Six-year-old student uses lemonade stand to purchase flags for her block

Local Mimosa Elementary student Addie Eitmann, 6, had a Memorial Day vision for her street – she wanted flags hanging on all her neighbor’s houses for Memorial Day weekend to honor our nation’s veterans.

“My mom and I were walking one day and saw a street that had flags on it, and I thought we could do that on our street too [for Memorial Day],” the six-year-old Eitmann said. “Memorial Day is important because it celebrates all of the people who fought for our country.”

Determined to make her vision a reality, the soon-to-be second grader quickly went into action late April with a plan – she would raise money with her own lemonade stand and purchase American flags for the 400 block of Wade Street in Luling. With the flags in hand, she would line them up along her street at neighbors’ houses on Memorial Day weekend.

“Our neighbors were excellent; we love our block, and they were very supportive and helped out a great deal,” Victoria Eitmann, Addie’s mother, said. “[Addie] spearheaded the whole thing – she drew up her flyer and got her dad to make copies, and then went out and knocked on doors, talked to individual neighbors and explained the whole situation to them.”

With her lemonade stand in place, some neighbors bought lemonade, while others offered cash donations to support the Memorial Day cause. The enterprising Eitmanns, who are also beekeepers, even offered neighbors free local honey samples to try as they purchased their lemonade.

“Some of my friends came, and got lemonade, and helped us raise money too,” the younger Eitmann said.

When her fundraising day was over, Eitmann had raised enough funds to purchase 15 flags for her street which she posted at neighbors’ houses in a display of support for veterans. The flags remained on display throughout the extended Memorial Day weekend.

“Some of [my neighbors] told me ‘good job’ or ‘this is a great idea;’ they were just really happy,” six-year-old Addie Eitmann said.

With her Memorial Day flag project a success, the enterprising six-year-old Eitmann already has plans to come back next year and go bigger – she plans to expand her project to include additional houses and neighbors on Wade Street next year, so that even more houses have flags present on Memorial Day in 2024.