One of the best Christmas gifts I got this year wasn’t even one that was meant for me. No, I didn’t switch a gift tag underneath the Christmas tree in the middle of the night (if I had, one of my cousins wouldn’t have gotten a new pair of Beats by Dre). Rather I got sucked in to an activity that I had forgotten I loved.

My cousin Dale received a 500 piece puzzle of the world map. Yes, I love puzzles. Yes, I have traveled the world. Yes, I can easily lose track of time staring at a map. But still somehow I wasn’t tempted to tear right into the box and begin assembling.  It actually wasn’t until hours later, after the Christmas dinner plates were cleared, that one person decided to open the box and I casually looked over their shoulder to survey the situation.

Had I been on my own, I would have started hunting through the box to assemble as much of the puzzle as possible in one sitting, but I did realize that this was more than just a puzzle, it was a chance for the family to do a fun activity together. There was also the stern reminder from my cousin’s wife:

“Don’t you dare put that puzzle together all by yourself in just 5 minutes. Make sure Dale (my little cousin) gets to learn from this exercise too!”

Point taken.

Teamwork

So through out the evening family and friends drifted in and out, putting a piece or two together or helping to find pieces of cardboard to build the puzzle on top of when the coffee table proved to be too small. But a for most of the evening it was me with 12 year old cousin and another family friend her age going through the trial and error of puzzle construction.

Assembling Africa by Christmas Tree lights

We started with the border, of course, then moved on to working on individual parts of the globe. Dale dove into Russia and China, Madison on Australia and South East Asia and I put together parts of Africa and South America.  Bit by bit we shared puzzle pieces and suggestions. And for, me I really enjoyed helping the young ladies learn a little bit about how the world fits together. My little cousin and I laughed as she practiced pronouncing Kyrgyzstan, and when Madison asked where Indonesia is, instead of putting the piece in place for her, I told her a general region and she figured it out for herself.

Dale and Madison hard at work

We eventually got through connecting all of the main land masses before bedtime called and stiff muscles needed to be stretched after crawling around on the floor for hours. The next day, with clear eyes and a new participant or two, we managed to put together the last all blue pieces of the ocean and the puzzle was complete. There’s nothing like seeing hours of work come together into a finished product. And getting to share my love of travel and knowledge of the world with future travelers made it all the better.

The Finished Product