Tuesday, February 15, 2011

FRIDAY FEBRUARY 25, 2011 JIGSAW PUZZLE PIECES







Jigsaw puzzles are a great way to spend time with your friends and family or on your own. It does not matter if you are working on simple large piece puzzles or if you are taking on a 3,000 piece monster. The art of jigsaw puzzles is a fulfilling and fun hobby. Anyone can do it. It sounds childish, but it allows the individual to concentrate, think and 'fit in' just as the interlocking pieces fit in. My mother, brother and I loved doing jigsaw puzzles on the dining room table. I remember after finishing a puzzle, we glued, shellacked and framed each one. For years the Apollo 11 Astronauts hung in the upstairs hall with the date July 20, 1969.


I have discovered a great website for puzzles. You can purchase puzzles or even submit a photo for them to customize into your own jigsaw puzzle. Check out this website http://www.justjigsawpuzzles.com/

I do suggest jigsaw puzzles to my older patients. It is a great way to stimulate the mind. First it allows for recognition of all straight or border pieces. It stimulates the mind with color. It engages the mind to find pieces. It also allows the individual to give back. I tell most of my patients to frame the puzzles and take them to a nursing home so the nursing home can hang them up in the recreation room.

An older man told me this one month after I told him to start 'putting together' jigsaw puzzles. He said, "I started doing them again with my 2 year old grandson. I do love them and can spend way too long doing them. I hope I do not get addicted to them." I said, "Mr S, I could think of a lot worse addictions than this one!" He laughed.

There are jigsaw puzzles of famous paintings. I bought one of my favorite artist, Salvador Dali. Last year Rick's parents, Nancy and Fred and I put together a puzzle of the 1939 movie, The Wizard of Oz.

I have even found puzzles of bees and herbs!!! I will save them for the rainy nights on Fire Island.

Until tomorrow...

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