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LIFE: The Great Challenge - by Royce B. McClure
- FIRST TO COMPLETE IN SASKATCHEWAN, CANADA.
March 8th, 2009
Tyler Nelson (with some help from Deb and Kelly) - Yorkton, Saskatchewan, Canada.
Assembled between August 14th, 2008 and March 8th, 2009.
It took me 149 days and 465 hours to complete, within a 7 month period. I started on
August 14 and finished on March 8. I did the puzzle in sections. I am 20 years old.
I really got into puzzles about a year ago, it was summer and my girlfriend Kelly
asked if I wanted to do a puzzle, at first I wasn't really interested but after we
found a nice 1500 piece puzzle, and finished it, I realized I really enjoyed jigsaw
puzzles. After we finished the 1500 piece I was curious to see how big they made
them, after seeing a couple 5000- 8000 piece puzzles I thought it would be really
fun to do such a large puzzle. I came across the Life puzzle and was shocked.
Shocked at it's size and how incredible it looked. At first I thought there would be
no way I could do such a huge puzzle, but after hearing from the Hall of Fame
members and how they said it wasn't as bad as it looked I decided to buy the puzzle
and start on it as soon as it arrived. The day it arrived I got to work on it. I
can't take all the credit because my girlfriend Kelly helped with the first section.
She put together the giraffe, the monkey and the bear on the giraffe. She also did
one of the yellow fish. She also snuck in about 30-50 pieces on section 3 as well.
Section 2 and 4 were done entirely by me. At first we were both going to do the
puzzle together, but she got too busy with school and it was really hard for her to
help, so I decided to finish it myself. I did the puzzle in the four sections and
did them in order.
Special credit goes out to my mother Deb who helped me sort the
puzzle when I opened each bag. I then sorted the remainder by myself. I sorted by
color not by shape, I didn't have any strategy while doing the puzzle, I just sorted
by color and picture and went from there. Section 4 was the one I enjoyed the
most, the swordfish is my favorite part of the entire puzzle, (see below.) I also love the lost
city, which was easier than I thought it would be. I found the birds in section 3,
and the ocean water, or wavy water on each section to be the most difficult to do.
The fish in section 1 were also pretty challenging. The rest of the puzzle was fairly
simple and very fun to put together. I did it over 7 months and I didn't do it
everyday. There were some times when I went 3-4 days without doing it. I tried to
put in time everyday so I could finish it within a reasonable time. I usually spent
at least 2 hours a night on it and worked on it quite a bit on weekends.
It was an
incredible experience and was a lot of fun to do. I enjoyed it very much. It is not
a hard puzzle, it just takes a lot of time, commitment, and patience. I will
hopefully be mounting it soon and will provide pictures of the displayed puzzle once
it's up.
Thanks for hearing my story, good luck to all those who wish to tackle
this challenge!
Tyler
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