Welcome to this week's edition of Mad Maggie's Ice Cream email newsletter.

It's hard to believe, but we're now into the second half of our season, as July 1st marks the midpoint of our April 1st-through-September 30th lease. I figured that it was about time for me to fix that darn broken awning out front, so son David and I spent a couple of hours on Saturday morning (and three trips to the hardware store!) taking it down, replacing the broken parts, and re-hanging it. Hopefully, having it fixed makes us look a little more professional now. I'll have to take a photo of the store quickly now before something else breaks! My oldest sister, Judith, celebrated her 50th birthday last weekend, so I took my first day off of the summer on Saturday to head down to the Cape for the party. The store seemed to still be in one piece when I returned, so I have to thank our team leader Samantha (our "Hippie Chick") for doing a great job keeping the store up and running. We definitely received some nice news last week, as Boston Magazine named us one of their "25 Beloved Ice Cream Shops" in their July edition. They butchered the names of our flavors, somehow coming up with a flavor of "Thin Mint chocolate chip" even after their "fact checker" called me to verify the names. Having done a stint working for the Boston Globe in a past job, I can attest to the fact that many of the people writing this type of story are either interns, or just relative newcomers, so I guess I shouldn't be too surprised that they messed up a few facts. It *was* nice that they mentioned the enthusiasm of our staff, and talked about our "Flavor of the Week" offerings. All in all, it was a nice piece of publicity for us, and we're flattered to have been included in this article. So make sure you say "Congratulations" to my kids serving you, as they're a big part of it! We've already noticed a bunch of new customers who mentioned that they learned about us through this article, so I guess the old saying that "nothing beats free publicity" rings true! Pajama Party Postgame --------------------- Well, we ended up with less giveaways than I expected, but our Pajama Party was still a hit, as we gave away 133 cones to folks wearing their PJ's to the store on Monday. I'm still trying to figure out what happened to the Victoria's Secret models, as they never showed up at the window to claim their free cones. My guess is that they didn't want to distract me from my ice cream making duties, so they probably came "incognito", dressed in some frumpy old bathrobes or something. I'll make sure to include a handwritten note explaining that they don't need to be embarassed about interrupting me from making ice cream when next year's invite goes out. (Also, it's odd that this year's invite came back to me marked "Return to Sender -- Stop Bothering Us!" Those postal workers can be pretty mean sometimes.) We had a little bit of trouble with our digital camera for the party (Some unnamed, but fairer-haired, members of my family don't seem to understand that those 48 photos of the dog licking himself all take up memory, and it takes a while to go through and delete them all without the help of a computer to navigate the digital memory storage...) so we had to improvise and use a couple of disposable cameras for the party. So there will be a bit of a delay in getting the photos online for your viewing pleasure. (Maybe when we go through the photos, we'll be able to identify what the VS models were disguised as...) The photos we did manage to capture with our digital camera are online at the website. Feel free to surf on over to: http://madmaggies.com/photos/albums/2005/PJParty/ to see some nice photos, mainly of my great crew! When we get all of the photos, my team will award the prizes, so watch the website (or the store windows) for the winning photos! Fresh Flavors! -------------- The summer fruits are starting to come in, and we're busily at work making them into great ice cream. Last weekend, I ran up to Boston Hill Farm and picked a dozen pounds of Strawberries, and we've now got Fresh Strawberry in stock. Those of you who remember this from last season will hopefully attest to the fact that ice cream made with fresh strawberries is just wonderful! I was lucky enough to have the help of a trained pastry chef (see the story below) to help me with this, and I think it's even better than last year's batches. One of my suppliers also makes a "Wild Maine Blueberry" puree that's only available for a limited amount of time during the season. Well, it's in stock, and I've got my hands on some, and it is an *excellent* product! We made a Wild Blueberry ice cream with it, and also a Blueberry Cheesecake. Both are in stock and waiting for you, so come on by and ask for a taste (or a large Sundae!) David, owner of my main blueberry source, Turkey Hill Farm, in Haverhill, MA, tells me that the fresh blueberries are a little late this season due to the cold May we had. But hopefully, they'll be ready by mid-July, and I plan to make Fresh Blueberry Sorbet again, as last year's attempt at this was a wonderful flavor. Look for it in a couple of weeks! Lance Armstrong Foundation Wristbands ------------------------------------- Late last season, I had bought 20 or so wristbands from the LAF.org website to support Lance Armstrong's efforts in raising money for cancer research, probably at the prompting of Sam. For anyone who doesn't know, Lance is a 6 time (I think...) winner of bicycling's Tour de France, and is a cancer survivor himself. He also has Sheryl Crow as his main squeeze -- lucky guy! The kids on my team and my kids at home ended up kicking in a dollar each and gobbling them all up, as they're apparently the trendy fashion accessory among Andover teens. With the Tour de France now underway, I decided to up the ante this season and ordered 200 of the wristbands for the store. The reaction to these has astounded me -- I knew that they were a hot item, but the response from our customers has been amazing. I was at the store after closing up last week, and a car pulled up and a woman came tapping on the window. When I opened the window, expecting an order for ice cream, she surprised me by saying "No, I just came to buy a wristband." One of my best friends Chris came by for a visit with new wife Ariella, and she told me how important it was to her to see these on sale, as her mother is also a cancer survivor. She claims that she'll go out of her way to buy from someone who sells these in their store. Wow, I never even realized that I *had* a "social conscience"! Who knew? Seriously, the act of paying for these upfront so that we can make them available to our customers is a tiny effort on our part, even from a business as cash-strapped as ours, and we're more than happy to participate in this good cause. If you're at the store, please consider purchasing one and wearing it. I never realized the power of these little pieces of plastic, but the public show of support obviously means an awful lot to many who are battling cancer. Manhattan Ice Cream Works ------------------------- We had a visit from a very nice woman, Jessica Maher, who works for a new company in New York City, Manhattan Ice Cream Works. Jessica is the main chef for them, and is busily working on setting up their production facility. She's a trained pastry chef, but has relatively little experience making ice cream, so she contacted me to see if I would be willing to let her help me around the store for a couple of nights so that she could get better feel for what it takes to make ice cream. I was happy to have her around, she ended up doing most of my chores for two nights this week, and we swapped a lot of tips -- I told her about ice cream, and she told me about pastries, especially fruit sauces. The result of this is that I think the variegating sauces we add to our ice cream will be a lot better now, as I have a better understanding of how to make fruit sauces that won't get icy. Hopefully, you'll see a difference in the Fresh Strawberry that we made this week! I sure hope Jessica finds more time to come by and visit with us -- I told her I'd be more than willing to have her stop by anytime to take on some of my ice cream making duties for free! If you ever find yourself in Manhattan, and come across Jessica's store, pop in and tell her you heard about her from Mad Maggie's! Plenty of Time to Read ---------------------- Now that school is out, my kids are spending a lot more time around the store. I was there the other day and one of them had arrived early for her shift, and was sitting outside, reading a book. I sat down next to her and asked what she was reading, and she somewhat sheepishly told me she was reading a book "about love". She showed me the cover of the book, and it read "How to Hug". She was a little embarassed when I laughed out loud, and she confessed that it was really boring, and didn't seem to relate to the title at all. I told her that she should probably think about returning Volume 9 of the encyclopedia to the library, and try to find another book to read. I've *got* to stop hiring so many blondes... Staff Profile ------------- This edition of the newsletter profiles team member Elizabeth. Liz is from Andover, and is a recent graduate of Central Catholic High in Lawrence. Liz was one of the last hires I made in our first season, as I went back and forth on whether she'd be a good worker, as I thought she was just too darn pretty (Maggie and I used to refer to Liz as "the one who looks like Cindy Crawford" when we were both learning all of the new kids' names...) and stylish to want to get down and dirty scooping ice cream. Boy was I wrong, as Liz is one of our best workers, and has no problem at all getting just as filthy as everyone else! Liz worked for Ruby Tuesdays at the Rockingham Mall over the winter, and reports that her job there was awful, so I guess working at our store isn't bad, as she's back with us! She is definitely one of the most likeable members of our team, as she gets along with everyone, and I've never heard a bad word about her from others on the staff. I like to kid Liz that I want to trade lives with her: Being young, attractive, out of school, an only child, having a nice car that her folks gave her as a graduation gift, and working enough to pay for her fun, and spending her free time with friends at the beach or beside her pool seems like a nice way to spend the summer. Come to think of it, I hate her! ;^) I also spend a lot of time teasing Liz about being a "closet blonde", as despite her dark hair, she keeps us in stitches sometimes with some of the silly mixups that seem to follow her around. Her hair seems to lighten in the summer sun, so I tell her it's the blonde streaks that are affecting her! Seriously, Liz is a wonderful young lady, and is one of my favorites. I have a lot of fun teasing her, but I know I don't have to worry about customers being served well when she's working. She's known around the store as the team member who makes the prettiest Banana Split. Here's a photo of Liz from the night of our Pajama Party: http://madmaggies.com/photos/albums/2005/PJParty/tn/100_3225.JPG.html Liz claims that (a) she's overweight, and (b) that she never looks good in pictures, but if you take a look at the photos on our web site, you'll see that she's a terrible liar too, as every photo I have of her looks like it could be on the cover of Vogue magazine. Liz will be off attending Assumption College in Worcester in the fall, and we're going to miss her! Hopefully she'll be back with us again in the spring. If you see her, say hi and tell her you read about her in the newsletter! Newsletter Coupon ----------------- Print out a copy of this email, bring it to the store, and whoever serves you will do the Chicken Dance while they prepare your order! I haven't actually cleared that one with my team, so just in case they refuse, we'll give you two smoothies for the price of one with this email. You can even substitute a Frozen Hot Chocolate for one of the smoothies, if that works for you! (One offer per customer, not valid in Puerto Rico, New Zealand, nor Guam.) And before you ask, no, I won't do it -- I've seen videos of myself attempting to dance, and it's not a pretty sight, especially around small children. Thanks for reading, enjoy this great stretch of summer weather, and we sure hope to see you at the store!