Homemade, all-natural “Gatorade”

February 8, 2012 · 7 comments

On my to-do list today was “make marshmallows.”

It all started this past weekend, when on the way home from her orchestra rehearsal, I told my daughter we could have hot cocoa that afternoon. Instead of the praise-filled, Mother-adoring “YAY!!” I was fully expecting, her response was a lackluster, “mom, do we have marshmallows?”

“Um, no, honey, I don’t think we do.”

To which her reply was unquestionable, non-Mother-adoring, silence.

Anyway, it’s not that I feel the need to meet every whimsical expectation of my eldest child — but making marshmallows was something I had been meaning to try and do, so this week it was.

But my 3-year old has been down with a fever and headache since Monday morning — and when I woke with her beside me in bed this morning, my husband informed me that our eldest was the latest to succumb. So we’re home today, all three feeling tired and cranky, and I’m trying to simply be thankful for the relatively healthy year we’ve had, rather than feel inconvenienced or grumpy.

Because, I mean, marshmallows. On my to-do list, on a Wednesday.

Instead, I’m whipping up what can best be described as the opposite-end-of-the-spectrum: homemade Gatorade.

I’ve got two pitiful little ones, neither one having much of an appetite. I want them to stay hydrated, and keep balanced electrolytes. But I also want them to avoid sugar at all costs, since that ingredient effectively shuts down the immune system. Enter homemade Gatorade: all-natural, no refined sugar, no chemicals, tastes just like the powdered stuff. If you happen to have a couple lemons or limes & some honey, you’ve got all you need.

Confession: I don’t think my youngest has ever had Gatorade, and my oldest has likely only had it at soccer practice. So while they don’t care that the flavor is so similar, they both drank it up, guaranteeing that they’ve ingested fluid, salt, and calcium. That’s a win.

And the marshmallows? Let’s just say that’ll be the barometer for how we’ve fared, come my next post.

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