Puppy Pieces

I got the idea of doing a paper piecing quilt made of puppies after I got really into paper piecing. The pattern is from Piece By Number Quilts. This quilt is for Kaylee, who loves puppies. The plan is to make a quilt that is 5 puppies by 7 puppies with black sashing and border. After many hours cutting, prepping, and perforating all the paper pieces (all 105 of them), I finally started piecing it.

So far, I've only made 2 puppies, it's slow process but the results are worth it. The one place I really have potential to mess up though is in putting the pieces together after I tear the paper backing out. The puppies have no eyes right now, as I'm still not entirely sure what I want to do there. The easy thing is to use fabric markers to draw the eyes on, but I'm afraid I'll accidentally mess up or the marker can bleed a little on some fabrics. That'd ruin the puppy instantly and I'll have to make a new one. So I'll probably end up using the cutting machine to cut out 70 eyes and applique each one on by machine. Some of the puppies will also end up with applique collars ... if I have the patience.

This is the perfect opportunity to use a design wall, and I bought a portable one at Quilt Festival from Cheryl Anns Design Wall, but when I went to assemble it, I found out I was missing a corner join piece. Ugh! So I hope they can send me a new one soon, because I really want to get the design wall up.