Backyard Margarita with Lime Wedge & Fresh Mint Garnish

Neighborhood lawnmowers have grown quiet but the clean, crisp smell of a cul-de-sac’s worth of freshly cut grass remains.  The last soothing calls of robins fill the air as the lightening bugs make their debut.  Amidst their intermittent flashes that my boys so enjoy, dusk falls upon the suburbia that I call home.   On such a perfect summer evening it is difficult not to be aware of the beauty that surrounds me.  My mind begins to wander.

I take notice of the imposing Mulberry Tree that is in the parkway of our backyard.  Its sturdy frame must have graced that spot of land for the better part of 150 years.  Its knotted and gnarled branches have likely provided refuge to generations of Great Horned Owls whose most recent descendents we’ve been fortunate enough to witness stalking their prey.  Suddenly, it occurs to me that I have been looking at that formidable tree everyday for over a decade while sipping my morning coffee from the view out my kitchen window.  Wow, how can that be?  A decade has passed in the blink of an eye. Not one, but two children now have completed their first years of elementary school and my youngest son will start preschool in the fall.  They are growing like weeds. -Continue>