My search is for a children’s book, probably in the 1970-1997 time frame.  The book was a time traveling mystery involving a shy, loner-type girl who escapes to sit in a nearby very old tree.  On rare occasions, while in the tree, the girl time travels back to colonial times where she meets two girl friends in the tree.  At this point, the tree is much younger.  The colonial friends remark about the traveler’s shoes and how different they are.  The shoes are modern sneakers.  On a subsequent meet up, the time traveler brings an alphabet book which shows a picture of a giraffe listed for the letter “G.”  The colonials have never seen a giraffe.  At some point, the time traveling stops and the loner girl wonders what became of her colonial friends.  On a library day, the loner looks up colonial samplers.  She finds the sampler her colonial friends made when they couldn’t find her in the tree anymore.  The antique sampler is of the alphabet with a giraffe for the “G” letter and a stitched picture of the modern girl with her sneakers!  The title of this book is not known to me and i remember it had nothing to do with the possible subject matter of the book; therefore, not colonial samplers, mystery, time travel, etc.  The author was a woman, but I don’t know the name.  Please help locate the title and author of this book.  I am sure my two grand daughters would love this book, which  my daughter read years ago in Virginia.  Thank you!

I read this book sometime in 80’s or early 90s. A young girl recently graduated from high school or boarding school is invited to spend the summer before college with a distant cousin who lives in an old house somewhere in the Midwest. I believe the girl is recently orphaned and has been left financially set. She starts to hear a piano playing at night and when she dons an Edwardian dress one night, She meets and falls in love with a young man from the 1910’s who loves ragtime music. I can’t remember if they meet through time slip or if he is a ghost. When she finds out he left for Europe on the eve of World War I, she decides to delay college and travel to Europe to find out what happened to him or perhaps find him. I remember her wearing bell bottoms. Been looking for this book for a long time and would appreciate any leads.