The Elephant In The Room
In honor of National Elephant Day on September 22nd, I’ve had an elephant in my room, on my puzzle board, all month long!
My love of elephants harkens back to my grandmother who always had elephant statues in her home. They had to have their trunks up and be facing the door, which according to her - and Vastu Shastra, the Indian science of architecture - brought good luck and guarded the home against negative energy. How a French Canadian woman who had never been abroad in her life knew this is beyond me, but one of the few keepsakes I have of her is a wooden elephant that I keep facing the door!
Conversely, I always assumed that an elephant with the trunk down was bad luck and I warned my husband when he placed two in his office that his father brought back after serving in Vietnam (where they are a symbol of their culture). Imagine my surprise when I learned that downward facing trunks actually signifies saving energy and one in your office helps you conquer obstacles!
The poor elephant featured in this 1000-piece Heye puzzle, Elephant’s Life, definitely needs all of his energy to overcome what is happening to him! I’m all ears when I hear a puzzle with artwork by Marino Degano is available – another one I’m eying up is African Habitat.- and this one did not fail to delight.
A friend wondered if all the elephant skin would be hard to puzzle, but it’s actually the worms and birds that were challenging, but these critters’ antics were so cute and varied, I didn’t mind. Speaking about elephant skin, did you know the reason it’s so wrinkled is that the folds retain up to 10 times more water than flat skin, which cools them down? Hmm…maybe, as I live in hot and humid Florida, I should be happy about my wrinkles?
Elephants have the longest gestation period of any mammal at 22 months. I was worried it might take me that long to do this 1000-piece Baby Elephant by Yazz puzzle at first! As I’m a “sort by color” type of person and every piece of this puzzle was a riot of color, it gave me brain overload initially, but it was a ton of fun and worth the effort. I assume when this elephant grows up, it will look like this 500-piece Elephant by Aquarius.
In Elephant, a 750 piece by Ceaco, the matriarch is with her calf and their trunks are intertwined. Elephants do this to greet one another and reassure their young. I could have used that hold when I pieced this together, as the fit was a bit loose, however the vivid colors made it worthwhile. If you like the “aw” factor of this, Mother and Child by Jacarou Puzzles should be packed into your puzzle storage trunk too!
Another vibrantly-colored puzzle is this 500-piece Electric Elephants by Debi Hebron by Lang. At first glance, what looks like similar colors may make you think this will be a mammoth undertaking, but patterns made it easy to spot what went where and this was a cute and quick build with no false fits.
Electric Elephants by Debi Hebron
I was drawn to this 1000-piece Indian Pillows by Eurographics because I bought a pillowcase very similar to the elephant one in the puzzle when I went to India. I bought it to commemorate my surprise at looking out of my tour bus one day and seeing it being passed by an elephant! You can tell this is an Asian elephant, as they have smaller, more rounded ears; whereas African elephants ears are shaped like the continent they are from.
The collective noun for elephants is a herd, or a parade. I’ll go with the latter as it provides a nice segue into my last puzzle, this 1000-piece Elephant Walk by Hart Puzzles featuring artwork of Jennifer Garant. I actually started with the elephants, as they stood out against the darker palette. They are sitting in the puzzle, but did you know that elephants actually parade on tip-toe, like the charming circus people pictured on the podium in the puzzle? X-rays of elephant’s feet reveal that their bones are actually standing on tip-toe.
How do you puzzle a difficult elephant puzzle? One piece at a time! It’s how I approached all these builds, but if you would like a smaller piece count puzzle to celebrate this holiday, Elephant Mini Puzzle by New York Puzzle Company at just 20 pieces, or the 300-piece Asian Elephants Endangered Species by Mudpuppy may be the ones to chew on instead.
In closing, an elephant’s temporal lobe, the part of the brain associated with memory, is larger and denser than that of most people, which is why they say elephants never forget. I encourage you never to forget that around 90% of African elephants have been wiped out in the past century - largely due to the ivory trade - leaving only an estimated 415,000 wild elephants alive today. So do your part to take in the beauty of and protect these magnificent creatures when you can.
– Lisa @lisalovespuzzles
I love elephants and really enjoyed reading your post.
Once again, I am delighted to read your Blog Lisa. Well, done :-)
What fun puzzles you shared, quite a few new to me. Loved that you shared your grandmother’s elephant and the “trunks” stories.
