Puzzle me this! - How I made my new puzzles!

My family has a New years tradition where we put together a puzzle as a family. We start it on New Year’s Eve and try to finish it on New Year's Day. It’s just a fun background project that family and guests will work on it here and there as they visit. Every year we enjoy searching for the next puzzle we’ll do during the holidays.

This year I thought, wouldn’t it be cool if we did puzzles of some of my art?!?! How would I even make that happen? So I had a new mission! How could I make puzzles out of my artwork?

As always I had to first find a manufacturer. As I’ve mentioned in past blog entries, it’s always easier when you can go with an existing, trusted manufacturer. It makes the process much smoother and less risky. So I reached out to the company that makes my convention merch bags. I’ve been so happy with their bags, I used them to make my Milk Carton Boxes for my Star Baby Blind Boxes! And those turned out amazing. If they could make puzzles that would be amazing!

After contacting my rep, I found out that they do indeed make puzzles! So this dream definitely could become a reality. Then I hit my first big choice, 500 or 1000 pieces? Oof. We normally do 1,000 pieces for our holidays, but I know a lot of people enjoy the 500 piece experience. Rather than make the decision myself I put it to my community! I got a lot of input and 500 pieces was definitely the lead choice. Sorry 1k, maybe next time!

Once that was decided, I needed to figure out what designs I wanted to do. Oh man! That was hard! I could have gone with some of my typical designs, but I decided I wanted to branch out a little and try something different. After some thought, I decided to go with my Kimono Cats, Circus Day Dream, and of course my original Gas Mask Girls! 

Sending the art work and getting that puzzle started was the easy part, after all I already had the artwork ready. The fun part was designing the box for each puzzle!!!

Seeing the sample boxes was so cool! They looked so good! 

I was even more excited when they sent me pics of the Circus Daydream puzzle cut up, but fully assembled!

Each puzzle also comes with a 24x18" reference poster! How cool is that?!!?

They look so nice! The final product looks amazing!

I am so happy with how these turned out and I can’t wait to bring them to my store! I’m hoping I get them in time for Christmas, but that may not happen. :( But stay tuned for my newsletter and social media for exact release dates!!!!

Well now I have my puzzles ready for this New Years! I guess I’ll need to come up with some new designs for next year!!!