Still “puzzling”

Bob and I are still on this jigsaw puzzle binge.  Our middle daughter, now living in New York, loves these crazy things, so for her birthday this year we are sending her a jigsaw puzzle each month, only with a bit of a twist.  Once she completes the picture, she is to turn the puzzle over and there will be a message “from someone who loves her”.  Which means Bob and I have to put the puzzles together first, roll them up carefully, and send them out to friends and family who write/draw on the blank sides, roll them up again and send them back to me in the same tube.

Postage paid, of course.

Puzzled

I had no idea how much my middle adult daughter loves jigsaw puzzles!  We rarely did any when she was growing up, just not my thing, you know.  She says it’s a stress buster, and just plain fun. 

Now that I know this little tidbit of info this one who lives half a continent away, I’ve decided to give her a year-long birthday present of a puzzle a month.  Only with a little twist: Bob and I will build the puzzle first, turning it over when completed and writing a message on the back. 

She’s all in!

But wait, there’s more.  I’ve sent out an APB to family to get them involved.  Now, when the hub and I finish a puzzle, I (carefully) wrap it up and mail it to different family members for THEM to write/color/draw on the back, send it back to me (postage pre-paid) and then I break it up and send it off to its new coastal home.

They’re all in!

Okay, yeah, this is getting expensive.  Hopefully I’ll have some ready and rolled up when we travel to actually be with family and get a few done in advance that way.  It’ll be worth it though, helping my middle child connect with family in a unique way, dontchaknow?!

Wholly Holy

Unlike my sister-in-law, Terri, I’m not a jigsaw puzzle person.  Every vacation or holiday, you can just about bank on it—out comes some beautifully photographed but deviously detailed puzzle with three million pieces, and somehow that’s supposed to be stress-reducing? 

To each his own.

If I were a puzzle-fan, however, I definitely wouldn’t buy them secondhand, like I do most everything else.  There’s just this nagging thought that after all that work the last piece (or five) would not be in the box.  That could mean, for instance, that Washington’s nose might be missing as he’s crossing the Delaware, or the chalice might be missing from the Last Supper, or Picasso’s Guernica….

….well, okay, on that one I might not notice.

Point made, if I want to make sure I have a whole puzzle, it needs to be a NEW puzzle.

I’m also thinking this is what God had in mind when