Al, What a treasure! While I do not have quite the beautiful sampler you have, I do have a couple "beauties" otherwise. I have a crazy quilt made by my great-grandmother for her hope chest, which she brought to her marriage in 1852 [she made it sometime prior to that]; I have a crocheted tablecloth made by my great-great-great grandmother who actually worked on it during her trip to the US in the 1850's [she actually has the name of the ship on which her family traveled, and the departing and arrival ports in the tablecloth! it depicts lovely sailboats and seashells throughout]; I have a china cabinet which my great-great grandmother brought with her from France, which was handmade by her grandfather, a master carpenter by trade [this piece was given an insurance replacement value at over $100,000 recently; to me it's priceless!] I am lucky to be surrounded with so many items! There are quite a few more as well, the key is to be sure and photograph and document them all well. Organize those photographs with your files, so that even should something [God forbid!] happen to the item, future generations can still enjoy and see the handiwork of these ancestors!
Cyndi

Dear Cyndi, Hi there. I enjoyed reading your post. You're right of course, these pieces that we are lucky to be left with are priceless.

I'd love to see photo/s on here at familytreecircles of your lovely heirlooms if you so desire.

Do you know that museums would love to get their hands on these things? We can share easily with photos. Many descendants aren't so lucky to have anything left of their ancestors and it gives them an idea of what life was like for their own.

What I do with all my photos is attach them electronically to the individual's name (MRIN) in my Personal Ancestral File, that way I can print out a book at a later stage for family members.

Kind regards,
Alison.