Christmas in June

I finally got my hands on that Moda Blitzen I bought! I sewed up this lovely pillow:

I'm going to make a pattern for it as well....I thought I'd have more luck trying to sell my Fire & Ice pattern to distributors if I had more than one pattern. Of course, both could just flop instead :). Plus, I've been itching to make a quick project with this paper piecing pattern.

I'd show you pictures of the back, but uh, the pillow is popping out of it....I made an envelope backing and didn't actually have the correct size pillow form, so I just mercilessly shoved a slightly too large yet floppy pillow into the sham. Cuz I'm classy like that ;P.

And here are some close ups to look at the quilting:

I used a Sulky silver metallic (surprised? probably not!) and absolutely love the outcome. Very sparkly, but not scratchy (who wants a scratchy pillow?).

I quilted an all-over shell pattern in the middle patchwork area, and straight lines in the borders. You can see the back of the shells here:

It's the first time I've done this kind of quilting, and I'll definitely do it again. It was a lot of fun, though I could use a bit of practice getting myself out of corners and tight spots! It started looking suspiciously like pebbling in a few places...

As a side note, I'll need a few pattern testers - any experienced (not advanced, though, you just have to be capable of following a pattern and have some basic quilting skills) quilters willing to test this guy out? He's not written yet, but will be (hopefully) shortly!

Linking up to Link a Finish Friday and Delicately Constructed Friday.