Prominent symbols in Walker's story are the antique quilts keep by Miss Johnson, which symbolizes the family’s history or heritage in the story. The quilts “pieced by Grandma Dee and then Big Dee and then the mother” each have their own unique design. One quilt has a “Lone Star” pattern while the other has a “Walk Around the Mountain” pattern. The characters respond in two ways to their family's heritage in the story, not unlike the two uniquely patterned quilts.
The first way, Miss Johnson, the mother and Maggie the youngest daughter see their quilts and their family heritage with a colloquial naiveté saying, "These old things was just done by me and Big Dee." The quilts like the heritage they represent are things to engage with everyday as a way to affirm their worth.
The second way to respond as Dee, the eldest daughter has having passed up the opportunity to Share in the family's heritage earlier when offered a quilt claimed the quilts were "old-fashioned, out of style." Dee now returned from college only to see in the quilts an aspect of the family’s heritage as a thing of “priceless” aesthetic value, which she feels should be proudly displayed separate from her present life. At this point, Dee has changed her view of the quilts and what they stand for but sadly, she has still not fully grasp the significance of the quilts to the family.
Alice Walker has created in the story symbolic quilts out of a patchwork of cultural and historic elements. The Johnson's are divided culturally on two sides, Miss Johnson along with Maggie stand on one-side, while Dee stands on the other side. Miss Johnson and Maggie are proud of the fact that their lives intertwine with their ancestors’ culturally. “Maggie even knows how to quilt”, making her symbolically the next bearer of the family heritage. Dee's view however of her ancestor's cultural is that it is important and should be admired from a distance as a source of pride, she explains this idea when she tells her mother what she would do with the quilts, "hang them, she said", as if that was the only thing you could do with these quilts. Again, Dee reveals the gap that exists between her and her mother and her sister concerning their heritage.
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