I finished the main crochet of the 9 cat squares I need for the pillow. I still need to embroider their faces for them to be truly done. Since the edges of my squares tend to curl up from a tight gauge, I pinned them onto a piece of foam core to see if the grey seems to blend too much and the cat shape gets lost. I am still trying to decide if they each need a colored border. I may have to live with this for a day or so before I decide and meanwhile, I will try adding the faces to see if that makes any difference. I might also play with joining them with a whip stitch vs. crocheting them together thinking maybe the ridge formed by crocheting them will give them more structure. So many decisions!
This will hold up my starting the back since I will need to add rows if I do add a border, but I am sure I can find something to work on while I go back and forth on it. Today I also experimented for the first time with metal stamping. Apparently cheap dollar-store spoons have one thing going for them; they are rock hard. I managed to get a few smudges that might have been letters stamped, but the curved spoon and my need (as a weakling) to hit the stamp repeatedly causes it to move quite a bit. I’m going to play with ways to secure the spoon and maybe a sturdier surface under it to see if that helps.