Fresh Cherry Limeade!

Around our house, Mondays are special.

Wade is off work (usually) on Monday. So we have breakfast all together, and usually I make something nice for dinner.

I like to make Monday night dinner special, so I will usually make someone's favorite dish, or use candles, or we'll eat outside or something like that. (Do you do things like that in your family? Kids- and husbands- LOVE when regular dinner feels "special", so it's worth spending some time coming up with fun ideas!)

Last night, I made a pitcher of fresh cherry limeade, and served it at dinner! Then kids loved it, and so did Wade and I!

I added a small bottle of sparkling water to mine, so it was sparkling cherry limeade! Nicholas was so excited when I put this on the table at dinner!!

Here's what you need!

~1 1/2 cups fresh lime juice (That was about 8 limes for me)

~1 1/2 cups sugar

~1 1/2 cups water

~2 Tb. grenadine syrup (it's by the alcohol mixing stuff at the market)

~5 cups water (I used 2 cups sparkling and 3 cups plain water)

~maraschino cherries and lime slices for the pitcher or glasses

Juice the limes and set that aside:

Then combine the 1 1/2 cups of water and sugar and bring to a boil in a pan and stir until the sugar is dissolved. What I did at this point was to put the lime juice, grenadine syrup, and the sugar water in a pitcher and place it in the fridge until dinner time. Then, right before serving, I added the additional 5 cups of water, the cherries and lime slices, and some crushed ice.

We have 4 people in our family and there was plenty for one meal. If you have a lot more in your family, you may want to make double.

I got this recipe from http://www.foodgawker.com/

Oh, and we had the make ahead Calzone for dinner last night- they were AWESOME!!!!!!!!!! Here's the link to the recipe: Make Ahead Calzone. You should totally make a batch- it was really nice to be able to just pull them out of the freezer and bake them. :)

Have a great day!