Mini & Mug Rug Courthouse Step Blocks

This blog post is sponsored by Riley Blake Designs. They have kindly provided fabric from the Confetti Cottons line and Kisses Basic Cottons for this fun sewing project!

Have you seen my Skinny Courthouse Steps Blocks tutorial? Finished strips at 1/2" have become a bit of my signature, and I wanted to sew up a couple of mini quilts using my tutorial to provide a few more visual examples of color palettes and inspiration for quilting. I also kept around the scraps from my chopped up courthouse steps to piece together additional mug rugs.

Mini #1: White and Bright

My first mini was made with my signature white background with some pops of color (Confetti Cottons lime, peacock, and lipstick). I paired this mini with lipstick Kisses for the quilt back, and used Aurifil 50 weight thread for piecing and straight-line / walking foot quilting. I finished the mini quilt with an art quilt facing to minimize distraction from the design.

Mini #2: White on Dark

For my second mini, I used 1/2 yard of violet, and paired it with just a bit of fuchsia to finish off the on point blocks, and the remaining fuchsia for the back. I used white for the accent stripes. I went with a similar finishing technique: walking foot quilting with Aurifil 50 weight and an art quilt facing.

Mug Rugs

The nice thing about chopping off my courthouse steps was that the leftovers could be nicely finished into two mug rugs per mini quilt. I added a bit of leftover scraps in white and fuchsia to join these chopped off pieces and did very simple walking foot quilting. Doesn't your mug need a rug?!

These were a fairly quick sew and you can see more #wip photos below. If you are thinking about sewing up a mini but want to experiment with digital coloring first, check out this design on QuiltFill. Guess what?! I'm running a giveaway on my instagram feed where I'm giving away one mini, two mug rugs, and Riley Blake Designs fabric and notions, so make sure you check out the details there. Thanks again to Riley Blake Designs for sponsoring and contributing to the giveaway!