Tutorial: Double Bear Paw Block

I had some interest in a tutorial for the double bear paw blocks that I used for my big scrap quilt.  This block uses 4 bear paw blocks that have an extra black black outline, laid out traditionally with sashing and a black center square. Each individual "paw" (or quadrant) is made of scrappy squares of fabric in one color and half-square triangles.  This block is great for using up 2 1/2" and 3 1/2" scrap squares, and it's a big one: it finishes at 18 inches square.

Fabric Requirements

I used scraps for this quilt, so I'm listing the fabric requirements in terms of cut pieces needed (not yardage).

2 1/2" squares in the following colors:
4 - pink
4 - blue
4 - red
4 - green
5 - black/dark gray
20 - low volume

3 1/2" squares in the following colors:
2 - pink
2 - blue
2 - red
2 - green
12 - low volume
20 - black/dark gray

Making the Paw Quadrants
To make individual paws you will need to make half-square triangle blocks from both low volume fabrics + black, and black + featured color (here that is blue) using the 3 1/2" squares of fabric.

For making half-square triangles, I use the following method:
1. Place the fabrics that you are going to use in your block right-sides together.
2. Draw a line diagonally across the paired fabrics from one corner to the opposite
3. Sew 1/4" on both sides of the line you have just drawn
4. Cut along the line
5. Press the 2 blocks, and trim them down to 2 1/2" square
*Each pair of fabrics creates 2 half-square-triangle squares

For a single paw, you will need to do the above steps for 3 black/low-volume pairs (you will end up with 6 HST blocks from the 3 pairs of fabric), and two blue/black pairs of fabric.

Layout your 2 1/2" colored squares and half-square-triangle squares as shown above and assemble paw. Then repeat this process for 3 more paw blocks of different colors (here I used pink, red, and green).

Assembling the full block

1. Sew four sets of 4 low-volume 2 1/2" squares together to make the sashing sections.

2. Sew the pink paw and the blue paw to each side of one piece of low-volume sashing. Then sew the green paw and the red paw to the other 4-block piece of low-volume sashing.

3. Sew the last two sections of sashing to a black 2 1/2" square as shown below.

4. Lay all of your pieces out as shown above and sew the last piece of sashing (9 square long with a black center) to the two sets of paws.

Voila! You now have an 18" square double bear paw block. Congratulations!

For my quilt, I made 16 of these blocks and laid them out four rows across and four down. I also added sashing of 2 1/2" low volume squares in between each set of paws, and capped it all off with a boarder around the quilt top that was two 2 1/2" squares wide. For more information on my quilt and additional pics, click here.