Time to Kick It Into High Gear

Well, today is the day that I am kicking things into high gear.  Already this morning, I emailed the Kansas City Star marketing person, the person in charge of organizing Quilt Market, and the person in charge of books.

So, I now have ordered copies of my book to resell!  Wahoo!  They'll be arriving soon.

I wrote all the things that I'm working on to promote my book or am planning to the marketing person.

The Quilt Market person already got back to me to let me know that she will be sending out an invitation to do a Schoolhouse lecture and a booth book signing.

Okay, so it begins...

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Yesterday, I went to an interesting antique shop in Harrisville, PA which used to be a hardware store.  It was huge and had so much stuff -- items were stacked and piled everywhere from floor to ceiling.  I did find this quilt, though.

 

So far this quilt is a puzzle to me.  The black sqaures and pieced triangle squares (which looks like the Little Cedar Tree block) are BLACK SILK.  The lighter fabric squares and rectangles at top and bottom (which is a brownish green)  are also SILK or maybe TAFETTA (I'm guessing they were once a darker green, perhpas poison green?).  The block arrangement is unusual as are the colors used.  The border is a dark blue green (maybe also poison green?) and it is somewhat coarse, maybe LINEN?  It is about 74x81.  It has a pale green silk ribbon or tape binding on two sides and a black silk ribbon or tape on the other two sides.  The quilt is hand pieced and quilted.  Hand quilting at 8 full stitches to the inch and includes both crosshatching and double diagonal lines in BLACK THREAD.

 

As you see, it definitely has some condition issues, shattered silk, tattered binding/edge, a few holes, etc.

 

But what really makes my heart go thumpity thump is the backing fabric!  It is glorious and near perfect, see below.  Although it's hard to see -- the colors are that distinctive greyish-blue, gold/brown, and tan.

 

 

 

My gut tells me this a very special quilt.  Sadly, I have no information about it.  I feel that this is an early quilt, perhaps pre-Civil War.  I am going to consult with some quilt expert friends and I'll post an update when I know more.