Staycation Day 4...Frustration!

Well today was pretty much unproductive (and yes, it's still early in the day, but I need advice before I can do more because I am just so frustrated!)

I am stuck on my landscape quilt.  The next step is to sandwich it up and start quilting all over (I decided to skip the machine embroidery step since I'm not thread painting).  But before I do that I need to figure out the border situation.

I want a border for this quilt.  I think a border ties a neat bow on it, plus provides a really great frame that bits of the picture can sort of leak onto.  I love quilts that extend out onto the border in little ways, it just makes the quilt feel alive.

For example, check out this quilt from PIQF (sorry, I didn't get the artist's name, but she was from Australia and had a special exhibition at the show).  The leaves extend onto the frame (I think they were actually three dimensional too!)

My snowy mountains have no sky behind them.  I figured they could be the part that extended out of the picture and onto the border.  This would also emphasize how tall Denali is, since it extends even beyond the frame of the quilt!

However, when I measured those mountain tops, my border would have to be about 5 inches wide since the mountain tops slope so much from their lowest point to their highest point.  This is just too big of a border.

Okay, instead I figured I would do a little arched border over the top of the quilt, so the mountains can extend onto it but it doesn't need to be so big.

I cut my template arch out of paper.

Now, how do I actually piece an arch?  I have no idea!!!  Either I cut it out of a really big piece of fabric, or I could attempt to paper piece it based on that arch I just cut out of paper.  I haven't paper pieced in years though...

Well the next dilemma, even if I can figure out how to make an arch, is color.  I liked a red piece but don't have enough.  So then I was thinking about splicing together a bunch of reds/pinks probably just in wonky slices so I don't have to worry about making them look perfect for the arch.

My boyfriend thinks these colors might be too strong.  I think he's probably right but I don't know what colors to use.  The most annoying thing was I brought this to the quilt store with me today to figure it out and then got so distracted buying quilting threads that I forgot to look for a border fabric.  And the quilt store is a long drive away, so I don't really want to go back soon.

I also have a whole lot of this totally gorgeous fabric, but it has nothing to do with the design.

One alternative is no border at all.  But then I would have to sew my binding on over the very wobbly tips of the mountain which would cut them off and be hard to sew.

What colors would you use for the border?  What do you think about the arch?  Any easy ways to piece it?