My "Labor" Day Weekend...

So...I got this puzzle when I went to Nauvoo recently, with the intention of putting it together and framing it. I love this picture of Nauvoo, and have wanted it since I got home from my mission, but all the prints of it are about $400. A little out of my price range. :) But my parents bought this as a puzzle when they came out to visit me, and when I got home, there it was, framed and beautiful, hanging on our living room wall. It makes me feel "at home" even at home. So I vowed I would get it and do the same. My parents told me it took them just one night as a Family Home Evening activity, so I figured it would be super fun, and couldn't wait to do it. My mom gave me an old frame and glass that I could frame it in, so I was really excited. I had other options for Labor Day weekend, but I decided I didn't care about them, and that what I really wanted was to get this all put together. So I set out on what I figured would take a day.

*Ahem*

How wrong I was...! First of all, there was this brown paper from hell (I say that only because I truly feel that's where it came from. This is a place I speak of.) stuck on both sides of the glass that had probably been on there for years, to "protect" it. I spent ALL of Saturday scraping it off as carefully as possible so as not to scratch the glass underneath. Between Goo-be-gone, fingernail polish remover, and very sore fingernails, I managed to get it entirely clean by SUNDAY afternoon. Yyyyyeah. After that, I painted the frame (it looks very cool, by the way, and thank you...) and started on the puzzle. Due to the fact I kept working on it all Sunday and Monday, and I'm STILL not finished, I have concluded that this puzzle did not, in fact, take my family one measly little night to put together. Okay, so...there's a slight possibility - since there would have been at least seven people working on it instead of just me, but...REALLY!??!?! I had no idea this would be such a project!!! I ask you - how many red brick houses and little white picket fences can there BE in one puzzle?!?!? (Trust me. I know Nauvoo. There are NOT that many white picket fences!!!! In fact, I'm stitting here and can only think of maybe one. Eric Dowdle (the artist) if I ever meet you, you will feel the full fury of my wrath about your stupid little white picket fences!!!) And, of course, I am cursed with this inability to leave a project until it is finished, so the fact that it's still not done, and I had to go to work today makes me crazy! Lol. I laugh, not because that was a joke, but because it's either that or cry. I must finish that puzzle! But it makes me hurt to think about sitting for so much longer, desperately trying to finish it! Hahha!

Needless to say, I had to have something else to do while I was taking on this major project. Sooo...my roommate, Aubs, bought seasons 1 and 2 of Heroes recently, and I may or may not have watched season 1 in its entirety this weekend. All you friends and foes out there who judge me for watching that much tv in one weekend, I ask you to please remember the puzzle. And the stupid brown paper from - you know where.