Collection 5 - Where Did That Name Come From?

Collection 5 contains some of my favourite blocks and many were early blocks in the design and making of Raconteur. How can I tell this? By looking at the colours used. Raconteur was to be my first 'pastel' quilt. However as I progressed I decided that baby pastels were just not my style and although I attempted to still remain in the pastel range I ventured into the stronger pastels such as those used in Mums Among the Gold, Echoes and Behind Walls. So now for the origin of the names.

	Behind the Walls - doesn't each individual section remind you of someone sitting alone in a little room, locked in their own thoughts and own world. Are they all the same or just that little bit different? You will never know for certain.
	Pointing the Finger was named after a long day spent mainly in primary schools. One thing which I always found interesting when working with children from toddler stage to the end of high school was the different ways that problems were sorted. I understood little kids would cry, you ask, they tell the cause...easy peasy. High school they sort out a lot of things with their friends or by themselves. Primary school they dob... jealous about something... dob on the kid, angry with someone...dob, doing the wrong thing...dob on someone else.... the day is full of kids dobbing, which is a slang word meaning to tell on someone or point the finger.
	Gift Wrapped - don't the arrow heads remind you of that gorgeous ribbon bow that arrives upon parcels which are wrapped by someone who has a lot more skill than I do with curling ribbon. Every year at Xmas I attempt to master the curling ribbon with scissors trick... never does it look as beautiful as my expectations or someone else's effort... but I keep hoping.
	Echoes should have been called Ripples as it was named after the effect you see when dropping pebbles in the water but at the time the only word I could think of was echoes.
	Baby Blue was named because of the fabric colours. Did you realise that until recently blue wasn't always for boys and pink wasn't always for girls? The evolution of our preference for these colours for the particular sex has come about just since the first world war. Prior to that time both boys and girls wore the same crisp white dresses as girls until they were 6 or 7 years old. These colours were chosen for practicality since it was easiest to bleach everything. The bleaching rendered everything both clean and hygienic. Then pastel colours were introduced and babies were generally dressed in either. However around the time of World War I, there developed the fear that a child would grow up perverted if s/he were dressed in the 'wrong' coloured clothes and so the clothes became gender specific and with time these colours became set in stone. Research shows it could have quite easily gone the other way with pink being for boys and blue for girls. Men are gradually changing and wearing pink, particularly in Australia following the strong support from various male sporting teams for Breast Cancer Awareness, whose official colour is pink. However this has not been extended into baby's clothes.
	Mums Among the Gold - this one is a direct reference to the fabrics used. The bright pink reminded me of chrysanthemums and although not clear in the photo, the background fabric is a gold print on a white background.
	Taylor's World was named after a student that I taught and the title is from a book which her mum, Jenny, wrote about Taylor's first few years and the trials and tribulations in the family during those years. Taylor is a great kid and I enjoyed teaching her. She is someone who gives her best all of the time.