Kool-Aid Kool-Aid Tastes Great

If you like Kool-aid, mix one package of cherry and one package of grape, a cup of sugar and two quarts of water. It tastes like fruit punch instead of just Kool-aid. It's gooooood.

I know. I'm a Kool-aid connoisseur from way back. My dad didn't believe in buying soft drinks. He thought water was good enough. However, he had no aversion to those bright colored packs of artificial colored powder that you mixed with enough sugar to put you straight into diabetic coma- Yep, Kool-Aid. And I loved it.

Long after I was buying enough soft drinks to keep Coca-Cola stock rising, I still bought Kool-aid. Then my kids came along, and of course, how could I deny them that artificial dye high that only Kool-aid delivers. Sometimes (covering my eyes and asking forgiveness from the patron saint of Mothers) I actually gave the toddlers Kool-Aid in their bottles. (Gasp) And they loved it.

It was about the time that they hit school-age that Kool-Aid came out with those new flavors and suddenly Kool-aid was so Kool it even came in BLUE. And I had to have me some of that blue stuff. So we made Kool-aid and we iced it and we drank it until our tongues looked constantly the color of rainbows, and my kids had that joker moustache in bright red across their mouths. No, no milk moustaches at our house.

I learned a lot about Kool-aid through the years. I learned that this stuff you buy at the grocery called GOOP would take the stains out of clothes, and a puddle of Clorox and water left to sit would take the stains off formica counters.
But, even I, the greatest Kool-aid fan of all times, was a novice compared to my friend, Dawn.

She had a house full of kids, and she knew more about clipping coupons and pinching pennies than anyone I've ever met. One day at my house, while I made the kids sandwiches and she made the drinks, I caught her rinsing out the Kool-aid packs. Huh? She dumped the powder out and then filled the little pack with water several times to "get it all out." I thought geez, this woman is either a first class cheapskate or she really likes her Kool-aid. It turned out to be both, and I loved her for it.

That day sparked a great discussion of our Kool-aid eperiences growing up. It turns out her dad had gone to the same "hate cokes, allow Kool-aid" school that mine had. And she had learned even more than me. She started mixing the stuff. She came up with the ultimate Kool-aid mixture, recipe at the top of this entry.

So when my Arizona born husband talks about his Mountain Dew, I just sigh and wonder how he got to be so smart without the full Kool-aid upbringing.
Now if I could just get the Kool-aid man to burst through your computer screen about now and sing, that would really be Kool!