Some of the puzzle boxes, with use, start to get worn. He likes to look at the picture though, so we just reinforce the boxes with clear packaging tape. Then they are quite sturdy and he can look at the picture as he works.

There used to be 30 kids in my classroom for half an hour every morning, rampaging through the boxes to get their favorite games out, then rushing to put them away. Baggies were great for the pieces and the tape held the boxes up for about a year’s worth of this constant use.

I stored them on shelves stacked 3-4 deep only.

I don’t need cards because I play computer solitaire. Also computer mahjongg solitaire (the current craze). I don’t need jigsaw puzzles because I bought Brainsbreaker, a shareware jigsaw puzzle program that can turn any jpeg (a kind of computer image file) into a puzzle. You get to choose the kind of pieces you like and the number of pieces. I have harvested dozens of interesting pictures from the web and use them as jigsaw puzzles. What works are pictures with a high pixel count and clear, bright colors. Anything too fuzzy, dark, or murky doesn’t work well in a puzzle.

The best things about doing jigsaw puzzles on the computer are 1) you can never lose a piece, and 2) the cats can’t jump onto the puzzle and slide it off onto the floor.

I’m going to be changing them over to some shelving in another closet instead so I can grab them easier, but I have taken all of my different versions of Trivial Pursuit and combined them into one box so that those aren’t taking up as much space anymore. I plan to go through and see if there are any others I can do that with sometime soon.