Rita Riesebieter

Rita Jeannette Riesebieter died on October 8, 2022, after a long and satisfying life of 98 years. She was born the fourth in line of nine children on September 9, 1924, to Charles and Minnie Flynn at the home farm outside Reedsburg WI.

On September 15, 1946, she married Richard Riesebieter. Together they raised seven children, Bill, Jane, Warren, Paul, Carol, Mark, and Mary. Their family grew as the children married and had grandchildren, all who brought much joy to Rita. They are Sasha, Jessica, Nadia, Elizabeth, Jana, Jami, Maria, Anita, Ashley, Kelsey, Maia, and Cody. Rita loved and enjoyed spending time with them all. Rita’s happiness increased with the arrival of great grandchildren Henry, Elsa, Moses, Oskar, Kipling, and Mack.

Rita was preceded in death by Richard in 1994, her son Bill, her son in law Don Ellickson and his daughter Ashley, her parents and all her siblings except for Jerry.

Rita had many happy memories of family members together at the farm near DeForest and at her home in Sun Prairie. Everyone enjoyed her cooking, baking and especially her carrot cake. She loved showing hospitality to her friends and family. She loved to spend time with her siblings, Gene, Zeta, Bob and Jerry and their families at the family farm in Reedsburg and going on trips with them. She spent time travelling to visit her family in California, Ecuador, Washington State, and Cape Cod, MA. She loved going on vacations with her children and getting to spend that extra time with her grandchildren.

She loved to sew and make her own clothes, sometimes without a pattern or putting several patterns together to make an outfit. She loved looking at quilt books and going to quilt shows and making various quilt patterns as gifts to her family and friends. She then had friends over to help her put the quilts on the quilt frames and tying them. These memories gave her a lot of joy when she could no longer sew.

In the mid-1950’s Rita began studying the Bible with Jehovah’s Witnesses and learned the answers to many of her questions such as “Is hell really a place of torment and why did Adam and Eve die? Most importantly, she learned that God has a name, Jehovah, and that it was Jehovah’s purpose for obedient mankind to have the hope of living forever on a restored Paradise earth. She learned that even those who had died in the past would be resurrected back to life in Paradise. This hope of a resurrection back to earthly life gave Rita great comfort as she faced death herself.

She dedicated her life to Jehovah, and on January 26th, 1957, she was baptized as one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. From that day on and for over 65 years she did her best to be a faithful witness of her God by the life she led and to give a witness to all she could. Especially did she endeavor to set a good example for her children and friends by displaying the fruitage of God’s spirit of love, patience, kindness, helpfulness, generosity and hospitality to others. Together with these qualities she always had a good sense of humor as she enjoyed visiting with others.

We look forward to seeing our dear Rita in the paradise earth. She will undoubtedly have beautiful flower and vegetable gardens and will enjoy her many friends who will just stop by to “visit”.

The Riesebieter Family would like to thank the staff of Agrace Hospice Care for the kind and compassionate care they gave to Rita and the support they provided to the family.

Also, the family of Rita Riesebieter wishes to express their sincere gratitude to the many friends and relatives who have shown such kindness during this time of grief.

The Riesebieter Family invites you to join us in person on Saturday, October 29th at Kingdom Hall of Jehovah's Witnesses at 5475 Portage Road, Madison, WI, 53704. Visitation is from 4pm to 5pm CST. At 5:00 there will be a video movie followed by funeral talk.

The family also invites you to join us virtually for Rita's video and funeral talk on Saturday, October 29th at 5pm. The video link will open at 4pm.

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/3587089030?pwd=L1cxR2hkTXdneUVWSXpRNINPcUxEdz09

Meeting ID: 358 708 9030

Passcode: 19141919

Cress Funeral Home

1310 Emerald Terrace

Sun Prairie, Wisconsin

608-837-9054