a lovely […]
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How the West Was One by Chris Huang

Liberty Puzzles, 510 pieces. I really enjoyed this one – nice image, pleasantly occupying with mixes and repeats of textures and colors. Lots of fun whimsies, and a bunch of really nice multi-piece whimsies. I especially loved the buffalo (inside the buffalo, and well-colored, too!) and the woman playing guitar ….
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Cocktail Time

This puzzle was super-fun — even when one of my cats stood on my precariously balanced puzzle board and knocked it over. The puzzle wasn’t hard — biggish pieces, bright colors & chunks of background, lots of words … but really enjoyable. I enjoy some vintage nostalgia (but note that people of color existed back […]
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