Out of sight

A tradition in our family is to do a puzzle on Christmas day. There's always one under the tree from Santa, and we work on it together. When we first started this, the puzzles were simple and we usually finished them before the end of the day. Over the years, however, they have become larger, with more and smaller pieces, and more detailed pictures, so they take several days to complete. Luckily my sister Jocelyn and my husband John are both really good at puzzles! The rest of us are average (Mom, Jocelyn's boyfriend Damon), disinterested/uninvolved (Dad), or quite frankly awful but enjoy the process anyway (that would be me). Recently, I've been the one to assist Santa by buying the puzzles, but my lack of skill at them doesn't stop me from getting hard ones: I pick them based on liking the picture, and depend on Jocelyn and John for the execution. I glued and framed the one from last year, I liked that picture so much. It's hanging above my mantel at the moment, but will come down with the rest of the Christmas decorations, as it's a picture of the Nativity.

This year, I was really excited about the puzzle I picked out for Santa to bring. It's a picture called "Not a Creature Was Stirring" (a painting by an artist named Nicky Boehme), and it depicts a living room on Christmas Eve. Four stockings are hung by the chimney (I can only assume "with care"), a cat is snoozing on the floor in front of the fireplace, through the window a smiling snowman sporting a red scarf and black hat appears to wave the green glove at the end of his stick arm, and the Christmas tree is covered with lights and loaded with a pile of presents at its base. I was (and am) excited about it because the picture has a special quality: it glows in the dark! (Or it will, once we get it put together.) I'm not 100% sure, but my guess is that the tree, the wreath on the wall above the mantle, and the evergreen garland on the mantle are the parts of the picture which will glow. (I'm guessing that because they all have lights in them as part of the image.)

The only problem is that, since the pieces for those three sections of the puzzle all look essentially the same, it's going to take a good long while to finish putting it together. Jocelyn's visit ended on the 28th, so it's up to John now. (I'm willing to help, but just not able to be very helpful! I'm better at the early stages of a puzzle - sorting pieces, and putting together the obvious/easy sections.) So it's early January, and I'm still waiting to see the glow in the dark effect. Here's the puzzle as it looks so far.



In our house, we have a particular challenge with puzzle making: the work in progress needs to be protected from the three cats overnight (unless we want to start the process all over again every morning, which of course we don't). We accomplish that by covering the coffee table with a throw, which keeps the puzzle out of sight for the cats. The only problem is it also keeps it out of sight for us. You know how, when you can see a puzzle, you try to put a piece or two in it every time you look at it? Or you might multitask and work on it while watching a movie or TV? Well neither of the above is happening with this puzzle right now, as neither John nor I has chosen to remove the throw for the past couple of days. To tell you the truth, I think we're avoiding it. We'll get it done eventually, though!

This gets me thinking about the new year, and resolutions. What things in my life do I keep "out of sight" rather than working on them, and what are the results of that choice? What will it take to get me to "look" at those areas, and thereby make progress in them? Hmmmm...food for thought, especially at this time of year.