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Puzzle: Monaco


Size: 500 pieces,  1 missing
Dimensions: 45cm x 35cm
Producer: Leap Year
Location: Monaco or Monte Carlo, officially the Principality of Monaco, is a small sovereign city-state located in South Western Europe on the northern central coast of the Mediterranean Sea. It is surrounded on three sides by its neighbour, France, and its centre is about 16 km from Italy.

Monaco is the name of the country and its capital (and only) city. It is famous as a tax haven, and wealthy foreigners make up the majority of the population at approximately 84%. … Read more

Puzzle: Hilton Head Lighthouse


Size: 504 pieces
Dimensions: 27.3cm x 45.7cm
Producer: Mega, Encore! series
Location: Hilton Head is a resort town (located on an island of the same name on the Atlantic Ocean) in Beaufort County, South Carolina, United States. The island gets its name from Captain William Hilton. In 1663, Captain Hilton identified a headland near the entrance to Port Royal Sound, which he named “Hilton’s Head” after himself. [Wiki]

Book: The Babytalk Insider’s Guide To Your Baby’s First Year

Title: The Babytalk Insider’s Guide To Your Baby’s First Year
Author: Stephanie Wood and Kitty O’Callaghan, contributing editors, babytalk magazine
Source: Ottawa Public Library
ISBN: 978-0-446-69804-7
Available online

Notes: This book’s main message, it appears, is to calm the parents down by telling them not to stress about pretty much anything except putting the baby to sleep on their back and using a car seat. Everything else is justified: to breast- or formula-feed, whether to use a pacifier,  whether to prop the bottle, – anything and everything is a parents’ choice and … Read more

Belly cast

In August (about a month before my due date, and a bit more before Alaric was actually born), I travelled to Julie Keon’s studio in Cobden for a belly casting session. The result of this session was a white body cast from shoulders to top of the legs including the arms and hands, made with hospital grade plaster-gauze strips. The cast remained with Julie for a few weeks to be completed, strengthened and painted the shade of blue I have picked leaving the centre of the belly white for further decoration.

Julie had dropped … Read more

Puzzle: Coliseum, Rome, Italy


Size: 750 pieces
Dimensions: 59.69cm x 39.37cm
Producer: The Canadian Group, Sure-Lox, Wonders of the World series
Location: The Colosseum, or the Coliseum, originally the Flavian Amphitheatre (Latin: Amphitheatrum Flavium, Italian: Anfiteatro Flavio or Colosseo), is an elliptical amphitheatre in the centre of the city of Rome, Italy, the largest ever built in the Roman Empire. It is considered one of the greatest works of Roman architecture and Roman engineering.

Occupying a site just east of the Roman Forum, its construction started between 70 and 72 AD under the emperor Vespasian and was … Read more

Puzzle: The Sleepy Shopkeeper by Mike Wilks


Size: 550+ pieces
Dimensions: 46cm x 61cm
Producer: Great American Puzzle Factory
Author: Mike Wilks (b. 1947, London) is an artist, illustrator and author of nine books including the global bestseller The Ultimate Alphabet (Pavilion Books, 1987). [Wiki]
Note: Puzzle within a puzzle – find over 1000 things that begin with the letter “S”. “Who would think that here in the nooks and crannies of the sleepy shopkeeper’s store would be over 1,000 subjects starting with the letter “S”?   Sure – there’s a skeleton, a sailboat … Read more

Puzzle: A Court Reception

Puzzle without any missing pieces:


Size: 650+ pieces, 3 pieces missing, 3 pieces damaged. Update: Sincere thank you to Cliff from Albany, NY who sent me the missing 3 pieces. His puzzle was missing 5 different pieces, and so between the two of us we could put together a complete one.
Dimensions: 48.26cm round
Producer: Jaymar Specialty Co.
Piece: Adaptation of a porcelain plate decoration, Chinese, K’ang Hsi Period (1662-1772), The Metropolitan Museum of Art
History: The Kangxi Emperor (4 May 1654 – 20 December 1722) was … Read more

Puzzle: Grand Teton


Size: 500 pieces
Dimensions: 48.26cm x 35.56cm
Producer: The Canadian Group, Sure-Lox, National Parks series
Location: Grand Teton National Park is a United States National Park located in northwestern Wyoming, south of Yellowstone National Park. The park is named after the Grand Teton, which, at 4,197 m, is the tallest mountain in the Teton Range.

The origin of the name “Teton” is not definitive. One possible origin is that it was the name given by French trappers in the area. (“Tetons” means breasts in French) Another possible source is that the mountains derive … Read more

Puzzle: North Cascades

North Cascades National Park is a U.S. National Park located in the state of Washington. The park is the largest of the three National Park Service units that comprise the North Cascades National Park Service Complex. Several national wilderness areas and British Columbia parkland adjoin the National Park. The park features rugged mountain peaks.

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Puzzle: Victorian Splendor


Size: 1000 pieces
Dimensions: cm x cm
Producer: Springbok
Poem: If I could select any house in the world
or the dwelling that I would call home,
how quickly I’d pick a Victorian manse,
a house with a high stained-glass dome!

I’d surely want turrets and towers, all rounded
and stretching straight up to the sky,
and right on the top of the tallest of all
my personal banner would fly.

Each window would sing out the artisan’s praise,
beveled panes would be etched with … Read more

Puzzle: After the Shower by Kevin Daniel


Size: 500 pieces
Dimensions: 45.72cm x 60.96cm
Producer: Karmin International
Artist: Kevin Daniel
About the Artist: When Kevin Daniel began dabbling in paints and completing portraits as a young man in the early 1960s, he had no thought that he was nurturing the beginnings of a profession that would last a lifetime. As he studied the Renaissance masters’ paintings and portraits from books and museums, his thoughts were only on how much he enjoyed doing it.

In his twenties, this Minnesota native began concentrating on painting animals and wildlife, discovering that … Read more