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The Return Of The Puzzle Puzzle
It's been years, but once again, I find myself trying to solve the puzzle puzzle.
You know what I'm talking about, right? The dilemma of what to do with a jigsaw puzzle after you've finished putting it together.
Being myself a reformed jigsaw puzzle addict (see post from 2/7/2017, "Crocheting A Kitty Hat And A Tom Cat Hat"), the puzzle of what to do with a put-together puzzle used to be much more relevant for me back when I was puzzling and over-puzzling. (I haven't had a relapse since the time Tom and I were at the Columbus Art Museum and around the museum there were jigsaw puzzles of some of the paintings that patrons could stop and work on. See post from 2/22/2017: "The Big Four-Oh, Part 3: the Green Bean anniversary").
You know what I'm talking about, right? The dilemma of what to do with a jigsaw puzzle after you've finished putting it together.
Being myself a reformed jigsaw puzzle addict (see post from 2/7/2017, "Crocheting A Kitty Hat And A Tom Cat Hat"), the puzzle of what to do with a put-together puzzle used to be much more relevant for me back when I was puzzling and over-puzzling. (I haven't had a relapse since the time Tom and I were at the Columbus Art Museum and around the museum there were jigsaw puzzles of some of the paintings that patrons could stop and work on. See post from 2/22/2017: "The Big Four-Oh, Part 3: the Green Bean anniversary").
Anyway, years ago there used to be quite a lot of jigsaw puzzling going on at my house, thanks in no small part to myself. There was a large piece of cardboard perennially on our family room floor upon which the puzzles were constructed. It always seemed a shame, after all the work involved in the construction of a puzzle, especially a beautiful one, to quickly deconstruct it. I always puzzled over what next to do with the puzzle. Eventually I'd break the puzzle apart and put it back into its box, but what to do with it then? There's no fizz in reassembling a puzzle that one has previously assembled. On the other hand, it felt wasteful to throw out a perfectly good puzzle. And so the boxes of once-done puzzles sat on a shelf in the basement. For years.
Then I heard about puzzle glue, an adhesive that one spreads over the puzzle that causes the pieces to stick together. I saw this as a satisfying solution to the puzzle puzzle: the beautiful puzzles could now be preserved as a permanent picture.
But then, instead of boxes of used puzzles, I now had a stack of puzzle pictures. I tried framing and hanging a few, but how many puzzles does one need hanging on one's walls? Besides, the puzzles never really fit the standard sizes of poster frames.
I eventually swore off jigsaw puzzles and threw out all the old boxes of puzzles and the puzzle pictures, except for this one which my daughter did that still hangs in the basement:
Then I heard about puzzle glue, an adhesive that one spreads over the puzzle that causes the pieces to stick together. I saw this as a satisfying solution to the puzzle puzzle: the beautiful puzzles could now be preserved as a permanent picture.
But then, instead of boxes of used puzzles, I now had a stack of puzzle pictures. I tried framing and hanging a few, but how many puzzles does one need hanging on one's walls? Besides, the puzzles never really fit the standard sizes of poster frames.
I eventually swore off jigsaw puzzles and threw out all the old boxes of puzzles and the puzzle pictures, except for this one which my daughter did that still hangs in the basement:
And then the COVID-19 epidemic hit and here we go again.
So tell me, friends, all of you who've turned to jigsaw puzzles while sheltering place: What do you do with the puzzles after you've put them together? How do you solve the puzzle puzzle?
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