Here’s a free hand embroidery pattern for you, doodled up over the weekend. It is a slightly altered version of a design from an old book – resource below!

The embroidery pattern come about like this…

Step back to my childhood with me! Memorial Day weekend transports me to childhood. Those three day weekends at the beginning and end of the summer – Memorial Day and Labor Day, respectively – were reserved for certain family rituals.

And while most people were beginning or ending the summer with picnics and cook-outs, or enjoying the first or last summer fling of camping by the lake, or lining streets for parades while slurping snow cones or dissolving into sticky messes of cotton candy – not us! No, no! We had our own unique family ritual.

It was called “Cleaning the Garage,” and while it’s a family joke now, it has become a deep-seated kind of urge. Memorial Day weekend comes around, and I feel compelled to clean the garage.