As I was mentioning on my June Goals post yesterday, we’ve made progress on the baby to-do list and are settling in for a lazy, outdoorsy, very DC summer around here! One of the big items on my DC summertime to-do list? Spend more time on our rooftop with friends! It’s really beautiful up there, and you can see so many DC sights, including the monuments and the National Cathedral (heart eyes). One side is for grilling and lounging and the other is the pool. I felt like last summer slipped away before we had really taken advantage, and you can bet that’s not happening again!
The heat and humidity really set in this weekend, so I wasted no time organizing a rooftop cookout with the Porters on Saturday. We even got to know our neighbors across the hall a little better. It was just the perfect summer evening watching the sun set over burgers and watermelon.
While the food was delicious (thanks, Will!!), I have been meaning to talk about my favorite pregnancy drink for a while: Arnold Palmers. The teetotaling part of pregnancy really hasn’t been too hard for me, as I wasn’t a big drinker before, but sometimes you just want something fun to drink that isn’t water. I’ve been loving sweet tea, lemonade, and all possible flavored combinations of the two really since day one. (I’m wondering if Kristin Winchester’s enthusiasm for sweet tea during the Southern Weddings’s Mason-Dixon Madness had anything to do with it…)
So you can imagine how excited I was when Southern Breeze sent me a box of their delicious calorie-free sweet tea! (They even sent me pregnancy-friendly decaf.) I realize most true Southerners would have a hard time believing that one could make sweet tea without cups of added sugar, but you will just have to try it. I like it way better! It’s made in Marietta, Georgia in real tea bags (not the powdered stuff), and it manages to be sweet without that artificial sweetener flavor. I don’t know what kind of magic they’re putting in these tea bags, but there will be a pitcher in my fridge all summer.
It was super easy to make: just add boiling water to a pitcher with the tea bags and steep for 3-5 minutes. Then add ice or stick it in the fridge! (Does anyone else remember their mom making sun tea in the driveway in the 90s? That required some advance-planning.)
Will also makes an amazing fresh-squeezed homemade lemonade (it’s pretty much just the Chick-fil-a recipe), which is great since he also makes a wonderful homemade margarita I can’t have. We decided to make a batch of lemonade to mix in with the tea, and it was divine! That’s one great thing about sweet tea: it’s great alone, but also plays well with others to keep it interesting. I want to try their watermelon tea recipe next! Also, I want to try all of these fruity sweet tea recipes, obviously.
I swear we didn’t plan to wear blue and match the straws, but sometimes things just work out!
True confession: the guys were drinking beer, so I didn’t even bring them glasses for tea at first, and they had to ask if they could try some too! Oops! But once I remembered to be a decent hostess, the sweet tea got rave reviews from all.
This post was sponsored by Southern Breeze Sweet Tea, but the opinions are all my own!
