When life hands you raspberries (and lemons)

I can tell you it seems like we’ve all been handed lemons recently. Am I right? The normally sweet experiences of spring have been stolen right out from under our noses – our calendars have been stripped of graduations and parties, bridal showers, spring break trips and so much more.

What are we are left with? Distance. Alone-ness. Illness. And a vague feeling of -nothingness. We don’t even know what day it is, let alone if we have anything on the calendar. Because we don’t. This C-19 business is lemons – for everyone – especially the sick and the medical professionals, but also the general public who are just living day to day hoping they’ll find toilet paper.

So, last week, when my friend, Theresa, who always makes me laugh and is also my baking buddy, called me up and offered to pick up necessities from Costco for me while she was there – I responded with a hearty YES! (Meet Theresa – no, we did not bake in the same kitchen this week- this picture is from last year!)

And when she showed up at my doorstep with all the goods – plus lemons and raspberries (because she didn’t need as many as she bought) – asking if I wanted to do a baking challenge – my response was a resounding YESSSSSSSSS!

She and I baked last week. And we traded samples (at a distance, of course) of our lemon-raspberry goodies. SPOILER ALERT: We both won the challenge. It was so wonderful to do something I love – and remember that I can make lemonade when life hands me lemons. There is always a silver lining to be found.

Theresa made a Raspberry Custard Tart with a buttery sugar cookie crust and it was beyond fantastic. I don’t know if you can handle this much truth, but, I broke my “mostly no sugar” rule and ate many bites. quite a few times. I may have not shared very much with my family.

I made Aunt Belva’s lemon pound cake WITH raspberries. And it was very creamy and delicious if I do say so myself. Then, because I love Dark chocolate with raspberries I used the extra raspberries to make chocolate raspberry oatmeal muffins. They were pretty yummy, but were a little dry, so I’ll need to tweak the bake time if I make them again!

Friends, take time to look for your silver lining. Seriously -all is not lost. There’s always a way to make lemonade out of the lemons we’ve been given!