July 6, 2007

  • Whew, has it
    really been this long.

    I must be a busy
    lady.



    This July, the
    children and I will be holding a Lemonade Strand to benefit Homeless Children
    and the Emergency Women’s shelter downtown. There was a recent article in the
    Herald Leader about the Shelter, conveniently followed by an advertisement for
    the first annual Lemon Aid Days fund-drive. I figured even though Georgia is
    little, she might enjoy doing a lemonade stand. She is very industrious and
    energetic. So we registered.

    Website: http://www.lemonaiddays.org/index.htm

     

    It took a while to
    explain homelessness to my three year old, what a concept, right? She really could
    not understand why anyone would want to sleep under the trees in the park when
    it rained.  I tried to explain that it is
    not something that people want to do but rather have to do.  I told her how some families have no food and
    no toys and how the families have to go to nice places like the shelter to take
    showers and get dinner for free.

     

    So 4th
    of July was the kick off day for the lemonade stand. We set up in front of the neighborhood
    pool. It was not the smartest thing as everyone was downtown for the 4th
    celebration.  We set up in the street
    behind the Volvo. The park would not allow us to set up on their property
    because of liability reasons. Damn lawyers/chronic sue’rs take the fun out of
    things sometimes. I thought about bucking the system and setting up in the park
    anyway, but Georgia
    is definitely too young for that lesson.  I mean really do you think they would fine us?
    “Mommy and daughter fined for selling lemonade to benefit homeless kids”, I can
    just see it in the paper now.

    We set up in the
    street. After an hour with no business, I sent Georgia up to the pool entrance to
    drum up some customers. I had my eye on her the whole time.  I could see her talking to the lifeguards,
    then she turns around and starts yelling to me. I couldn’t hear her at all, she
    was uphill from me and the wind just carried her little voice straight away.  She got frustrated and just started running
    down the hill to me. She did not stop until she was standing right next to me
    and she says, “I said, how much is it?” “25 cents” I say and off she goes,
    running back up the hill jumping over the cement drainpipe. Then she comes back
    awkwardly, with hands at her sides motioning that my plan did not work but
    still looking over her shoulder to see if anyone is coming as she comes back to
    me. The lifeguards are on her trail and she quickly snapped into gear, getting
    cups, filling them with ice and short filling them with lemonade. The life
    guards laughed and laughed. Telling me how cute she is and how we should have
    set up downtown. We were also selling watermelon and bubble gum, so I manned
    the watermelon cooler while she kept on with the cups of lemonade.  They came in pairs until all of them had made
    it down to us.

     

    We sold 11 cups of
    lemonade and 6 pieces of watermelon.

    Totaling $4.25 for
    the couple of hours we were there.

    It was a great
    day.  We plan to go out this Saturday to
    the same location with the same plan only this time in our bathing suits. It
    sure was hot!

     

    I think the
    neighbor kids will be at the stand this Saturday to help.

    And we have a date
    to set up in front of Wal-Mart at Hamburg
    on the 22nd.

     

    It was a good
    time.

    Around the house with the kids:

    One of my favorite places in the world:

    Beautiful dirty faces:

    Fun with garden gloves

    I love this smile:

    Daddy's annual bath:

    Stick yer butt out!

    Get back here boy!

    The Dessert Rose in bloom:

    Hens and Chicks in bosai pots.