Children's Museum Offers Free Lemonade For Good Deeds

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) -- "When life gives you lemons, make lemonade." The Children's Museum of Pittsburgh is giving a new twist to that old expression.

Program director Taylor Garcia explains the concept.

"This lemonade doesn't cost money. But you have to pay with the promise of a good deed."

She says kids are asked to write their promise on a yellow tag and add it to others on a "promise tree." The refreshing respite is tied in with a current exhibit at the museum.

"It's called 'XOXO,' an exhibit about Love and Forgiveness," the program director says. "So we came up with the lemonade stand, and we're giving out free lemonade. It doesn't cost any money...to anybody that comes by. But in order to pay for it, you have to promise to do a good deed. And we want to know what your good deed is."

The lemonade stand was inspired by a chocolate shop in Denmark. Same basic idea. Good deeds equal free chocolate.

But this is more of a lemonade kind of day. And young visitors are very diligent about recording those promises.

"Clean up," says a boy.

"Make the bed!" a little girl adds.

"You can do something really simple like, 'Just smile at strangers all day,' which is a good deed that we received recently," Garcia says. "Or something really big like buying someone lunch, which could be big for a child."

The best part, she says, is "seeing what is in people's hearts. And you never really get to know, unless you ask. People come to the museum every day, and share a little bit of their world with us. And that's why we do the work."

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