Wow, what good luck. Like many of us, your benefactor must be a true fabricholic - in the extreme.
For a beginner (or anyone!) Ohio Star would be a good pattern. After collecting batiiks for a number of years, that's my plan :) Here's a free, relative easy pattern:
http://www.quilterscache.com/O/OhioStarBlock.html
BTW, if you haven't checked out quilterscache, it's an awesome site :thumbup: