Saturday, April 30, 2011

Hospitality is...Lemonade



Have you ever walked into somebodys home...even to quickly drop off something...and been offered a drink of water or a cup of tea? It is the most welcome and kind guesture anybody could offer a guest. Even if you are on the run, it is the thought that counts! It is one way of saying: "Stay. I care about you. How are you?"

When you have guests in your home...YES, even family!!!! It is your chance to comfort and to offer hospitality. It is your opportunity to love and to listen. I know. We all have days where we are running a million directions, trying to balance family, friends, sports, laundry, grocery shopping, work, dental appointments and everything else, but it is vital that we stay in the WORD so that at any given time, we are able to offer comfort to those who enter our homes...even if we feel like we have nothing to offer!
Remember, sometimes we just need to listen!

Here is a little assignment for us. I am not telling you what to do...but I want you to see how great it feels to do something very simple in offering the next person who graces your home with a drink, okay? What do you think? Are you up for it? I'm doing the same thing!

Let's make it fun! Since picnic season is here...it will serve two purposes.

READY?

Now remember, we are anticipating. That means we are planning for and looking forward to someone dropping in. SO, since my dishwasher always seems to be full...and not everybody likes drinking water or lemonade out of champagne flutes...I love to fill glass jars. {My friends always give me grief for my glass jars, but hey...!} Mason jars are great or you may recycle other glass jars, too. Go ahead and fill them with ice water or whatever else you would like.

A half gallon of Newman's Own Lemonade is less than $2 and it fills about 7 pint jars. I fill the jars with ice, top it off with lemonade, add a slice of lemon and a sprig of mint {thank you, Jess!} I screw the lids on and put them all in a glass 9X13 pan, so they are ready to go. This eliminates sticky bottoms all over the fridge.




Have your children help you with this. It is a great way of letting them know that you will be exercising "hospitality" to your guests by offering them a drink. This is the perfect time to explain hospitality to them. They will become hospitality minded very quickly!

Having these drinks ready will also be great to grab before sports activities picnics or for your children to offer their friends. Another thing I do...which saves on glasses is to have punched tags {I make them out of scrap paper!} available...that way, when your children are done with their drinks, they can mark them with their initial or name and keep it cold in the fridge for later use!







SO, if it is water, lemonade or iced tea you will be serving...the most important thing is that you will be SERVING, comforting and caring!

"Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God."

2 Corinthians 1:3-4

IF YOU LIVE IN THE AREA: I will be offering a HOMEMAKING 101 CLASS on Thursday, MAY 26th from 7-9. The class is $20 and I have four spots left. The topic for the evening is PICNIC PACKIN'. I am really excited about this. It will be a fun evening of ideas, snacks, recipes and a couple of drawings! Please e-mail me for the details! Hope you can join us!


15 comments:

  1. Great post! And I love the idea of using pint jars for drinks!!! We are having a party this summer and I am going to use those rather than paper cups!!!! Thanks for the inspiration!

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  2. What a wonderful post about hospitality, comfort and compassion. Thank you for the assignment!
    xoxo

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  3. This is just lovely! I really love this and there is nothing more refreshing than a cold glass of lemonade:-)

    http://foodfashionandflow.blogspot.com/

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  4. How lovely, I would feel honored to be offered this.

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  5. This is a beautiful and inspiring post on the simplicity of hospitality and kindness. I love the idea itself and will have it ready to go. It's still a little chilly in upstate NY most days so we're still sipping hot teas. But, in the meantime, I'll get some jars ready!

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  6. i love this idea! i don't really have guests, but this posts makes me want to have someone over just to serve them lemonade! : )

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  7. How perfect!

    Silly question, but will the ice stay ice in there or will it melt?

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  8. Thank you everybody! I knew you would have fun with this. Keep me posted on how it goes.

    Alison...we keep our fridge really cold and it is perfect...our ice stays frozen. If it does melt a bit, it should still be fine, because the lemonade is pretty sweet.

    Carmar...I hope you have someone over to enjoy a glass of lemonade. If not, you and you son could make lemonade and take it to someone!

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  9. Cute idea and great photos! It's so nice to meet you. I dropped by from Raising Homemakers. I really enjoyed your homemaking post. BTW, just a thought, but have you tried making your own lemonade with lemon juice and sugar? It tastes so fresh!! And not nearly so sugary. We have a family of five (originally seven but two are grown), and have been living on the same income for many years. We discovered this as a way to save money only to find out that the lemonade tastes just fabulous! We buy large lemon juice in bulk from our bulk outlet store (Sam's club).

    Love your jar idea and the pretty tags. (PS. noticed the nice label on the fridge shelf. Great idea too!) :o)

    Blessings,
    Donna from Comin' Home

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  10. Love the jars and pretty tags, what a nice idea to be anticipating guests.

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  11. What a cute idea! So funny, but we also use mason jars to drink from. I had attempted canning several years ago and didn't keep up with it. So I decided to put the jars to use. Although, I did not keep my lids. I wasn't using them, and you know how us organizers are about not keeping things we don't use. lol
    Thanks so much for linking up to my Organizing Mission link party!

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  12. I love how you can turn almost anything into something so cute and crafty!! I am looking forward to some sunny weather and a nice tall glass of lemonade!! Thanks for linking up to Foodie Friday.

    Oh, and if you haven’t done so already - don’t forget to pop on over to Little Brick Ranch to enter the Joey Totes Earth Day GIVEAWAY!!!

    **Bloggy Tip of The Day - Make sure you have an email address associated with your profile to make it easier for people to reply to your comments!! :) **

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  13. What a wonderful idea and an easy way to teach hospitality to our kids. Love it!

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  14. Hi! I'm having a linky party called A Themed Baker's Sunday where this week's theme is LEMONS! Time is running out though! and I would love for you to link this recipe or another lemony deliciousness! Can't Wait!
    http://cupcakeapothecary.blogspot.com/2011/04/themed-bakers-sunday-2.html
    Alyssa

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  15. What a neat post. I love the creativity of this project plus the hospitality aspect of it. Wonderful job!

    Emily
    Deviantly Domesticated Team
    http://stephaniehillberry.com

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