Sunday, Music, and Raspberry Lemonade

Today is Sunday. I have a confession to make. I played my "recovering from surgery" card to the hilt and slept in. Our church starts at 8:00 am, and lucky for me, Sacrament meeting is last! So I slept till 9:15, got up and dressed, and met my boys at church. Also lucky for me, our church building is down the hill from our apartment. I know it is awful, but the thought of 3 hours of earnest "How are you feeling??"-s made my skin crawl. All of those of you who caught me and did it anyway, I love you! I really do!! :) I just feel awkward after about... twice.

Anyway. It was a lovely Sunday. A quartet of men sang "Come Come Ye Saints", one of my favorite hymns ever. They were wonderful. I would rather listen to men sing than women just about anytime. I love it when the men blow us out of the water in Relief Society... through a wall!! They went acapella on the last verse, my favorite, and my heart ached and soared at the same time, and tears came to my eyes. Hymns have a profound effect on my spirit. I can get a message in moments from a musical number that a well-prepared talk just can't quite duplicate. Not that I don't appreciate talks!! I just love music. It has always been part of me! There were songs I listened to growing up that I was determined my children would listen to AND LIKE! Lucky for me, they do. In fact, I still get choked up when they sing "... big brown beastie, big brown face, I'd rather be with you than flying through space..." My favorite song when I was a little girl, "Hey and Away We Go" by Mike Oldfield, about riding horses (my favorite animal).

I still listen to loud crazy music, and dance with my boys. I turn my 'Singing' playlist up and sing as loud and as hard as I can, to Celine Dion and Josh Groban and Moulin Rouge (boy, can Ewan McGregor sing or what?!) and Hayley Westenra (oh man, oh man...if only) until my throat gives out. In fact, I just discovered a few years ago that I hum while concentrating. I did not know this. My mom pointed it out! My boys each have their own lullaby (Baby Mine and Angel's Lullaby) and there are still a few songs I can't listen to yet, because they remind me of Autumn, my little girl who was too little to stay with us. Someday I'll be able to listen to them.

Until then I will keep singing "The Fox" (Nickel Creek) with all three of my boys, and singing hymns to my Heavenly Father, thanking him for big things like my life, my family, and little things, like Joe hiding under the table with Bracken, Stephen reading James and the Giant Peach to his brother (!!!!), and my hubby making the most delicious lemonade I've ever tasted! And on that note, I shall take an icy glass of this heavenly concoction and go sit outside.

Raspberry Lemonade with Mint
Printable Recipe

1 cup sugar
1 cup hot water
1 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice (about 10 lemons)
4 cups cold water
about 1/2 cup fresh raspberries
a sprinkling of fresh mint leaves

Mix sugar and hot water in your pitcher till sugar dissolves. Add lemon juice, water, and stir well. Add raspberries, and crush about half of them against the sides of the pitcher with your spoon. Add mint leaves, and refrigerate till chilled. YUM.

Stephen has really gotten into this food photography thing... Isn't he adorable??

Note: Make sure you use mint that looks like this:

not like the stuff I used. I don't know what it was, but it was smooth instead of bumpy and had an odd aftertaste.