Tag Archives: jigsaw-puzzles

Thursday Thoughts 10-30-2025

I have always been impressed by black and white images taken by skilled photographers, but I’m drawn like the proverbial moth to a flame to color. The more of it the better.

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Halloween is almost upon us. I have a couple of sketches ready to paint that have a Halloween theme. They make me feel as if I’m celebrating a bit, even though I’m in Thailand now. 😃. I’ll work on those today.

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Today I took a virtual treadmill vacation to ‘nature’s paradise’ I’ll call it. Maybe it was Oregon, but I enjoyed walking along wooded paths, across icy patches on hilly slopes, beside rushing streams, seeing some glorious waterfalls, mountain-top ponds and lakes, and finally up to huge boulders in the middle of a flat plain then down a path across the sand to the ocean! Not a person nor building to be found. Lovely!

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After breakfast Brian and I went to get cash for my massage and cleaning lady tomorrow. He followed me back to my place so he could take pictures of my finished jigsaw puzzle to order a glass print of it for me. When I told him about loving to FEEL the finished puzzle, he looked at me with his eyebrows raised. He said he would “leave us alone so we could have some privacy.” I laughed my head off. 🤣. I call myself a ‘puzzle pervert,’ but my friend Marsha suggested a much kinder term, a ‘puzzle appreciator.’

I will leave the finished puzzle on my table until the new one arrives. Then I’ll take it apart and leave it in a gallon-sized plastic bag with the picture that came with it in the recycle area in the building so someone else can enjoy it.

I’m looking forward to starting my turtle puzzle.

Remember to include some fun in your day. Laughing is great exercise, you know. 😂🤣😛

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Thoughts on Sunday, 8-14-2025

I’m going to see if I can draw and paint this, just for giggles. I took the owls puzzle apart this morning. It is now neatly in a gallon baggie with the picture. I’m going to put it in the area where – if you want it – you can take it. Brian ordered the glass print of the finished puzzle today! 🥳

I started the new puzzle this morning. Impressive, isn’t it? 🤣

This is the new puzzle image. I just love the calmness and fantasy of this. And, it has water, of course, one of my favorite things, plus purple!

Brian took a break from working and came to see how I was. We went for chocolate – always a wonderful thing – and we’ll meet later to share some dinner.

I made some more thank you cards for my housekeeper yesterday.

Meanwhile, I’m writing posts for the blog and then I’m going to paint some of my latest sketches.

I have to tell you that I really love my life lately. I can move from one fun thing to another, spending my day grinning from ear to ear, whether working a puzzle, reading on my Kindle, working in my art alcove, listening to music, watching a movie, writing blog posts, playing on the computer, taking a short walk, taking a nap, and more. I’m totally spoiled and loving every minute of it.

We go to visit my husband at the nursing home tomorrow morning. The last time he wasn’t hurting, had no complaints, and made sense much of the time. He’s still playing with the squeeze ball. We brought him the book he said he wanted, but we don’t think he’ll read it. At least he knows we love him and want to do whatever we can to make him happier and more comfortable. Hopefully tomorrow’s visit will be a good one.

I hope that you are finding joy in your life. Life is too short to be taken up only with have-to’s. Really work to set aside some time for YOU. Tell the people you love how much they mean to you as many times as they will let you. 🤗

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I DID IT!!!!!!

I did it! I FINALLY finished the owls jigsaw puzzle yesterday! To the last piece, it was quite a challenge. I had to shift whole parts of the puzzle to the left, move the bottom down, remove part of the left side to get it right, but things finally came together. I’ve never had such a difficult puzzle where pieces looked like they fit, but they didn’t. ARRRRGH!

I showed Brian when we returned from visiting my husband at the nursing home. He looked it over carefully, compared it to the picture I have on the wall, and declared, “I guess I believe it.” He said he didn’t think I would finish it. I think that started the ball rolling on my determination to do it. 😃

Brian declared that the owl above is glaring at me because it took me so long to finish the puzzle.

This guy Brian thought was merely staring at me.

The ones on the right were chattering about me in amazement that this was so difficult for me.

My housekeeper, Khun Nong, showed an interest in the puzzle last Friday. I told Brian I would keep the puzzle on the table at least until she got to see the finished piece. I will also keep it until I get the new puzzle that Brian ordered me today!

I LOVE, love, LOVE being able to leave my puzzle out right in the living area of my place not worrying about it being in anyone’s way, causing any problems, making demands on how quickly it comes together. It used to drive my husband nuts when I would have one out, even in my art studio upstairs, so I just stopped trying to do them for quite a while. I’m SO enjoying playing with them now.

I rediscovered how good a puzzle FEELS when the pieces are together. I’m now enjoying stopping each time I pass it and running my hands over it, or just placing my hands on top of it and enjoying how it feels. 🤗

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Jigsaw Puzzle Wisdom

This is the jigsaw puzzle I’m trying to put together currently. I have a “Puzzle Table” in my living area, just inside the front door of my condo. 😁 As a statement of my joy in creating my own space for the first time in my life, I have devoted one of the prime spots in my place to a thing I love.

Brian actually bought some cushions to tie to the wooden chair I’m using, to make it more comfortable.

Since I’m older than dirt, I’ve spent a lot of time in my life WANTING to be able to devote ANY place to a jigsaw puzzle. It got to be such a problem in my house that I put them away for a long time, just giving them up because it wasn’t important enough to cause strife. Stupid problem.

NOW, my puzzle is proudly showing most of a border now on the table. My stepping stool sits beside the table, holding the boxes of unused pieces. Since it’s been there a while, I have thought about related things lately, compiling a kind of informal list of things I’m learning as it sits…

  • The puzzle is a metaphor for life – it is what it is
  • It will sit there as long as someone gives it space – and it’s important to give mental, emotional, and physical space to things that give us pleasure.
  • It’s not how quickly the puzzle comes together – it’s the joy in the DOING – the pleasure in seeing pieces that might create something else coming together at whatever speed, creating a more pleasing picture.
  • It’s not the finishing that is important. It’s the starting of something new. Something you’ve never experienced before. It’s opening your mind and heart, expanding your horizons as it lives in your place.
  • It’s the stopping and finding a piece in life you didn’t see before that make joy burst inside.
  • It’s continuing to spend time and effort at something even when the rewards may be few that leads to character building.
  • Life is a work-in-process, a quiet building, day by day, toward the person you would like to be.
  • When the pieces don’t fit, change your perspective.

You get the point here. I’m not as a good a puzzle person as I used to be. It doesn’t matter. No one cares how long it takes me to put it together, or even if I EVER get it put together. The puzzle is not a measure of my worth – it’s a joy-filled time when I can shift focus and concentrate on something enjoyable, trivial, that might bring a smile to myr face while I spend time with it.

I hope you have what amounts to a puzzle table in your life, that it grounds you and adds something special. Enjoy each piece.

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Tuesday, May 27, 8:50 am

This is the jigsaw puzzle I am trying to put together. I love owls, and the colors this has I think are wonderful.

The very BEST part is that I now have a “jigsaw puzzle table” and the puzzle is OUT, very close to the door, where everyone visiting can see it for as long as I am working on it! I may even coax a person or two to sit down and work on it with me. 🙂

Brian is coming down to pick me up to run errands around 10- 30-ish. We had to wear our “Thailand Rainsuits” again this morning to go to the gym and back for our workout. As we were putting them on before venturing into the downpour, a lady who works at the condo building came out to ask Brian how his dad was. From his gestures, Brian told her that some things were better, but that his dad remains very, very confused at the nursing home. I am so amazed and pleased that people all over the building are so kind and caring to ask. He has obviously made quite an impression here.

When we get finished with our errands, I’m going to spend part of the afternoon using my new step stool to see what is up high in my place. I will get it cleaned out and use it as good storage places.

I think I told you that I have headphones with my computer for the first time ever. Brian got a set for Harvey and me so that we didn’t drive each other crazy with sounds. I’ve told you I came out of the hospital with a large hearing loss for which we are now looking for hearing aids. My husband would drive me out of our office in the states with the high volume on the gory movies he loved. The headphones would make it possible for us to each watch a movie with volumes set where we wanted them, sitting side by side, without bothering each other, or one could watch TV and the other work at the computer with the headphones that canceled out the noise of the other. Even though I am by myself in the condo, I have neighbors who might not enjoy my choice of YouTube videos or TV movies, so I wear the headphones. Last night I tried it, playing a documentary of Jelly Roll! ☺️

I have been finding drawings I like on YouTube and Pinterest and trying to reproduce them in my sketchbook. I’ve been using regular pencils, colored pencils, and recently bought a set of watercolors. Since the whirlwind of our lives is calming down a bit now, I’ve been having a blast simply playing in my art alcove, enjoying the process under no pressure to try to make something I hope someone will like enough to buy. Can you see me grinning? 😁

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