On a hot summer day what could be better than a cool sip of sweet?
"It's very good, actually," Rebekah Read said of her cold cup of lemonade. "Some people want more sugar but some mommies like it with less."
Read and dozens of other neighbors have all stopped to see Clearwater's most-popular lemonade stand.
"Yeah, we love lemonade," Caroline Brasfield-Carter said with a chuckle.
Caroline's son, Jackson, is manning the pitcher. He pours cups of cool lemonade and hands them to the neighbors. They hand him money but he doesn't give them change.
At this stand, nobody wants any change.
Jackson, 10, has been hosting lemonade stands in his front yard for years. He always takes donations for drinks and gives away the money to various organizations. In the past he's given to the Ronald McDonald House, hospice and other charities.
This year, the donations are going to a place that's near and dear to his heart.
"We were setting up our lemonade stand for kids with prosthetics and Jackson ended up being diagnosed Sept. 6 of last year with Osteosarcoma," said Caroline.
This year's lemonade money will be presented to the Pediatric Cancer Foundation during a ceremony at the Tampa Bay Rowdies home game on Sept. 30.
"It's pretty tough," Jackson said about living with cancer. "You just don't feel good and you feel different."
After nine rounds of chemotherapy, he feels great. Kids from his school stop by to see how he's doing and to make a donation. Jackson's grandparents help refill the lemonade pitchers.
The hope is that they run out.
"Pediatric cancer isn't funded as much as any other kinds of cancers so I wanted to give back," said Jackson.
The family had hoped to raise $1,000 with the lemonade stand but blew past that mark in two hours. After the last drop was poured, Jackson has collected $2,544.71 to donate to PCF.
"Everyone was very generous," said Jackson.
September is Childhood Cancer Awareness month. According to the Pediatric Cancer Foundation, 43 children per day, or 15,780 children per year, are expected to be diagnosed with cancer.
