Dissolution of Lithium in Methanol Easy question to kick off my chemexchange membership!

I'm learning chemistry in my spare time, and fittingly for a video art project I'm doing, decided to try a simple inorganic(?) procedure to make some crimson flames.

My research lead me to believe that lithium methoxide works wonders for this, especially in solution with methanol which only has a very faint blue flame on its own. I basically already know it works, based on some demonstrations seen on YouTube, but I'm unable to find much anything in literature about the lithium salt of methanol. So I'd like to verify my understanding of the equation:

To my understanding, dissolving lithium metal in methanol should yield:

$$\ce{Li + CH4O -&gt; CH3LiO + H}$$

...Lithium methoxide in solution with methanol, assuming an excess of methanol, and some released hydrogen gas.

Am I correct? Can someone shortly explain the actual reaction that takes place?

Additionally: I think the solution should be relatively stable and easy to store and handle, like methanol, unless there's a reason to believe otherwise?
Also, if one wanted to produce dry lithium methoxide powder from this, what might be a good precipitant to crash it out of methanol?
I have not done it with lithium but many times with sodium. Lithium is the less reactive, so it should not give more problems. We use sodium to dry methanol, so it is a common operation in the lab. The reaction is:

$\ce{2Li + 2CH3OH -&gt; 2LiOCH3 + H2}$ 

Of course, hydrogen is dangerous, especially in the presence of oxygen and still more in this exothermic reaction. So, be careful. 

The solution is stable, but attracts water and carbon dioxide, so it must be stored well closed.

To get dry lithium methoxide, the easiest is just to evaporate the excess of methanol.
You put it in a round bottomed flask, attach it to the rotary evaporator, open the vacuum and distill it of. With sodium it works perfectly well. A white solid remains. Again, this solid will attract water and carbon dioxide, so it must be stored properly. 

Finally, if the only purpose is to have a methanolic solution of lithium, you can better use lithium chloride which is very soluble in methanol, and much safer (no reaction, no hydrogen, no heating).