Tag Archives: Puzzle Review

Earth Day, Yesterday, and All Year Long!

April 23, 2019 PuzzlePaws 1 Comment

Yesterday was Earth Day, a holiday started in 1970 that focuses on environmental reform and the human impact on this world we inhabit. Yesterday was also the day after Easter, and my mom and little sister headed home. I was wiped. Chronic illness means that I “hit the wall” and can’t push myself any further. Last week was a whirlwind, and by Monday, I was very much done. I spent Earth Day in bed.

Today, I’m still tired, but I wanted to bring up a thought. Earth Day was yesterday. Yesterday is over. Does that mean I can just put Earth Day and all it means on the shelf until next year?

Earth Day isn’t like most other holidays… It’s a way of life.

This year, I managed to convince White Mountain Puzzles to allow me to do a few reviews. I immediately fell in love with Amazing Sea Turtles. It reminded me of the Earth Day commercials and shows I watched as a kid in the 80s and 90s.

I’ve never done a White Mountain puzzle, so I was surprised by the box stand that was included. Made of recycled cardstock, it holds the box lid so that you can have the puzzle image at hand. As this puzzle didn’t come with a separate poster, the box stand came in handy.

My work space, border set up and ready to go!

I found this to be a delightful puzzle. It’s advertised as an E-Z Hold 300, which means it is made with slightly larger than normal sized pieces, on recycled blue chipboard. The grid-style cut was not challenging, but I don’t want a challenging 300 piece. I do 300 pieces to relax and let me think.

Back to my original point. Earth Day as a way of life. It’s daunting, isn’t it? especially as a person with disabilities. I love my straws, as they keep my hands from spilling drinks down my front, I like modern conveniences. But even I can do small things all year-round to help the planet. I can and do choose to buy puzzles made with recycled materials. I recycle and reuse items. SC and I have furnished our home in furniture that had been discarded but was still serviceable. I use public transit often, and I donate to earth-friendly charities when I can afford to. I have in the past, planted trees. Small things, sure, but small things, like puzzle pieces add up.

This puzzle features a handful of sea turtles swimming through a busy coral reef. It’s a great image to show what we could lose, and what we need to protect. More importantly, it makes me happy. I love sea life and aquatic scenes.

PUZZLE SPECS

Company: White Mountain Puzzles
Title: Amazing Sea Turtles
Artist: Gerald Newton
Year released: 2017
Pieces: 300
Cut-Style: Grid
Finished size: 18 x 24 inches
Bonus poster: No
Made from recycled materials
Made in USA

QUALITY:

Box: Sturdy, Light-weight, 10 x 12 x2 inches, Glossy Finish
Board: Thin and sturdy pieces
Cut: Steel-cut Die
Image Quality: Excellent, great color saturation
Finish: Glossy
Puzzle Dust: A bit more than I prefer, but not too much
Piece shapes: Grid style, 4 shapes
Piece Fit: Excellent, nice tight fit that if careful, I could pick up

Disability Notes: The E-Z Hold pieces are really nice. They fit my hands well and I had no difficulties in assembly. I can recommend this size puzzle for kids and adults, and I think that people with hand or eye difficulties will enjoy it as the colors are amazingly bright!

Where to buy: Amazing Sea Turtles is available on the white Mountain website for $13.99 USD.

White Mountain Puzzles : Website / FaceBook

Disclosure: I received a complimentary puzzle from the manufacturer in exchange for review. The opinions are my own. All links are direct, I do not make money from them.

Thanks for reading, and please click the Follow Button under my profile on the right side of the page. To support posts like this in the future, consider joining my Patreon!

Puzzle Review, Uncategorized

Easter Bunnies and Easter Eggs!

April 19, 2019 PuzzlePaws 1 Comment

I don’t know about you guys, but Easter is one of the few holidays that I get excited about the food. As a kid, I loved my Easter basket filled with marshmallow Peeps, jellybeans, and chocolate bunnies. The best part wasn’t Easter supper with its ham and fixings, but Easter breakfast; where after searching the whole of the house for hidden eggs, I got to crack those colorful shells and roll my hard-boiled eggs in salt and pepper.

This Saturday, I’ll be helping my younger sister Hime and my god-daughter Bug fill my kitchen with the scent of vinegar and a veritable army of brightly colored eggs! Lucky for me, one of my favorite puzzle companies, Cobble Hill, unveiled a perfect Easter puzzle for the 2019 year.

Easter Bunnies by Donna Race is a springtime delight! It’s a 500 piece random-cut puzzle that has three sweet bunnies guarding a nest of colored eggs among a field of early Spring flowers.

The included mini poster! A super helpful puzzling tool!

Ignore the cat hair, check out these weird shapes!!

I had help assembling this puzzle. My sister Hime is in town for the holidays, and she and Mom helped sort the border and started work on the bunnies. My Bestie Angel came by the other day and helped finish the bunnies and made a serious dent in all the flowers.

I can’t express how happy this puzzle made me. It really brought home the fact that Spring is here, and that while my neighborhood flowers haven’t bloomed, they will soon!

I know that only some of my readers celebrate Easter, because some are observing Passover or Ostara this week. To all of you, I wish the best of holidays and I’ll see you on Monday, which is both Earth Day and Half-priced candy sales!

PUZZLE SPECS

Company: Cobble Hill
Title: Easter Bunnies
Artist: Donna Race
Year released: 2019
Pieces: 500
Cut-Style: Random
Finished size: 19.25 x 26.625
Bonus poster: Yes
Made from recycled materials
Made in USA

QUALITY:

Box: Sturdy, Medium-weight, 10″x14’x2.5″ Matte-Linen Finish
Board: Thick and sturdy pieces
Cut: Steel-cut Die
Image Quality: Excellent, great color saturation
Finish: Satin, linen texture
Puzzle Dust: Almost none
Piece shapes: Random
Piece Fit: Very Good, nice tight fit that if careful, I could lift it up completely

Disability Notes: I can definitely recommend this for a teen, an adult, or for a person whose hands have good and bad days. I had fun. My hands didn’t ache after assembly, and the difficulty level was certainly up to adult standard. I can happily recommend a large piece puzzle for people with fine motor skill issues, or arthritis.

Where to buy: Easter Bunnies is available on the Cobble Hill website for $15.99 USD. It is still in stock, so I suggest ordering in advance for next Easter!

Cobble Hill Puzzle Company : Website / FaceBook

Disclosure: I received a complimentary puzzle from the manufacturer in exchange for review. The opinions are my own. All links are direct, I do not make money from them.

Thanks for reading, and please click the Follow Button under my profile on the right side of the page. To support posts like this in the future, consider joining my Patreon!

Puzzle Review

1500 Pieces!My Largest Piece Count Yet!

April 12, 2019 PuzzlePaws 3 Comments

The fun part of being a puzzle blogger is finding new brands to try to stretching myself as a puzzler. Before I’d started PuzzlePaws, the largest puzzle I’d done was a 1000 piece, and honestly, I preferred 750’s. While I don’t hold with New Year’s Resolutions, I do want to challenge myself and to be active in the puzzling community. Next year, I want to be able to join World Puzzle Days, and Jigsaw Jubilee. To do so, I know I need to increase my piece count to include 1500 and 2000 piece puzzles! It’s a bit scary for me.

Thankfully, while I was at Toy Fair this year, I discovered Playview Brands, which is the spin-off company of Karmin International and their puzzle line. When I explained that my goals, I was offered a chance to try a different sort of large count puzzle.

This is a triptych puzzle, or a three-in-one puzzle. There are three separate 500 piece puzzles that make a single 1500 piece image. It was perfect to help me work on this year’s goals!

The puzzles came individually bagged and included a lovely poster to help with assembly.

I got a bit lucky, while the bags aren’t labeled as to which image they hold, I guessed by using the pieces I could see and managed to assemble them in order! Assembly was an adventure!

I found the pieces to be on the small side of an average 500 piece puzzle, thin, but incredibly sturdy! They connect well and hold tightly.

56749176_410701726390606_987145190139494400_n — Puzzle 1

Puzzle 1, day 1, I had friends who had swung by to pick up some firewood SC had split and they stayed and spent a good hour or so helping me build the image. Elyse refused to go home until she found the piece of deer that was eluding her!

57028912_322606175124039_164383525292736512_n — Puzzle 2

Puzzle 2, day 2, I got a late start, and assembled it all by myself. Because of the late hour at which I finished and took the photo, my overhead glare is awful. Lesson learned, take photos in the mornings!

57154953_560126491146801_1282849393501798400_n — Puzzle 3

Puzzle 3, day 3, I started this puzzle the night before, but had only managed the frame and sky before running out of spoons for the day. One of my besties came over in the morning to help me puzzle. She hadn’t done a puzzle since she was a little girl, so it was fun to show her tips and techniques.

56786094_577281452675381_973459053512491008_n — The Big Picture!!

This is a huge puzzle! When fully assembled, it is 24 inches high by 54 inches long! It completely took over my 6 person dining room table and I had to stand on a chair to take a picture.

PUZZLE SPECS

Company: Karmin International Puzzles/ Playview Brands
Title: Mountain Cabin Scene
Artist: Geno Peoples
Year released: 2018
Pieces: 3×500, or 1500
Cut-Style: Grid
Finished size: 24″x 54″
Bonus poster: Yes
Made in China

QUALITY:

Box: Sturdy, Medium-weight, 12″L x 8″H x 4″W
Board: Thin and sturdy pieces
Cut: Steel-cut Die
Image Quality: Excellent, great color saturation
Finish: Semi-gloss
Puzzle Dust: Almost none
Piece shapes: Grid style, 5 shapes
Piece Fit: Very Good, nice tight fit that if careful, I could lift it

Disability Notes: I can definitely recommend this for a teen, an adult, or for a person whose hands have good and bad days. My friends and I both had fun, and the full assembly only took us roughly 3 days. My hands didn’t ache after assembly, and the difficulty level was certainly up to adult standard.

Where to buy: Mountain Cabin Scene is available on the Karmin International website for $14.99 USD wholesale, I do not know if they do direct retail sales.

Karmin International Company : Website

Disclosure: I received a complimentary puzzle from the manufacturer in exchange for review. The opinions are my own. All links are direct, I do not make money from them.

Thanks for reading, and please click the Follow Button under my profile on the right side of the page. To support posts like this in the future, consider joining my Patreon!

Puzzle Review

Cherry Blossoms and Chickadees! A Springtime Review

March 22, 2019 PuzzlePaws Leave a comment

Spring is finally officially here!! Huzzah!

It’s silly, but Wednesday was both the first day of Spring and the start of the National Cherry Blossom Festival in Washington DC. I’ve never gone, but I have friends who hit it every year. This weekend I’m in Lancaster, Pennsylvania for Zenkaikon, an anime convention. Before I left, I started Cobble Hill’s Chickadeedeedees. It’s a 500 piece puzzle featuring chickadees and cherry blossoms by the amazing Karen Latham.

Pardon the warm tones, I was trying to reduce my night-time glare.

This is one of the new 2019 designs, and one of the rare puzzles SC insisted on. I’d never known that my spouse liked chickadees, but there he was, reading me the Wiki and listening to bird calls on YouTube. If you want an awesome video about chickadees, I recommend LesleytheBirdNerd’s video.

Honestly, I find it cute when he gets excited/inspired by something out of the ordinary. He listens to me explaining the difference between ribbon and random cut puzzles. By the way, this is very much a random cut puzzle! SC likes the random cuts, finding them to be a great mental challenge. “That piece doesn’t go there at that angle…Shit, yes it does!”

I mentioned that I started this puzzle, however, I didn’t manage to finish my assembly before having to leave. SC, bless him, took some of his spare time to finish it and gave me his analysis. He also did my amazing cover photo!

Two thirds finished and yes, that’s a dice catalog in the corner.

I’d managed to do about 2/3rds of the puzzle, finding it to be of moderate difficulty. It’s a 500 piece puzzle, so the pieces are comfortably large and with a random cut, the placements are not always obvious. SC did the final third, noting that I had mistakenly placed a piece where it didn’t belong, so he spent a bit of time looking to place a piece that belonged in the space I’d filled.

His sorting style was thus: flowers first, then obvious leaves, then twigs, then oddball shapes, and finally the standard shaped pieces. He did say it was of moderate difficulty, and that a couple of pieces nearly achieved flight (he was frustrated and want to throw them across the room)! SC notes that the large piece size confused his eyes, but made his hands happy, and that the pieces fit and click in securely. Both of us liked the new small poster included with the puzzle that was printed with the same linen texture as the puzzle and that both puzzle and poster images matched!

All done! I couldn’t have done it without my Spouse-Critter!

PUZZLE SPECS

Company: Cobble Hill
Title: Chickadeedeedees
Artist: Karen Latham
Year released: 2019
Pieces: 500
Cut-Style: Random
Finished size: 19.25 x 26.625
Bonus poster: Yes
Made from recycled materials
Made in USA

QUALITY:

Box: Sturdy, Medium-weight, 10″x14’x2.5″ Matte-Linen Finish
Board: Thick and sturdy pieces
Cut: Steel-cut Die
Image Quality: Excellent, great color saturation
Finish: Satin, linen texture
Puzzle Dust: Almost none
Piece shapes: Random
Piece Fit: Very Good, nice tight fit that if careful, SC could lift it up completely

Disability Notes: I can definitely recommend this for a teen, an adult, or for a person whose hands have good and bad days. SC and I both had fun, and the full assembly only took us roughly about 6 hours over 3 days. My hands didn’t ache after assembly, and the difficulty level was certainly up to adult standard. I can happily recommend a large piece puzzle for people with fine motor skill issues, or arthritis.

Where to buy: Chickadeedeedees is available on the Cobble Hill website for $15.99 USD. It is currently out of stock, but it’s on order, which means there will be more made soon!

Cobble Hill Puzzle Company : Website / FaceBook

Disclosure: I received a complimentary puzzle from the manufacturer in exchange for review. The opinions are my own. All links are direct, I do not make money from them.

Thanks for reading, and please click the Follow Button under my profile on the right side of the page. To support posts like this in the future, consider joining my Patreon!

Puzzle Review, Uncategorized

Sweetly Addictive, Adding to my Puzzling Habit

March 13, 2019 PuzzlePaws 1 Comment

There are a dozen popular artists whose artwork is used for puzzles. I’m fond of Nene Thomas and Chris Ortega, not so much Thomas Kinkaid. Of the more recent artists, I’ve been avoiding Aimee Stewart. It isn’t that I don’t like her style, rather, I found myself intimidated. Aimee’s art is very reminiscent of Lisa Frank, all bright colors and happiness.

While at Toy Fair, I spoke at length with one of Buffalo’s representative about their new puzzle lines and some of the art styles. When I mentioned how popular Aimee Stewart’s puzzles seemed amongst my puzzling groups, but that I was not sure I could handle the visual busyness; it was suggested I try the 300 Large Pieces version. I chose the Sweet Shop, as it reminds me of the old-fashioned candy store I went to as a girl in Cape Cod.

Yes,this piece is a little bent. It came that way, and I’ve emailed Buffalo about it.

The 300 Large Pieces are designed to be 67% larger than Buffalo’s normal puzzle pieces. I found them to be wonderful for gripping on a bad hand day, and they still had the Perfect Snap™!

This shows both the Large size, and the fact I can pick up whole sections to move them!

My fear of being overwhelmed by the bright colors and busy design proved to be moot. Instead, the cheerful, bright colors made assembly a joy! This puzzle was moderately challenging, but not so much as to need a break. With the tight fit between pieces, it is easy to move whole sections of pieces.

I might be hooked on these, not that I NEED more puzzles. One of the joys of being a reviewer is also the bane of my productivity. There are always new products to try, and very little time to go back and enjoy something I’ve already done. Then again, I might have to make sure an Aimee Stewart is set aside for the 2020 World Puzzle Days.

PUZZLE SPECS

Company: Buffalo Games
Title: Sweet Shop
Artist: Aimee Stewart
Year released: 2016
Pieces: 300 Large
Cut-Style: Steel-cut Die
Finished size: 21.25 x 15 inches
Bonus poster: Yes
Made in USA

QUALITY:

Box: Thin cardboard, sturdy, 8 x 8 x 1.5 inches
Board: Medium weight chipboard, sturdy pieces
Cut: Ribbon Cut
Image Quality: Excellent
Finish: Semi-Gloss
Puzzle Dust: Minimal
Piece shapes: Standard 2-knob and some star-shaped pieces
Piece Fit: Excellent

Disability Notes: As I noted, the large pieces of this puzzle are easy to handle, which is great for those of us with arthritis or other hand mobility issues. I know that several of my readers have puzzlers in the younger generations of their families, and think this would make a great family project.

Where to buy: Sweet Shop is available on the Buffalo Games website for $10.95 USD. Buffalo Games also has displays at local Walmarts and Targets, but their selections will vary.

Buffalo Games : Website/ FaceBook

Disclosure: I received a complimentary puzzle from the manufacturer in exchange for a review. The opinions are my own.

Thanks for reading, and please click the Follow Button under my profile on the right side of the page.To support posts like this in the future, consider joining my Patreon!

Little pieces make a bigger picture