Hey Everyone, welcome back to Mug Rug Monday.

A new month means a new theme. No more winter but rather bright, cheery pinks and reds for February. After all it is the month of Valentine’s Day.

I have a large heart pattern called Be Mine and I thought I would make a small version of this quilt as a mug rug for this week.

I had wanted to use the same fabrics as I did for Be Mine which was created with the Stonehenge Sweetheart line from Northcott but I couldn’t find my leftovers. They must be in one of my many scrap bins.

I pulled these three fabrics from my stash to use instead.

Fabric choices

Sewing the Heart

I am going to be making some teeny tiny half square triangles for this project. Did I mention I don’t really like working small? I think I did yesterday for Stitch Along Sunday. So do I make the half square triangles the traditional way or use the Thangles I have left over from another project?

I decided to go with the traditional method of making the HSTs as they weren’t as tiny as I thought they would be – 1 ½″ unfinished.

Sewing the light and dark pink strips together I was able to cut the two squares together making it easier for piecing.

Here are the pieces laid out to create the heart.

Pieces laid out in rows

Here they are all sewn together.

Heart sewn together

Adding a Border

I thought that a white border would work and make the heart look like it was floating but I wasn’t thrilled with this once I had the strips sewn in place on either side of the heart.

White borders

Then I thought I would keep some of the white border so trimmed the existing ones and add the two pinks – one on each side. Didn’t like it either.

Two different pink borders

After doing some reverse sewing I added a dark pink strip to the other side and was happy with the results.

Dark pink borders

Quilting

I basted the three layers together with pins and chose a variegated pink rayon thread from Sulky to quilt the piece with.

Layers sandwiched with thread choice

I did an all over free motion design of hearts and stippling.

Quilting complete

Here’s a close up of the quilting motif.

Heart motif

Binding

I went with the white fabric for the binding and am very pleased with the final results.

Mug rug completed

See you next week for another pink, red or heart themed mug rug.

Happy Quilting!