Our Summer Experiment- who's got the best shakes?

So we are having a contest this Summer to see who has the best milkshakes.



We started at Chick-fil-A cause I was given a gift card by Sean's teacher and well, being a damn yankee, I had never been to a Chick-fil-A before. We truly enjoyed their chicken sandwich and hand spun milk shakes, and the bar was set very high. They have two sizes, and top each creation with an ample dose of whipped cream and a cherry. Sean had vanilla, Jack and Craig each had chocolate and I had to have the cookies and cream...Yum...

So the contest came about as I was trying to replace our outside umbrella and well, boys do not like to be dragged from store to store to shop for umbrellas in this heat unless, you promise them a milkshake! So...off to Burger King we went because I had heard they had a nice size shake on the dollar menu...


The boys liked them well enough, though the vanilla did not taste much different from the chocolate, In fact after the indecision of my four year old, "I want chocolate, no wait I want vanilla, no wait I want chocolate"...well let's just say I handed him a shake and then he asked what flavor it was and I said, "what did you order" and he said, "chocolate", and it was vanilla but I let him believe it was chocolate crossing my fingers and saying a quick prayer under my breath, and fortunately he bought it.

So this one is funny, we stopped at McDonalds to celebrate Craig's success at his first round of swim lessons...and I asked the boys what flavor shake they wanted and they said to me that McDonalds does not have shakes. I was flabbergasted, those were THE shakes when I was a kid.

Shamrock shakes for Saint Patricks Day, delish! Replaced by the McFlurry. But I, up until now was able to convince my kids that they don't even sell shakes. OK I may regret this later, but we ordered them...They are not what I remembered, tasted very artificial. Sorry Ronald, but I do love your new Cafe' mochas!

So now to the place that compelled me to write this post. Another cleverly advertised fast food joint that I have never been to. Until today, Where they not only had shakes, but limeades and java frozen heaven. Yes, you know it well...Sonic

I am not sure if it's the novelty of the old fashioned drive up and order, which I enjoyed mostly cause I was not being barked at like drive thru window operators can be known to do? And we ordered a burger, popcorn chicken, an oreo blast, one vanilla and one chocolate shake and of course, since I have to participate, I ordered a java mocha, frozen. It was heaven! I will gain weight as the result of this experiment, but the kids are really enjoying the comparisons. Sean's even involved in the different costs vs. quality. Sean noticed that Sonic has Happy Hour from 2:00 to 4:00, all drinks (probably not shakes) half price.
Next stop is Steak n Shake....hand dipped, whipped cream and that cherry...

Leave me a comment telling me about where you get your favorite shake, and flavor. I'll randomly pick someone to get a $5.00 gift card to McDonald's. remember to include a way to reach you. Contest will end June 30th at midnight. We have our winner thanks for playing!

Misty...please email me your address and a I'll pop a gift card into the mail for you!

suzanne

Custom Twitter Pages.

Remember when domains came out and people were buying up domain names like crazy, with a "ya never know he could become famous and want his/her name as their home page."

Well Twitter is free, and you should sign up up even if you don't really intend to twitter just yet?

Grab your name in case sending tweets becomes the norm/neccessity like the cell phone.

to all you newbies out there,

here are a few commands to get you started

@username + message
directs a twitter at another person, and causes your twitter to save in their “replies” tab.Example: @ijustine I love that song too!

D username + message
sends a person a private message that goes to their device, and saves in their web archive.Example: d krissy want to pick a Jamba Juice for me while you’re there?

WHOIS username
retrieves the profile information for any public user on Twitter.Example: whois jack

GET username
retrieves the latest Twitter update posted by the person.Example: get goldman

NUDGE username
reminds a friend to update by asking what they’re doing on your behalf.Example: nudge biz

FAV username
marks a person’s last twitter as a favorite. (hint: reply to any update with FAV to mark it as a favorite if you’re receiving it in real time)Example: fav al3x

STATS
this command returns your number of followers, how many people you’re following, and which words you’re tracking.

So go register at http://twitter.com/ and let's take it the next level and let me customize it,

like mine https://twitter.com/suedaisy just visit my etsy store.

twitter image from http://lordofdesign.com

It's a Scavenger Explorer,Treasure Party.

Sean was 9 this year and he is the party monster. Loves the whole party planning, creative games, and the more the merrier. Unfortunately since his birthday falls in winter, we must have a backup plan if the weather is too cold to party outside. First, keep control of how many are invited. Second, control how long the party will last. It's a good thing we do, cause this year the weather was terrible.

He wanted a scavenger hunt, spy type, explorer theme. We went with it and my Aunt Pat made this pinata.

We called him Pedro. So from there we got these pith hats at Michaels,

I hid them downstairs once the kids arrived and I knew how many there were, I wrote a number on the inside of each hat that when they added them together it would equal 415. This would be for a riddle later.

On the kitchen table was the first riddle. Go to the room under the house and look under the book about a mouse. They flew down the stairs. Earlier I had taken the book , "If a Mouse Ate a Cookie" and put it in the basement on our coffee table that lifts open. Inside were the the hats. They quickly figured that first clue out and were sporting their hats.

Inside one of the hats was a clue to go to another part of the basement where they had to figure out a secret code. Each child got a strip of paper with a series of colored dots and dashes that represented a letter and they were instructed to look at a chart and figure out what their code stood for. I used rocks and minerals, like sapphire, topaz, and diamond. Once they figured out their code they brought it to my assistant Miss Mary Beth who gave them each a lanyard with two different shapes and colors on it. Then we directed them to the mine which was our turtle sandbox filled with sand, and these self stick jewels from the scrapbooking aisle.

They had to pan for their matching jewels on their lanyards. To have control we allowed two at a time, the other boys played darts and fuzz ball to keep them busy. Once everyone found the jewels,

we did more riddles, including adding the numbers on their hats which led them to our mailbox (415) that had a riddle sending them back to the kitchen. We sang happy birthday and ate a cookie cake we decorated as a compass. We then opened the presents and finally, the last riddle lead them back to the basement and the destruction of the pinata.

Pedro held out for a long time and there was plenty of candy for everyone.

We all had a fantastic time.

suzanne