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Celebrate Barbie’s Birthday at Farrell’s!

March 5, 2014 / Food

Did you know that Barbie is going to turn 55 this year? Yep, her birthday is on March 9th and what would be a better way to celebrate than a trip to Farrell’s?
Last year Emi and I each chose a Barbie to take with us to our local Farrell’s restaurant on Barbie’s birthday. Emi also insisted we bring a table, 2 chairs and some Barbie-sized food for them. We set up their table for 2, right above our own. I fell completely in love with the special Barbie Sundae that we got! Seriously, the pink whipped cream was SO yummy! I cannot wait to go back again this weekend and participate in all of the festivities they’ll have going on!

This Sunday, March 9th, you too can bring your Barbie into any one of the Farrell’s locations, to celebrate her 55th birthday with free birthday ice cream, presents, and surprises!

To celebrate America’s favorite doll’s 55th birthday, Farrell’s Ice Cream Parlour Restaurants is going to throw a birthday party for Barbie like only Farrell’s can! Kids and kids at heart will join Barbie and Ken look-alikes this Sunday, March 9, from 10 – 11am at all seven California Farrell’s locations. A special Barbie-inspired, 30-scoop – 7 1/2lb., Farrell’s famous ice cream Zoo will include, among other ingredients, a pink strawberry ice cream, rainbow sherbet, sprinkles, whipped cream, strawberry sauce and cherries with the guest of honor herself sitting atop to be run around the entire restaurant. A special Barbie birthday song has been created and will be sung before the kids get to eat the Zoo for free and birthday presents are given out.

Check out some pictures from last year’s celebration!

For guests that can’t make it to the 10am main birthday event, Farrell’s will be celebrating all day by selling a pink $1.99 birthday-sundae to all guests that bring in their favorite Barbie doll and purchase a kids or adult entrée and drink. The special $1.99 birthday sundae is fashioned from one-scoop of strawberry ice cream, strawberry sauce, pink whipped cream, party sprinkles and a cherry on top.

“Barbie is America’s favorite doll. She’s an original piece of Americana and takes all of us back to the fond memories of our childhood, just like Farrell’s.” says Michael Fleming, CEO, Parlour Enterprises, Inc. “This was a great opportunity to celebrate an American icon, but even more so, it was just a great excuse to have a lot of fun.”

Celebrations will be happening at all California Farrell’s locations:

·   215 S. Brea Blvd., Brea, CA  92821 Brea Downtown

·   8650 Beach Blvd., Buena Park, CA 90620

·   779 Shops Blvd. Mission Viejo, CA 9269 in The Shops at Mission Viejo

·   10742 Foothill Blvd., Rancho Cucamonga, CA  91730

·   3610 Park Sierra Dr., Riverside, CA  92505

·   1625 Watt Ave., Sacramento, CA 95864

·   21516 Golden Triangle Road, Santa Clarita, CA 91350 in the Mountasia Family Fun Center

For complete details, limitations and rules for this event please see FarrellsUSA.com. Barbie is a trademark of Mattel Inc. and is in no way associated with this event.

some photos courtesy of Farrell’s Restaurants

Fun at the Newest Farrell’s in Buena Park!

February 26, 2014 / Food, Let's Eat!

We were so excited to attend a pre-opening VIP event last weekend at the new Farrell’s in Buena Park. It actually didn’t feel like we even went to a restaurant, it was more like this giant party with 200 of our newest friends, that just kept on going!
Upon our arrival in the parking lot, the girls immediately spotted the Medevial Times mobile and insisted on posing for a picture with it! (Little did they know, they’d soon meet the actual knights inside the restaurant!)

I love the location of this newest Farrell’s because it’s very close to so many of the family attractions that the city of Buena Park has to offer, including Knott’s Berry Farm and Medevial Times. After checking in with the Farrell’s hostess, we were greeted by Alesha from Medevial Times. She had a promotional table set up and was handing out Medevial Times swag and coupons for the attraction. Alesha really interacted with my girls and even visited our table a few times, once we were seated.

Two of the Medevial Times’ Knights were walking around inside the restaurant, passing out t-shirts and crowns and helping the Farrell’s crew deliver some of the exciting desserts that require a whole lot of singing and hoopla! The girls REALLY wanted to order The Zoo, which is one of those desserts, JUST so they could have it delivered by the knights, but we also knew there was NO WAY that the four of us could finish a dessert that had like 1000 scoops of ice cream!
The energy of the entire staff at Farrell’s was amazing and it was something you could feel right when you walked in the front door! I think this is why it felt like we were at a party. While you’re at your table, you are constantly being invited to participate in songs and clapping and although it does seem like there’s non-stop drum banging occurring throughout your entire visit (because there is), you’re so busy having fun that you don’t seem to mind it nor the fact that your child or children are NOT sitting quietly at your table and that’s OK under these circumstances!

We started off with Farrell’s Ooey Gooey Cheese Sticks as an appetizer. For lunch, I ordered the Fabulous French Dip sandwich and the girls all ordered the sliders off of the children’s menu. There was even an option to upgrade the regular fries to chili cheese fries, so of course they hopped on that opportunity right away! We were careful NOT to eat too much regular food since we were ultimately trying to save room for some of their infamously crazy-good desserts!

Farrell’s isn’t just a fun family restaurant, it’s a total entertainment package, something that you don’t get at typical restaurant. This was apparent after just a few of the talented and energetic crew spent some time at our table, amusing the girls. First, “Max” stopped by our table, and the girls immediately spotted one of the buttons he was wearing which had a pickle on it. He then explained to me that the button was actually Mr. Bob Farrell’s original motto.

I think the girls took that as their cue to not only start asking him for pickles every time he passed by our table, but also to nickname him “Mr. Pickles“! Not long after that, we came to learn that “Mr. Pickles” was actually half of an infamous entertainment duo that you can probably meet at just about any Farrell’s community event, and at a future Farrell’s openings. The other half of the duo was nicknamed “Mr. Jake” by the girls. Jake is best known as “The Purveyor of Good Times” in the Farrell’s world. These 2 guys were so good with my girls, brought them stickers, pickles and took boatloads of pics with them. I think the girls instantly became lifelong fans after spending about 5 minutes with this duo!

The girls were extremely impressed when they got to witness an epic ice cream eating contest between the Medevial Times knights and the team of “Mr. Pickles” and “Mr. Jake“. Each team took a very different approach to how they were going to beat out the other one. While the knights continued mowing through their trough, the Farrell’s duo actually utilized glasses of water to wash it down, while stirring the ice cream and making it more liquid. I couldn’t actually watch for very long, but the fact that “Mr. Jake” did it all with a camera headband on is even more hilarious! I’m kinda wondering where THAT video footage is?

When it came time for our own desserts, we decided to share an order of the “Ice Cream Nachos” (yep, they exist) and a “Banana Split” and yep…our desserts were accompanied by drumbeats and a song! Both of these desserts were giant and yummy! I jokingly told the girls, who are all competitive cheerleaders, that if this had been one of their cheer competitions, that they would’ve placed first! (I may have helped them a little bit)

Everything about Farrell’s is so nostalgic. Their menus are printed on newsprint and you actually can take them home with you. The drinks are served in (plastic) vintage Coca-Cola glasses and there are little American flags stuck into just about every appetizer, burger and dessert. The decor is mostly black and white, with touches of red here and there and each table has an old-fashioned stained glass lamp hanging above it. The servers wear uniforms adorned with armbands and these adorable straw hats that are available for purchase in their shop.

Each Farrell’s location features a shop where you can buy logo merchandise and choose from a HUGE variety of old-fashioned candies. The shop also has a ton of other fun trinkets available, including Farrell’s mustaches.

My daughter and her entourage just didn’t want to leave the place! I don’t think we were there any less than 3 hours! After they spent time getting their posters autographed by their staff favorites, and taking MORE pictures with them, it was finally time to say goodbye!

Whether you remember Farrell’s from its way-back-when original locations, or you are just learning about it now, it’s something you need to experience just once! Emi hasn’t stopped talking about it since the other day and is just begging to go back again. It was THAT much fun!
Farrell’s in Buena Park is NOW OPEN!
650 Beach Blvd.
Buena Park, CA 90620
Phone # (714) 484-9700

It’s Time for Apple Picking in Julian!

September 29, 2013 / Travel

I absolutely LOVE this time of year! It’s the beginning of fall and, although we have such warm weather in Southern California, the apple orchards are open by the end of September and the apples are ready for picking!

(How adorable is this sign I found at Home Goods?)

This year we decided to visit the adorable town of Julian, since it’s just a hop, skip & a jump away! (Ok maybe it’s actually a couple hours away) The downtown area of Julian is adorable and has many little shops, restaurants and pie shops. You can also ride in a horse-drawn carriage down the main street. The farms and apple orchards are all pretty close to the downtown area, so you can either stop at them on your way into town or as you’re leaving. On this particular trip, we ate lunch at Julian Cafe & Bakery, before going apple picking. Not only was the food yummy, we also enjoyed drinking out of glass boot mugs! After lunch was when we wandered into the town pie shops and country stores.

Our favorite pie shop was Mom’s! We sat down inside to eat some warm pie a la mode and then we stopped at Mom’s again on the way out of town to take some pie home!

(They have more than one location!)

This year we visited The Julian Mining Company for apple picking.

We bought a bag to put our freshly picked apples in.

It was a bit tough to be there with a little perfectionist because Emi ONLY wanted to pick the perfect apples! Her selection process required a lot of patience on our part.

Luckily she was content after filling up one bag.