Help with a gift idea... making a puzzle

[pigletto]

My ds (5), is obsessed with puzzles lately. He will do the same puzzle 3 or 4 times in an afternoon sometimes. The 25 or 30 piece ones are getting to easy for him now. I want to get him a bunch of new puzzles for Christmas...and I had an idea

I want to make him puzzles out of family photos. Better still I want to make him puzzles out of our photopass photos from our last Disney trip

We won't be going again until next Spetember (we've had to reschedule twice now).
So I think this would be a fun way to use our photos and make a Christmas present.
This is where you come in. Is this even possible? Is there a service that does this, or is it possible to make a durable puzzle by myself?
I think I'd like to do this for my daycare kids as well with pictures I have of us on outings. If this is possible to do hopefully I can find a way to make them on a budget.

[thebeesknees]

Usually, a photo puzzle will run you between $20 and $25. The cheapest one I've seen is from artscow for $11.99. Maybe someone else knows of a place to get one for less.

[horseshowmom]

Oh, yes, definitely possible. Just checkout some of the online photofinishing options (Walmart, Snapfish, Winkflash, Shutterfly, etc.). I've seen puzzles on some of them.

ETA: Just google photo puzzle, and you should find some options (Walmart came up at $11.26).

[PolyndianPrincessJes]

Google search brought this up:

http://www.walmart.com/catalog/produ...ci_sku=5027151

[MickeyHereWeCome!]

I was just thinking about doing this for my daycare kids! I have always done mini photo albums to give them for Christmas, but thought this would be a neat alternative this year, now that they are getting older.

I saw some sort of puzzle making set in a catalog, which is where I got the idea yesterday. Unfortunately, it looked like a much more difficult puzzle, and was designed to be put together to be permanent in the end. I'll try to look through my catalogs to find it.

I really wanted something they could do over and over, so I'll be watching this thread to see if anyone else has great ideas!

[TxRabbit]

Your post made me curious. I remember seeing a make your own jigsaw puzzle kit a little bit ago. I couldn't find what I thought I saw but I did find this:

http://www.compozapuzzle.com/compute...aw-puzzles.htm

Which may not be the thickest thing ever, but sure was a neat idea!

[Amii]

The Kodak Gallery is having a contest where they give away $15 codes. I don't know if there are any left for this week, but they start giving out more codes tomorrow.

You can put in the code SWEETRETURN before you put in the $15 code and get an additional 20% off. I got my son a puzzle with a picture of him swimming with a dolphin for $11.29 including shipping.

http://www.kodakgallery.com/gallery/welcome.jsp

[pigletto]

Thank you for all the tips everyone

I will check out all of your ideas. I didn't know if these existed but apparently they do!
I had a dream last night that ds was doing a puzzle and it made a picture of him on the POC ride. I woke up this morning babbling at DH about what a cool idea it would be. It's great that I can actually do this!

[belle41379]

I took Disney images, cut them up (they were in squares for our young son) and laminated them. They were great "puzzles" for him to do. As the child gets older, you could just cut the pieces into more unique shapes (and traditional puzzle shapes). I wouldn't be on hard backing unless you put it onto cork board or cardboard and Mod Podge it after you cut the pieces.

[Danemom]

I think I've seen a puzzle die for use on an Ellison die cut machine. Maybe you could do something like that? I don't know much about the cricut machines but they might have something too?

[pampam]

I did a google under homemade jigsaw puzzles and it suggested glueing your picture (the larger the better) on a thin foam board or poster board and using an exacto knife cutting it up. You might want to try this with a magazine picture before you use your photos.

[rockiesfan]

I ordered custom photo puzzles two years ago for DD and DD from Snapfish. They come in a tin with the photo also on the lid of the tin - cute! But we were somewhat disappointed with the quality. The photo is a thin plastic layer that peels up from the body of the piece, so it's pretty fragile. Also the pieces weren't distinct, meaning you could put the wrong piece into a space and it would fit fine, just wouldn't look right. We did enjoy doing them, but not over and over like our other puzzles. The best part really was the tin with the big photo on the lid. I just checked; they're $24 now for 252 pieces or $14 for 110 pieces (25% of duplicates).