Don’t forget to celebrate National Ice Cream Day today!

It’s National Ice Cream Day! It’s the one day of the year when everyone seems to be in a good mood. People pass each other on the street with greetings of, “Happy National Ice Cream Day” and “Have a great Ice Cream Day” or “Merry Ice Cream Day to you.” Carolers delight all with their ice cream songs while strolling by houses adorned with ice cream decorations. Kids go door-to-door dressed in ice cream costumes and are rewarded with ice cream treats. It’s the greatest day of the year.

This may happen in some alternate universe, but, sadly, not here. Still, National Ice Cream Day can be a pretty fantastic day. You don’t have to go crazy to celebrate it, but you can make it special. Visit your favorite ice cream parlor and try something different. Get an extra scoop, add those mix-ins you’ve always wanted to try, or treat yourself to a special ice cream dessert like a sundae, banana split or an ice cream cake. Celebrate with others and grab your office mates, friends or family for an impromptu ice cream party.

It doesn’t matter how you celebrate National Ice Cream Day as long as you celebrate it. It only comes once a year.

Ice Cream Social. Lake Kennedy Center. Cape Coral, Florida. Friday, July 13. 1 PM. Free ice cream. (This ice cream social is really to celebrate Parks & Rec Month, but you can pretend it’s for National Ice Cream Month).

Uncle Dave’s Ice Cream Jog ‘n Hog. Shady Brook Farm. Yardley, Pennsylvania. Sunday, July 15. 8:30AM until…. Cost is $45 and a non-perishable food item to be donated to the Penndel Food Pantry. Racers will jog two miles then stop to eat one quart of Uncle Dave’s vanilla ice cream.

Ninth Annual Ice Cream Sunday. New Mexico Farm & Ranch Heritage Museum. Las Cruces, New Mexico. Sunday, July 15. 12 Noon to 4PM. Admission: $4 for adults; $2 for kids 17 and under. The event features an ice cream sandwich eating contest and race.

Blueberry and Ice Cream Festival. Fort Hills Farms. Thompson, Connecticut. Sunday, July 15. 1PM to 4PM. Free event. Samples of The Farmer’s Cow ice cream flavors including Buckets of Blueberries. Bluegrass music.

Free Ice Cream. Circle N Dairy. Gainesville, Texas. Monday, July 16. 10AM to 12 Noon.

Complimentary Ice Cream. Free to guests staying at Omni Hotels & Resorts. Tuesday, July 17. 4PM to 6PM. Event features Design-Your-Own Sundae Bar.

Mars & Six Flags. Tuesday, July 17. Mars and Six Flags Amusement Parks have teamed up to celebrate National Ice Cream Day. The first 200 guests to arrive at each park will receive a wristband giving them VIP access to select rides. The day will also feature an ice cream social from 4PM to 5PM.

Bishop’s Homemade Ice Cream is just one of the many ice cream parlors featured on New Hampshire’s Ice Cream Trail.

We’re fast approaching the halfway point of National Ice Cream Month. If you haven’t celebrated the greatest month of the year just yet, there’s still time.

A wonderfully unique way to mark National Ice Cream Month is to go on a ice cream road trip. The east coast features three ice cream trails for those adventurous types.

The newest of these, Maryland’s Ice Cream Trail, covers seven of Maryland’s finest creameries. Before you fill up the tank and put the car in drive, print out your passport to be stamped at each location. Submit your completed passport to Maryland’s Department of Agriculture for your chance to win free ice cream and other prizes.

A little further north is Connecticut’s Sundae Drives. The Nutmeg State’s trail covers close to forty of the state’s best places to get ice cream with each location categorized by the type of ice cream served.

While I would imagine that at least one of Connecticut’s ice cream shops serves up nutmeg ice cream to honor that state’s nickname, I’m hoping that isn’t the case for New Hampshire’s Ice Cream Trail. The Granite State’s trail features thirty-two of the state’s finest ice cream joints with none (crossing fingers here) offering rock based ice cream. Although, I’m pretty certain you can get Rocky Road if you ask nicely.

When I wrote the blog, I wasn’t sure what was meant by “world’s biggest ice cream.” I envisioned a very large scoop or container of ice cream. That shows my lack of imagination. Chef Blumenthal’s creation was an extremely large ice cream cone.

The cone and ice cream measured over 13 feet tall with a ton of ice cream. Freezing the ice cream took an entire month. Things got a little sticky when it came time to apply the strawberry sauce. The chef had rigged a catapult to shoot the sauce at the massive cone. Sadly, most of it didn’t stick.

Minor hiccups aside, Chef Blumethal (and team) now hold the record for the World’s Biggest Ice Cream.

You can win five Uncle Harry Ice Cream Rolls during July.

I’m giddy with excitement. Think six-year-old on Christmas Eve times three. That pretty much describes my state with the first day of July fast approaching.

Why would a grown man be so excited about the month of July? Twenty-eight years ago, President Ronald Reagan designated the seventh month of the year as National Ice Cream Month and said it should be observed with appropriate ceremonies and activities.

What gets me so stoked is that people, businesses and towns take the “observed with appropriate ceremonies and activities” to heart. There’s free ice cream, ice cream celebrations, ice cream events and more ice cream. I’m researching these “appropriate ceremonies and activities” and will alert you to them as I find them (some are below).

To honor National Ice Cream Month, I’m launching my own ice cream giveaway on Facebook. Each week in July, one winner will get five Uncle Harry’s Ice Cream rolls. Please visit my Facebook page for details and your chance to win.

OK, here’s a sampling of what’s coming up for this weekend and National Ice Cream Month.

Twenty-Fourth Big Dipper All-You-Can-Eat Ice Cream Festival. June 30. Elm Park, Worcester, Massachusetts. 10:30AM to 5:30PM. $5; $1 for ages 4-9, Free for 3 and under.

Super Scooper All-You-Can-Eat Ice Cream Festival. June 30-July 1. Great Plaza at Penn’s Landing. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. 12 Noon to 5PM. $7 donation to benefit the Jashua Kahan Fund and the fight to cure pediatric leukemia.

Serendipity Ice Cream. McMinnville, Oregon. On July 4th, the shop will be serving up free ice cream.

Meli-Melo. Greenwich, Connecticut. Ice cream flavor naming contest.

The Heritage Museum. Henderson, North Carolina. July 4. Ice cream social. 12 Noon.

The lone competitor in a different kind of summer games.

In 30 days, the United Kingdom will be the focus of the world as Olympic athletes begin competing in London’s 2012 games. In just 4 days (and 26 days before the Olympics), an Olympic-sized ice cream event takes place in Gloucester, England, thanks to British Chef Heston Blumenthal.

Earlier this year, I  wrote about reindeer ice cream Chef Blumenthal created for his Christmas special. Famous for his innovative cooking methods, the chef has starred in a string of television programs in which he exhibits his culinary artistry.

This Saturday, June 30, the chef will reveal a creation that he hopes will take the gold in the ice cream records book — the world’s biggest ice cream. The event will be filmed for one of his television shows and will include an examination of Britain’s love of ice cream.

The behemoth-sized ice cream will be served to those in attendance, so book your airfare now. You can stick around afterwards to catch Wimbledon and the Olympics. Of course, both will probably be a letdown after witnessing the world’s biggest ice cream.

Senator Jeff Sessions gets the scoop in DC.

Together, we can lick this. That could have been the campaign slogan for an event that finally brought political parties together in Washington. Democrats and Republicans (and their families) convened yesterday for the 30th Annual Capitol Hill Ice Cream Party and were treated to an ice cream extravaganza.

Sponsored by dairy associations, the event boasted over 2,000 gallons of ice cream and yogurt, 6,000 root beer floats and 44 cases of sundae toppings. Congress would need every bit of cool relief as temperatures soared into the nineties during the late-afternoon party.

You don’t need to be a major power broker to enjoy an ice cream party. Depending on where you live, you’ll probably discover an ice cream event near you. Here are some I found happening around the country.

6th Annual Old-Fashioned Ice Cream Social in Atlanta, Georgia. Area restaurants will be serving up their ice cream creations in the garden of St. Phillips Cathedral June 23 from 12:30PM to 2PM.

Texas-Sized Ice Cream Contest. Even if it’s small, it’s big if it happens in Texas and this Saturday, June 23, you can bet the homemade ice cream contest at the Winnsboro Farmer’s Market in Winnsboro, Texas, will be big on flavors. The market opens at 8AM with tastings starting at 10AM. The winner is announced at 11AM or when the ice cream is sold out.

Ice Cream & Puppets. On Tuesday, June 26, you can enjoy ice cream and a puppet concert at Trinity Bettendorf Healing Gardens in Bettendorf, Iowa.

It’s always a good idea to have an ice cream truck around you when stuck in traffic.

Being stuck in traffic is never fun especially when it becomes a parking lot. Add high summer temperatures and you’ve got a recipe for misery. This was the case for motorists recently on a British highway. Fortunately for them, they didn’t have to wait long for relief.

No. Cars didn’t start moving. The driver of an ice cream van who was also stuck on the highway decided to open for business. A new jam formed as people quickly lined up at the van. Thankfully, that one moved rather quickly.

It’s free ice cream day today in Cleveland and Detroit. You can get free Moose Tracks ice cream today at Public Square in Cleveland as part of Denali’s 10,000 Scoop Challenge. In Detroit, Hudsonville Ice Cream is hosting the Hudsonville Summer Extravaganza where they will be scooping out free ice cream. If you get there between 11 and noon, you can have your ice cream scooped by Detroit Tigers’ Alex Avila.

In Long Island, families will have to go without ice cream as Nassau County is experiencing a shortage due to distribution problems. Thankfully, there is a solution for all those going without their favorite treat. Uncle Harry’s Ice Cream cakes can be found at the BJ’s Wholesale Club,  Brush Hollow Road.

The Ice Cream Brrrger

Last summer I blogged about a hamburger that was topped with a scoop of ice cream. Not to be outdone, sibling restaurant chains Hardee’s and Carl’s Jr. have created an ice cream brrrger. For a buck, ninety-nine you get an ice cream sandwich that does a pretty mean imitation of a hamburger. There are sugar cookie buns, chocolate ice cream for the meat, and red, yellow and green icing for the ketchup, mustard, and, I guess, pickle relish.

Officially designated Ice Cream Capital, LeMars, Iowa is in the middle of it’s 26th annual Ice Cream Days with a parade, activities, and plenty of ice cream.

Starting this evening (June 16, 2012), the city of Hudson, Ohio begins it’s Screen on the Green movies which kicks off with an ice cream social.

If you find yourself in Geneva, Illinois next week, head over to the Swedish Days Festival. In addition to a host of activities and attractions, local restaurant Colonial Cafe & Ice Cream will host an ice cream eating contest.

Finally, Ruby Falls at Lookout Mountain, Tennessee is hosting an  ice cream festival for the entire month of June. There will be free sampling and a cavern scavenger hunt for kids.