After finishing up the mouthgrip on the mouthplate inside the head, I get to turn it right side out again. I add the foam skull piece back in, in order to decide the placement of the nose and eyes. I can pin the nose on temporarily, then I can see where the eyes should go. This is a very important part of the puppet build, because the "focus" of the eyes needs to be just right. I want this puppet to appear to be almost peeking over his nose directly at the camera/audience. I used the seam as a guide to center the nose and the eyes, and decided on placing the eyes about 2 finger widths back from the top of the nose. This is going to differ from puppet to puppet. I really take my time getting the placement decided. I pin them where I think they should go- then I look at them straight on and from the sides. I also have other people look at them. (My kids are great critics!)
Before I sew the nose in place, I trim up some of the fur that will be directly under it (makes it lie flush to the head). After sewing the nose. I mark to small areas to cut just enough room to slide the posts from the eyes down into. I add the push-nuts onto the posts from the inside and they are locked in!

The mouthplate is the most important functioning part of the puppet. It really is the heart of the puppet, where all the life comes from. It needs to be easy to manipulate.  Each puppet builder has their own preferred way of building a mouthplate. I build this mouth from very heavy cardboard (it's from an artist canvas). I place the two halves of the cardboard a little ways apart, then tape them together with masking or gaffers tape. Then, I glue the cardboard piece into the foam. All this will be glued to the inside of the fleece mouth- which I will show you on the next post. :)