Courthouse steps

It was a sad day around the country today and at school as we remembered the devastation of the Christchurch earthquake. I got home and decided I wanted to immerse myself in some sewing to unwind. I'm still on my 'learning new things' project so I thought I'd tackle some courthouse steps - using Kim's really great tutorial.
I wasn't really too taken with my first effort:

I think I was too distracted thinking about construction and wasn't really thinking about the fabric. Not such a great idea to have the centre all the same colour. The second one I liked a bit better:

I'm not convinced courthouse steps are for me. Maybe they will grow on me. Hmmmmm.

In other news we had our first AMQG meeting of the year last night. We have a new challenge: Make a NICU quilt (neonatal intensive care unit) - the only real rule is that we have to use a design or block we haven't used before. I think that might be hard for some of the more experienced quilters!