Is she a Scarlet or a Ruby? (with prize preview bonus!)

Good news folks, there's still time to get in on the fun and help me name my dress form. I'm planning to keep the contest open until Friday when I'll select one of the entries to receive a little handmade gift. Friday also happens to be my birthday, so it seems appropriate to give a little something on that day.

No matter how much you torture me though, I will not tell you what I've made! Nope, not gonna do it. I won't tell....okay, fine...you got me. I can't keep a secret worth crap. Wanna see what I made?

It's coasters and a mug rug! Wait, whoa...mug rug? What the what? Yeah...until a week ago, I didn't know what a mug rug was either. I've taken the liberty of illustrating its intended purpose below. It's either a really big coaster, or really tiny place mat depending on how you look at it. What-ev. I think it's awesome and hopefully you do too.

I'm on a bit of a linen kick at the moment. There's just something so beautiful about natural linen next to a selection of beautiful cotton prints...so simple and so gorgeous. I think I'm going to be using linen a lot more in the future.

One of the great things about this project is how it used up some of the teeny tiny scraps I had on hand that really aren't good for much else. I still have enough cut squares left to crank out a couple of additional sets, so I just might whip some up for myself. It only takes about an hour to do up the entire set. You can find the coaster tutorial I used over on Craft Snob if you'd like to make your own. The mug rug measures12 X 8 if you're looking to make that piece...it's not in the tutorial.

This project marks the first time I've ever done chain piecing. I'm sold. Such a time saver. If you're not in the know, chain piecing is where you keep running the pieces through one set after the other without taking the time to cut your thread in between. By the end, you have a long chain of connected pieces linked together and you just clip all the threads at once. I wish I'd tried this technique ages ago. Would have saved a tonne of time on some of my previous quilt projects.

Anyhow, like I said at the beginning of this post, there's still time to enter the contest if you'd like to win these little cuties. Hopefully you're even more excited to win now that you know what the prize is! To enter, you can go back to the original giveaway post and leave a comment there with your name suggestion for my dress form, or you can simply comment here on this post. Doesn't matter what you say...any old comment will do! If you've already commented on the original post (thanks so much!) you can comment here for an additional entry!

P.S. Despite the title of this post, I haven't narrowed down my choices for a name yet. Keep the fresh ideas coming!

UPDATE: The giveaway is now closed. Congratulations to Lesley who won herself a set of quilted coasters and a mug rug!