As well as the usual articles summarising the previous quarterly meeting and detailing the show and tell session that always form an integral part of our meetings, Issue 126 contained several pages of interesting articles including Part 7 of chairman David’s series on the wanderings of the Jigasaurus , two articles on the increasingly popular and active Flickr jigsaw groups (see also Related Events and Links section for more on both these) and two others on recent jigsaw festivals.
David’s article focused on an update on his progress on the huge collection of around 80 puzzles that he acquired some time ago and is slowly piecing together … the challenge of completing each individual puzzle being magnified by the jumbling up of some of the pieces from many of them! He illustrated his account with several pictures of recently completed puzzles including three of Holtzapffel’s glorious “Figure=It=Out” series, “The Indian Dancer”, “The Snake Charmer” and “King Robert of Sicily”.
Jackie’s article covered several of the Flickr groups she is involved with: “Jigsaws”- mainly, but not entirely, modern cardboard puzzles, “Leonisha’s Choice” – a gallery of 18 favourites from “Jigsaws” top contributor, “BIG Jigsaw Puzzle Collection” and “Artistic Puzzles”- both self explanatory.
More and more communities, seemingly mostly church-based, are putting on jigsaw festivals, which both raise much needed funds but also serve to bring people together and establish long-lasting friendships. Two recent ones described in this issue were held in August at Alton and East Cowes on the Isle of Wight. Local BCD members put on an interesting wooden jigsaw puzzle display in Alton and BCD flyers were included with each puzzle sold, in an effort to promote our membership. 
If you’re interested in attending either of these events next year, the dates for your diary are: Alton, August 27th-Sep 1st and Isle of Wight, August 13th -18th.
Other articles in the magazine covered Tricia’s Grand Canyon Challenge, an interesting puzzle box find from 1919, Chad Valley’s patriotic promotional puzzles and a detailed account of a member’s well curated Tower, Philmar and other 400+ piece puzzle collection.