And so it was that when she was ten years old her grandmother brought her into the dawdy house in Apple Creek, Ohio, where she had lived since Grossdaadi’s death.

“Kumme, Jerusha,” she said, “it is time for you to learn to quilt.  See here now, onest.”  And she began to teach Jerusha.

“The first thing that needs to be done before any quilt is made is to decide which kind of design we will use,” she said to Jerusha.  “We must know in our heart what the quilt will look like when it is finished, because it can take anywhere from four hundred to six hundred hours of time to put together just one quilt.  You can sew the most perfect stitch but without a good design it means nothing.  If the design is not pleasing to the eye from the start, that’s a whole lot of wasted time, and to waste time is to try God’s patience.”

Sitting at her grandmother’s side, she watched her sketch out what she called a “star” quilt.  The design was beautiful, but simple.  First a starburst in the center, then eight branching pillars, surrounded by another circle.  On the outside of the circle she drew more pillars that were set between the inner pillars with the outer circle separating them.

“On the tops of the pillars we will make flames of fire,” her grandmother said softly.  “They will be just like the lampstand in der Heilige Platz, where God spoke to the High Priest.”

Once the design was created, Jerusha watched as her grandmother cut the chosen pieces of fabric into perfectly matching parts.

“If the quilt is going to be even and symmetrical, the pieces must be true,” she said.

She let Jerusha try her hand, and even on her first try Jerusha cut the pieces straight and perfect.

“Ja, das is gutte,” Grandmother said.  “You will be a fine quilt maker, my girl.”

Once the pieces were cut correctly, Grandmother pieced them together with pinpoint accuracy.

“If the quilt is not aligned properly, even in just one small part, the whole thing will look off-balance and might pucker,” she told Jerusha.  “If the design is to be even and pleasing to the eye, each individual piece of fabric must be stitched together just right, in order for it to fit together properly.  You must trust your own eye and sewing skills for measurement and accuracy.  It is a gift not every quilter has.”

Over the following days as Grossmudder began to patiently open the quilting way to Jerusha, the girl felt something growing in her; the absolute certainty that God had given her an eye and a gift for this work.  As her grandmother pieced together the layers of fabric, she allowed Jerusha to help her stitch them together. First she placed the patterned top piece on a layer of batting and then sewed the whole design to a black backing piece.  Then, with the quilt stretched tightly on the quilting frame, Jerusha began to learn the even, beautiful stitch of the quilter.

“Dummel dich net,” her grandmother would say.  “Take your time, don’t hurry.”

Once when her mind wandered while she was stitching a piece, she made a mistake and went past the place where she should have stopped.

“Halt ei, sell geht su weit!” her grandmother exclaimed.  “You have gone too far. You must concentrate on what you are doing, my girl.”

Jerusha had watched with downcast eyes and a flame burning in her cheeks as her grandmother carefully removed the errant stitches.

“Never hurry, always pay attention, do the work as unto the Lord,” she told Jerusha in her gentle voice.  “You have been given a way to give back to the Lord, as he has given to you.  It is a special gift not everyone is given.  But to whom much is given, much is required.  You must always give back to God from the gift he has given you.  And there are dangers along the way.  If you become a good quilter it is quite possible for you to become arrogant, thinking that somehow you are more special than others.  That is why we put a small mistake in the quilt before we finish.  It is so that we do not make God angry with us for being too proud.”

Jerusha did not understand until many years later why she felt the small twinge of fear, the first she had ever felt, when her grandmother spoke those words.