The Check's In the Mail

With today's electronic banking when one may so easily set up routine automatic bill payments, does anyone still write personal checks to pay their monthly bills?  Yes, thankfully, the owner of the Hometowne Quilt Auctions does!

Quilt Receiving Center of Hometowne Quilt Auctions

Years ago as a single careerwoman, handling my own finances, I would routinely write a personal check to my landlord, the gas & electric companies, and the bank to pay my monthly bills for my apartment rental, my utilities and my car loan. During those early, lean years, I lived from paycheck to paycheck. with little money leftover to stash in savings, once my monthly living expenses were paid. 

In fact, sometimes I would write those checks and mail them off, knowing that there wasn't enough money in my bank account to honor the checks I'd just written.  But I rationalized that I had a cushion of time before the vendors would receive my checks in the mail and cash them.  Surely, I would receive my paycheck before then, enabling me to rush to the bank and deposit it, before the vendors had time to do the same with my insufficiently-but-now-sufficiently-covered checks. 

Inwardly, I'd tell myself in the interim, "Don't worry!  The check's in the mail."

Last week I was on the receiving end of this payment chain.  There, sitting in my mailbox Monday afternoon was a check made payable to me for the sale of two quilts I'd made and sold at July 17th auction held by Hometowne Quilt Auctions in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.  (A photo of my work might still be seen on the web site of Hometowne Quilt Auctions under the caption, "Quilt 399, Whimsical windmill Log Cabin with pillowcase and sham, 64"x87" in the first column, fourth row down.")

A year ago I retired from my career as a librarian to accompany my husband in his final career move, a transition from an FBI field office back to Headquarters in Washington, D.C.  One of my goals for this first year of retirement was to finish a quilting project that had gone wildly off track by using the fabric to make two twin-sized comforters.  (For the story behind that derailed quilt project, take a look at my "Wildly Quilting" post, dated July 15, 2011.)

During this past year as I handquilted those two quilt tops I'd pieced together last July, I tried to figure out how I could sell them to raise money for my daughter Jillian who annually raises her own support for her position as a staff member with an interdenominational Christian organization called The Navigators. (My August 4, 2011 post, "From T-Town to T-Town," describes the beginning of Jillian's Navigators ministry to college students at the University of Alabama.)  Should I sell the quilts on eBay and lose some of the profit in shipping fees? Find a quilt store owner willing to display them on consignment?  Ask the director of a local charity, for whom I volunteer, if she'd allow me to raffle the quilts off (and divert the proceeds from her charity to The Navigators, a very unethical proposal!) at the charity's Spring Silent Auction?

Instead of choosing any of those avenues, I searched Google and found Hometowne Quilt Auctions, a small business located in Lancaster County, PA, that holds bimonthly quilt auctions six times a year.

Firing off an email to the owner, I asked what his terms were if I listed my two quilts with their matching pillowcases and shams in one of his upcoming auctions.  When I received his favorable reply, my next dilemma was figuring out a cost-efficient way to drop off my items at the receiving center for his business. Shipping them by FedEx was not my preferance since that would cut into the proceeds I might earn from their sale. 

Then my husband mentioned that he had to travel to Philadelphia on business. "Could I go, too, and play tourist in Philly while you work? And," I asked, "could we rent a car as our means of transportation and take the back roads through Lancaster County to get there?" "Yes," he replied to both questions. What a great guy!

Tim at Valley Forge where we later stopped on our way to Philadelphia

And what a beautiful road trip it was through the gently rolling hills of farm land north of Baltimore, across the Susquehanna River and on into Pennsylvania Dutch territory where German immigrants, attracted by William Penn's promise of freedom of religion, settled in the 18th century.

Hometowne Quilt's receiving center is locatd at 1045 Newport Road, Manheim, PA.

When we arrived at the receiving center address for Hometowne Quilt Auctions, we discovered a tidy farmstead with signs directing us to the rear entrance of the barn.  Entering the barn, we found a huge room where several friendly Amish ladies were busily measuring quilts laid out on sawhorse tables while others listed newly consigned items into the July 17th auction catalog. 

A room in the rear of this barn acts as the auction's receiving center.

One of the Amish ladies hurried over to help us.  She asked me several questions: "What title did I want to give my work when it was listed in the auction catalog?  Did I want my set of quilts to be sold as one unit or in two separate lots?  What address should they mail my payment check to?"

While I liked the thought inherent in that last inquiry, I also had questions: 
How much do you think I will earn from the sale of these two quilts?  Rarely do any of our consigned quilts sell for under $150 was her answer.

What is your company's consignment percentage?  Twenty percent of the sale price is kept by our company as our consignment fee.

May I list a minimum sales price in the auction catalog that the auctioneer uses to begin the bidding?"  No, Hometowne Auctions does not allow the consigner to set a low bid.

How well attended are your auctions?  Our auctions rival the largest quilt sales in the world.  Tourists visiting Lancaster County as well as quilt buyers from across the United States, Canada, Australia and the United Kingdom attend our auctions.

What happens if no one buys my work?  Do I need to make arrangements to return to retrieve these quilts, if they don't sell?  Everything sells, even if the bid drops to a very low price.  (Gulp!)

Finally reassured that, yes, this was the right venue for converting these quilts to cash, I surrendered them into her care and mentally kissed them goodbye.  After working on them for an entire year, I felt like I was saying goodbye to treasured friends.

Bidding the Amish goodbye, Tim and I drove on towards Philadelphia.  Yet, when we saw the exit sign for Valley Forge, we decided to visit the encampment where 11,000 tired, cold and ill-equipped colonial soldiers under the command of General George Washington camped during the brutal winter of 1777-1778.

With only an hour until closing, Tim & I hurriedly toured the Valley Forge Visitor Center.

Then, we returned to our rental car to drive the loop through the Valley Forge Historical Park.

Colonial soldiers slept twelve to a cabin in four-hastily-thrown-together-three-tiered bunks.
Did any of them sleep under quilts carried from home, I wondered?

In October 1910, the U.S. Congress approved the construction of the National Memorial Arch to commemorate the 1777-1778 winter encampment of General George Washington and Continental Army at Valley Forge.

Naked and starving as they are
We cannot enough admire
The incomparable Patience and Fidelity
of the Soldiery
–George Washington

Statue of General Anthony Wayne

General George Washington relied upon Wayne during the encampment to recruit replacement soldiers and provide clothing for ill-clad troops, saying,

"In Wayne the spark of daring might flame into rashness, but it was better to have such a leader and occasionally to cool him to caution than forever to be heating the valor of men who feared they would singe the plooms in battle."

Tim steps inside one of the Commander-In-Chief's Guard Huts at Valley Forge.

General Washington's Headquarters at Valley Forge

David Potts' House at Valley Forge
Originally owned by William Penn's daughter Letitia Penn Aubrey and her husband William Aubrey, the land where Valley Creek empties into the Schuylkill River was purchased by the Potts, a prominent Quaker family, who built and operated an ironworks forge here that provide military munitions for colonial troops.  The British raided the area and burned the Potts' forge, known as Valley Forge, on September 19, 1777.

Statue of Baron Von Steuben
Baron Von Steuben arrived in Valley Forge on February 23, 1778 to volunteer his services as a military officer.  His training of Washington's troops is credited with their emergence from the encampment in June 1778 as a cohesive and disciplined fighting force. 

The Washington Memorial Chapel at Valley Forge

Soldiers who served in the Continental Army were recruited by the colonies which struggled to provide these militiamen with food, clothing and pay. 

"It is not the meaning nor within the compass of this Address, to detail the hardships peculiarly incident to our Service, or to discribe the distresses which in several instances have resulted from the extremes of hunger and nakedness, combined with the rigors of an inclement season. Nor is it necessary to dwell on the dark side of our past affairs. Every American Officer and Soldier must now console himself for any unpleasant circumstances which may have occurred, by a recollection of the uncommon scenes in which he has been called to act, no inglorious part; and the astonishing Events of which he has been a witness--Events which have seldom, if ever before, taken place on the stage of human action, nor can they probably ever happen again. For who has before seen a disciplined Army formed at once from such raw Materials? Who that was not a witness could imagine, that the most violent local prejudices would cease so soon, and that Men who came from the different parts of the Continent, strongly disposed by the habits of education, to dispise and quarrel with each other, would instantly become but one patriotic band of Brothers? Or who that was not on the spot can trace the steps by which such a wonderful Revolution has been effected, and such a glorious period put to all our Warlike toils?

It is universally acknowledged that the enlarged prospect of happiness, opened by the confirmation of our Independence and Sovereignty, almost exceeds the power of description. And shall not the brave Men who have contributed so essentially to these inestimable acquisitions, retiring victorious from the Field of War, to the Field of Agriculture, participate in all the blessings which have been obtained? In such a Republic, who will exclude them from the rights of Citizens and the fruits of their labours? In such a Country so happily circumstanced the persuits of Commerce and the cultivation of the Soil, will unfold to industry the certain road to competence. To those hardy Soldiers, who are actuated by the spirit of adventure, the Fisheries will afford ample and profitable employment, and the extensive and fertile Regions of the West will yield a most happy Asylum to those, who, fond of domestic enjoyment are seeking for personal independence. Nor is it possible to conceive that any one of the United States will prefer a National Bankrupcy and a dissolution of the Union, to a compliance with the requisitions of Congress and the payment of its just debts--so that the Officers and Soldiers may expect considerable assistance in recommencing their civil occupations from the sums due to them from the Public, which must and will most inevitably be paid."

~ Washington's Farewell Address to the Army

November 2, 1783

Rocky Hill, near Princeton, New Jersey

Certainly, none of the brave and steadfast soldiers in General Washington's Continental Army ever received a check in the mail for their military service!