Puzzle Adventure #2.

I like puzzles.
They irritate me to high hell while I do them, but once complete I'm totally proud of myself for showing commitment to finishing the project, and the new piece of wall art I've just produced.

I just completed a 1.5 foot by 2.5 foot 1,000 piece puzzle a couple of days ago. I did it over 5 days, though I'm estimating it took collectively less than 24 hours to complete. I like more fierce looking black dragons (think 'Reign of Fire'), but this white one is still pretty.

It will join the 3 foot by 4.5 foot 3,000 piece Caribbean scene puzzle in my hallway that took me 4 months to complete 2 years ago. Behold the power of the wide angle lens.


Both of those are Ravensburger puzzles, the company that makes 18,000 piece puzzles. I saw one in a store 2 years ago that I had been incredulous about at the time because I thought about how horrific it would be to sort out 18,240 pieces and deemed the idea crazy. Then, recently after discovering that Ravensburger graciously separates the puzzle into 4 bags comprising of roughly 4,500 pieces a piece, I decided that finishing 4 different puzzles to make one giant one was totally within my reach. They make a few, all but one I found visually unappealing. After all, it has to go up on my wall. The one I wanted, and saw in the store two years ago, was a puzzle of 4 historic world maps. When I go to see about purchasing the behemoth last month, I sadly found that it was discontinued last year and nowhere to be found online.
This one couple realized how fun it would be the moment they saw it. The puzzle is exactly 18,240 pieces and is 6 feet tall by 9 feet wide. It took them 1 year to finish.

Rock on.

long time...

Merry New Year!

Yes, yes, I know it's been a century since posting, but I have some pretty pictures and and a few interesting (i.e. ridiculous) stories to tell. Like how I almost got killed by a shovel. Or how the plague almost took out my brother's family.

In due time. In due time, my friends. For now, I give you a photo of a bird in the tree in my back yard. Not necessarily pretty, but kind of dark and artsy-ish. No Illustrator here. Just a photo to which I added plenty of contrast.

Check back soon for my latest puzzle adventure.

My 2 month headache.

I, crazy person, thought it would be a fun and challenging idea to work a 3000 piece puzzle. Three THOUSAND. Yeah. Translation = headache! All the pieces look exactly. The freaking. SAME. It's going to be a 4 foot by 3 foot-ish Caribbean masterpiece when it's done, which will hopefully be by the end of the year. Two months to finish should be plenty of time, you say? Well. Considering that I spent 3 hours putting a section of 50 pieces together, and spent an hour staring at 200 pieces of just plain blue and got nothing done, I think two months will be a bless-ed miracle. I've already spent two months on it, and it's about half done, and even then I've only done the pieces that had identifying markers on them. I've not even attempted the pieces that have no distinguishable characteristics. Consider that I actually got this thing 2 years ago, opened it, tried to separate the colors, couldn't put anything together, put it back in the box, had it sit on the shelf for 2 years, reopened it 2 months ago because I was bored on a Saturday and now I've done too much to put it away again and I WILL. Stubbornly. Freaking. FINISH IT. I'm a nerd, yes. I'm doing a 3000 piece puzzle to torture myself. And when I DO finish it, oh I am SO not taking it apart. It's going to get slathered in 2 quarts of puzzle glue and be stuffed in a giant frame so I can have a piece of giant artwork hanging on my wall so everyone can revel in my nerd-dom. Yeah. Like I said. Crazy.