L is for Lemons

The lemons hang fragrant on the tree in our front yard.


The branches are bowed with the weight of the sun-filled fruit.

When the sun comes up and the sky glows pink and peach, the tree is luminous...like liquid gold poured onto shiny green leaves.

Our neighbors all share in the bounty of the lemon tree. We make pies and lemon bars and lemonade and freeze the rind and juice against the summer when all the luscious fruits whither away in the heat.

And each year at Christmas I gift my friends with boxes of fragrant yellow orbs strewn with red and white peppermint candies...a gift sure to bring a smile to snow and ice-bound loved ones.


In the spirit of the season, I would like to do a little lemon giveaway today for you, my Alphabe-Thursday friends. I will choose several names from those linked to the meme for this week. Please let me know in your comment if you would like to receive lemons. I will draw the names on Saturday and get them mailed out the same day, priority, so you will have them to scent your home with the fragrance of citrus, sunshine from an Arizona friend.

Thanks for visiting my Alphabe-Thursday "L" post.

To visit other L links, just click here.

Missed opportunity.

Geez. What is wrong with me?

...

OK. Please, please stop now. It was just a rhetorical question and you truly weren't supposed to start naming things.

BUT...

I have totally missed the boat on a HUGE business opportunity here and I'm pretty annoyed at myself at the moment. No, it's not chicken or dough sitting...

Really, it's not.

It's...a lemonade making company.


I'm serious.

Don't people buy a lot of bottled lemonade?

Hey! That was not a rhetorical question. You are supposed to answer to save me time googling.

Geez. Keep up here, please.

Even though you didn't answer the non-rhetorical question about bottled lemonade, I'm pretty sure people do drink a lot of bottled lemonade.

AND...

My life for the past few weeks has been loaded with Hallmark moments suitable for the adorable phrase, "When life hands you lemons, make lemonade."


So, I'm thinking...

Since life seems to be in the mood to inundate me with citrus fruit, I should totally take advantage of it and start a business.

Don't you think this is a great idea?

I know a lot of you are being inundated with 'lemonade making moments', too. We'll go in together with this thing.

Between all of us we should be able to supply the entire universe with lemonade three times a day!

AND...

Because I'm really swamped starting the lemonade making business, I must apologize yet again for being absent from your blogs and replying to e-mails. If you totally need to get in touch with me, (to tell me I won your $10,000 giveaway or something like that!) just put URGENT in the subject line of an e-mail!

OK. Off to fire up my industrial size juicer.

If I wasn't so worn out from 'lemonade making moments', I think I'd be a teensy bit more excited about a lemonade making business!

Sigh...

And on a subject I cannot segue into this post with any natural flow whatsoever... Momma Hen is having the worlds cutest Boo Banner Giveaway. Even though it greatly reduces my chances of winning (mwahahahahahaha!) click here to go visit her post. It is really a cute, cute banner for a clever school bake-sale. And she's mighty sweet as well...in a non lemon-y sort of way! (I did it! I segued! I love it when that happens!)

Prelude to a Giveaway

...so...I think it's time for a little Christmas giveaway. And it is going to be a something a little different.

I wrote this little story some years back and it seems appropriate right now...during this season of giving and sharing and offering brightness where there is only gray.

Tomorrow I will post the giveaway. And after you read this try and think of someone who could use a little extra sunshine in their life right. Tomorrow I will tell you what I'm thinking.
She pressed her sweet, little nose against the frosted window pane. Through the fog of her breath she looked at the snow frosted street…standing on tiny tip-toes to catch a glimpse of her Mother.

Oh, but it was cold here. How the little girl missed her home far away. She remembered playing on the playground in the desert winter sun, making orange juice for breakfast from sun-kissed fruit and picking big bouquets of roses to grace their holiday Christmas table.

But fate and sadness had brought her and her Mother far from the warmth of the low desert on this bleak and blow-y wintry Christmas. From the bedroom door she heard a series of coughs and she quickly left her chilly post at the window to hurry into that darkened room.

Her Gwams lay on the bed covered in many quilts and surrounded by pictures and books and mementos of her life.

“Gwams, can I get you something?” the little girl asked. Her Gwams lay pale and still, her once plump faced thinned and lined by some horrible sickness that all the adults whispered about. No-one told the little girl but she knew something very bad was happening…. Something that might take her beloved Gwams from her forever. When the little girl glanced again at her Gwams dear face she saw she had returned to sleep. The little girl pulled the covers up around her Gwams shoulders and quietly left the room.

Just then her Mother came through the door. The snow glistened on her hood and her booted feet left a little pile of slushy snow on the mat by the door. Her Mothers face was flushed from the cold and she looked very excited.

“Look, sweetie, look what came in the mail!” Her Mother exclaimed and she showed her little daughter a small box postmarked Arizona.

Oh my! What excitement! The little girl laughed and clapped her hands and jumped up and down in her joy. Her Mother didn’t even take off her boots but left atrail of damp tracks into the kitchen where she grabbed a small paring knife to cut the tape on the box.

The little girls excitement was great and she watched as her Mother carefully cut the tape and opened the box. Oh my! What was this? A smell the little girl had almost forgotten. The fragrance of lemons and sunshine and home rose from the box and the little girl and her Mother gazed in amazement at the beautiful gleam of yellow lemons, glowing like captured sunshine.

Mother dumped the box onto the table and the sunshine spilled into the room, spreading fragrance and light into the chilly air. A few leaves had been left on some of the fruit and the green seemed especially vibrant.

The little girl carefully picked the most perfect lemon and tiptoed quietly into her Gwam’s room. Very gently she laid it on the pillow next to her dear Gwams tired, grey face. Still asleep, her Gwams turned her head slightly and inhaled the fragrance of sunshine…. a gentle smile lit her face as she continued her peaceful slumber.