I like the idea of doing a disappearing 9 patch. While all those squares in the Irish Chain and great when they are matched up, that can be awfully tedious when you starting out. My thought is to do something that they can do easily and it's fun. There's not so much matching and having to be conscious of where all the colors will end up. Truthfully, if an Irish Chain had been my first quilt, I probably would have gotten bored and never finished. I also agree with not pushing finishing the whole top in one weekend. If its not fun, they're probably never going to do another. There are tons of patterns that don't have lots of matching and can allow them to play with color. This is much more attractive to me.