Loving your ideas!
Tartan, I am not sure I know what you mean by a cheater strip, but after reading Jennifer's comment, i think I have an idea. if I put a small "cheater" in the center of the border (pink black pink) that is equal to the width of my added borders, that would flatten out the look of that particular chain block, which I think I am okay with, if i make it a consistent feature in the center of all the borders. however, that would throw off how the points line up and "point" to the next block underneath it. not sure how that would look visually... if not satisfactory, I think I may have to play around with Wesing/Gay's ideas
I do like Barb's idea, too, and think it would work well, but unfortunately I do not have enough of any of the ivory fabric to make that happen. These were all miscellaneous pieces from my stash and I don't want to go out and buy more of something different, I think it would be too obvious.
Thanks again for helping me think outside the box!