Moving on...

The last of the blocks have been quilted. Now I am moving on to the borders.

Usually I put just a one inch inner border and only quilt in the ditch on both sides. This time I used an inch and a half strip and thought it needed a bit more quilting.

Since the blocks are eight inches, I decided to draft a simple pattern I could quilt in a single line all the way around, divided in two inch segments. This is what I came up with. I had planned to melt the plastic template with my soldering iron but I have no idea where it has gone, and while I was lookin for my wood burning tool, I spied my proxon router. I can't say it worked perfectly, as some areas of the stencil are a bit rough and hard on my lead pencil, but it works well enough.

Now one long border is done. Turning the corner with three to go.

The silkworms are a bit of a distraction. about 60 more have hatched out today. I think last year I ended up with about 80 or so and now the number is over 200. These are going to be a challenge to feed if they all survive. The biggest task is moving them one-by-one to fresh leaves with a paintbrush. It is going to be a few weeks before they can manage on their own, and several instars before they are big enough to find and move by hand. I remember once I ordered 100 eggs from a breeder and they sent some kind of food that resembled hot dogs. The instructions said that once they switch to real leaves, they will not go back. I imagine that places that raise them for the silk must use that kind of food, because I can't imagine feeding thousands of silkworms in such a labor intensive way. Just think back to the days of the "silk road"! To think people back then could raise enough for making fabric! Must have kept them safe inside without the threat of a virus.