Tips for putting a puzzle together

A pile of five hundred or a thousand puzzle pieces can be intimidating. But you can be well on your way to the solution by following these tips.

pieces of a puzzle

• Turn all the pieces face up. This may seem obvious, but you can’t even start to see the big picture until you can see all the little pictures.

• Find all the border pieces, then start grouping these border pieces with similar colors, shades, and lines. You will probably be able to start putting some of these together right away.

• Find the corners (assuming it’s a rectangle shape) and position the corners close to the size and shape of the puzzle. This will help you better visualize the placement of the center pieces.

• Sort all the other pieces by similar colors, shades, and lines. If you have a picture of the completed puzzle, position sorted groups into likely positions.

• Looking over all the puzzle pieces for a long time can be helpful, but it can also be helpful to take breaks. Also try viewing the puzzle from various angles.

• Dedicate a table to the project. If the table is in a location that you pass by frequently, so much the better.