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By Mom Unplugged, March 18, 2008 9:03 pm

Since my 2 year-old is obsessed with puzzles at the moment, I am always on the look-out for fun, educational, high quality puzzles that she might be able to do. A recent surfing expedition revealed these totally cool layered, life-cycle puzzles. They are made of wood and feature five separate puzzle pictures to complete. The mini-puzzles fit on top of one another in layers to show the life cycle of a butterfly (or frog, or duck).

The recommended age is 4 and up. As much as I’d like to claim that my genius 2 year-old could do these, she probably could not without assistance. The big photo makes it look deceptively easy, but there are actually thirty pieces, five puzzles, and five layers. Her older brother and sister might enjoy them though. Hmm…we’ll see. (It’s times like this that I really wish I homeschooled so that I’d have an excuse to buy these slightly pricey but really amazing-looking puzzles!)

These Beleduc puzzles are made in China of birch wood and meet or exceed “Specifications of European (EN-71) and American (ASTM) Toy Safety Standards:”

This butterfly puzzle is also made of wood, but the description offers less information (it costs less too):

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By Mom Unplugged, January 11, 2008 11:40 am

(So sorry for the pun, but I just couldn’t help it!)

Dear Readers,

Puzzles, puzzles, puzzles….Unplugged Kids do a lot of puzzles, and we are “Puzzle Central” here at the moment. Puzzles are my 2 year-old’s latest obsession, but they have always presented a bit of a problem for me.

Those simple wooden puzzles with the tiny knobs just fascinate my little one! The problem is, that I have never figured out how to store them. They always seem to end up in a pile on the floor of mixed up pieces and debris.

You are all probably laughing kindly as you read this, shaking your head sadly and saying to yourself: “I can’t believe she doesn’t know.”

Is there some great Mom-Club puzzle organizing secret out there that I am not privy to?

I have tried the following:

- Stacking them on a shelf: Looks nice until someone wants a puzzle from the bottom and all, or at least, some of them end up tumbling to the floor.

- Stacking them in a large plastic storage box with lid: This is worse than stacking them on a shelf since they all spill inside the box creating a giant, hour long sorting exercise for me.

- Puzzle racks: Nice idea but expensive and take up a lot of room. When you have a lot of puzzles, then this is not a viable option. (Does anyone have a method of making these at home? It can’t be hard, but not being terrible handy, I haven’t really thought of an easy way.)

- Keep them on a high shelf out of reach: This is no fun, plus that means that kids must bug Mom anytime they want a puzzle. Definitely NOT a good idea.

- Baggies: Instead of keeping puzzles on a shelf with the pieces in them, take the pieces out for storage and put them in a labeled baggie that attaches to the puzzle board. This is probably my most successful storage method, but I am not using it at the moment because I don’t like fiddling with baggies and I am DETERMINED to find a better way to store the puzzles in an assembled manner.

Usually I am the one offering unasked-for advice to the whole world via this blog. Today however, I turn the tables. I am unleashing the power of the blogosphere to help me solve my puzzle-dilemma.

The challenge is this: We can send humans to the moon. But can we find an easy, affordable and tidy solution for those boxless knob puzzles? I leave it to you dear readers, to come up with a solution to my problem!

Or, do you all use that easy Mom-Club solution that I know must be out there. If so, am I worthy enough to be allowed in on the secret? Pleeese! Pretty pleeese???

Thank you.

Signed,
Puzzled in Arizona

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By Mom Unplugged, January 6, 2008 9:03 pm

The theme for this week’s Unplugged Project was: Puzzle.

We decided to make our own jigsaw puzzles. I had been thinking of using magazine pictures pasted to thin cardboard, but my 5 year-old son had the brilliant suggestion of recycling our 2007 calendar. This worked well since the pages were stiffer than magazine pages and needed less reinforcement. In fact we didn’t have enough thin cardboard for the backing, so we used construction paper as a backing for one of them and that worked fine.

The first step was choosing pictures. There was some squabbling over who would get August so I declared that if they couldn’t cooperate, then no one would get August. Things settled down after that.

Once each child had chosen a picture, they tore them out, trimmed the edges, and pasted them onto thin cardboard (the top of a shirt box) or construction paper.

Then came the fun part. The kids cut the pictures up into pieces. My son decided to keep it simple, but my 7 year-old daughter cut hers into little tiny pieces!

Then, they put them back together again a few times.

It was a fun little activity for this gloomy, rainy day.

I look forward to seeing what you came up with at your house! Please sign in with Mr. Linky (if he’s here this week) so that we can all find each other.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Next week’s Unplugged Project:

Sculpture

Don’t worry, we’re not talking Michelangelo-quality here.

My kids came up with this project idea. When they said “sculpture,” I was thinking mundane playdough or clay. Silly me. My children apparently were thinking far more imaginatively and began talking about cardboard dogs and natural sculptures made from materials collected outside.

This is yet another reason why we adults should just stay out of our kids art work as much as possible. They often have far more creative vision than we do!

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By Mom Unplugged, November 14, 2007 8:19 pm

This is one that I don’t have yet, but that I am planning on buying for my almost 2 year-old for Christmas.

I like these wooden cube puzzles and we have had several of them, but usually the pictures are simply paper that is glued on to the block (including one that was a Melissa & Doug, I was very disappointed). Trust me, that never lasts long. Selecta doesn’t glue the image on, they use some sort of a transfer that doesn’t seem like it will ever come off (we have a few Selecta games with images on wooden tiles so I know how they do it and that it lasts).

Do the math, and you will find that these four cubes can make six different cute pictures. If you want to see them all, then click on the Amazon link.

Plus…Selecta toys are made in Germany. Need I say more?

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By Mom Unplugged, October 29, 2007 5:45 pm

I recently found these sturdy cardboard puzzles at Cosco and they are really great!

Each puzzle represents a continent. At the moment the manufacturer, A Broader View, only makes four (North America, South America, Africa, and Europe) but I believe that more may be in the works. Cosco had them bundled in packs of two, so we ended up buying all four and I am so glad we did!

One of my pet peeves with some geographic puzzles is that often the pieces are cut out in such a way as to bear no relationship to the actual shape of a state or a country. Why? Wouldn’t it be much more useful and educational to follow the natural boundaries?

These puzzle pieces do follow the natural shape of each country or state (except in the case of very small countries and states). This makes total sense to me!

Capitals are labeled, as are other major cities, large bodies of water and even lat / long.

It would be nicer if these were made of wood rather than cardboard, but at least the cardboard is quite sturdy, and feels like it will last a long time. One word of advice though: the first time it is unwrapped, an adult should remove the pieces since they are stuck in there pretty hard.

If you can’t get to Cosco (or they don’t have them any more), then you can get North and South America from Amazon (links below). It seems that as of right now, Europe and Africa are out of stock. Hopefully they will return eventually.

You also can find all of them, plus some interesting-sounding global puzzles (a future post!) at the manufacturer’s store: Geography Zone. Otherwise, search online to check for other stores and pricing. It seems to vary between $7.00 and $10.00.