Bear Paws - the December block

First things first - a big apology for the lateness of this month's bee. This apology is coming to you straight from the jaws of sinus hell, my 5 year-old and I have been having a 'who can sound the most like Darth Vader' competition all week and it's rather slowed things down.

Given that it's so miserable and cold at the moment I've started thinking about next summer already. We are going to have our very first family camping trip, and I'd really like to have a camp-fire quilt to take with us. my grandmother Norah, used to make us camping blankets when I was little and I'd like to keep the tradition going.

I've gone for Bear Paws for my block, because I love the simplicity Bear Paw quilts. I've chosen Kona Charcoal for the background and a selection of flame coloured batiks for the paws. Batiks are a big step out of my comfort zone for me, but nothing else quite had that flame-like quality.

I've used this pattern from Quilt.com to give a 14" finished block. I will say that although the pattern is pretty easy to follow I would go easy on the seam allowances. I found my HSTs unaccountably smaller than the patterns until I decided to give a fairly scant 1/4" seam.

I hope you all have a wonderful Holiday season, please don't feel obliged to get these blocks back to me quickly. Everyone is so busy at this time of year and I won't be stitching it up until the spring.

A very Merry Christmas and all the best for 2013 to all of you!
Helen
x