chocolate or strawberry?

When Susanna and Josh were expecting their first child three years ago, they faced the same dilemma many couples do in this situation: did they want to know the baby’s gender? When their ultrasound tech offered to tell them at a doctor’s appointment, they still weren’t quite sure. “So when she offered to write it down on a card that we could look at later, we said yes,” Susanna says. “But I thought the ultrasound tech slipped and said ‘he,’ so we suspected it was a boy."

Josh and Susanna decided they did want to know, but they wanted to do it in a way that was special to them. “We thought, How cool would it be if we had someone at Molly Moon’s made a sundae for us?”

So, Josh made a plan. He took the card to the Molly Moon’s on Capitol Hill and handed it to an unsuspecting scooper. “Here’s the deal,” he said, “this card is pretty precious.” He asked her to make a sundae, but not just any sundae. He asked her to peek at what was written on the card and, without telling him what it said, make the sundae with balsamic strawberry ice cream if it’s a girl, and chocolate ice cream if it’s a boy.

After receiving this precious card, the scooper who helped them was a little overwhelmed but also honored to be part of this occasion. She even started crying! Josh took the sundae, covered in a large puff of whipped cream to conceal the ice cream flavor, took it home and put it in the freezer.

“We had a little ritual around it,” Susanna says. “We had dinner and lit a candle. We were so excited just thinking about the little spirit that was in me. We said a blessing about the child, and then after dinner we pulled out the ice cream and started eating it. I saw something dark-looking, and thought, This has to be chocolate. But I kept eating and realized it was actually balsamic strawberry … it was a girl!”

A few months later, their daughter Iris was born.

Susanna and her family are still Molly Moon’s fans. In fact, the first ice cream Iris ever really liked was our chocolate ice cream! So when they came by for photos last week – on Iris’ third birthday – we made sure they got plenty of their favorite flavors – melted chocolate, salted caramel and of course, balsamic strawberry!

We LOVE hearing stories from families who have shared important moments in our shops, and with our ice cream. There have been first dates that led to long-term partnerships, proposals and lots of other sweet stories from families like Susanna, Josh and Iris. If you’ve got a story, we’d love to here it! Drop us a line at info@mollymoon.com.