96 pieces, May 2011; after a hiatus from cutting puzzles, Denton
had resoundingly solved a 60 piece commercial (cardboard) puzzle, so
I made him his first non-tray wooden puzzle with a few more pieces.
He solved it the day I gave it to him, and has put it together every
day since, sometimes twice.
Image is "Djamila and her cub posing" by Tambako the Jaguar
117 pieces, May 2011; solved by Denton within 45min of me turning
the saw off. I suspect it's easier than the snow leopard, and am
slightly puzzled as to why Denton worked on it sky-first.
Image is "US Coast Guard Cutter Hollyhock (WLB 214)" by Per Verdonk
179 pieces, May 2011; the idea of a circular grid had been bothering
me for a while; I wrote a script to print a template, then fudged
the edges, and did the interlocks freehand. I will let Denton have
a try when he feels ready for a challenge, but since I think it's
really quite hard, I'm not going to spring it on him unsuspecting.
Image is "Wind Power" by Nuala
117 pieces, May 2011; Denton asked very specifically for another
puzzle that was the same number of pieces as the boat puzzle. He's
found his comfort zone, and solved this one immediately.
Image is "Locomotives BNSF 9930 (GMD SD70MAC ) & NS 8390 thru Detroit" by Per Verdonk
108 pieces, June 2011; the layout here is dominoes on a 12x18 grid. I generated the layout with a python script, and assigned the in/out interlocks checkerboardwise so that all the pieces are approximately the same shape.
It seems to me to be about as easy as other puzzles with the same
piece count, and the lines in the image don't hurt.
Image is "Salaryman waiting on the Bullet Train" by Trey Ratcliff
106 pieces, June 2011; I wrote a little script to print stars of various sizes and various amounts of skew, then printed them to sticky-backed paper and chose my favorites. I'm pushing the limits for sharp corners, so I think it will not wear very well, but Denton really does appreciate the stars.
I wished that I had gotten the "filler" pieces more uniform in
size.
Image is "Spinner Dolphins" by Steve Dunleavy, 2011