One of my favorite childhood memories was going to the local Friendly’s for an ice cream treat! We got to share the tradition with Mio the other day… Judging from her reactions, I think it’ll be a favorite of hers, too!
Dan and I brought home a little treat for ourselves, too! The Friendly’s Watermelon Roll is a childhood favorite of mine, and it features lemon sherbet on the outside, watermelon sherbet on the inside with chocolate bits.
Dan’s sister Hyo came to visit us for the weekend of May 4-5, which also happened to Cinco de Mayo and Kodomo no Hi weekend! She snapped some great photos of Mio while she stayed with us, which I wanted to share on the blog…
Thanks for the awesome pictures, Hyo! Here are some of my own snapshots (mostly taken on the phone) from the weekend…
Last Saturday, my high school girlfriends and I threw our dear friend Mimi a bridal shower! After getting engaged with a very romantic proposal last October, Mimi and Sujay just tied the knot earlier this month in San Diego with a spur-of-the-moment, intimate marriage/elopement(!) ceremony. While some of our friends were able to attend the beautiful ceremony, half of us couldn’t make it because of scheduling conflicts, and we all wanted to gather to celebrate this wonderful occasion with Mimi! Our friend Juli rallied all of us together and assigned us different tasks to create a lovely and memorable post-wedding bridal shower for the bride.
My best friend Debbie and I were put in charge of cooking and baking all the food for the shower, and we had a great time planning the menu together and cooking together the day of. Thank you Angel for letting us use your kitchen and stepping in to help us with the cooking — we couldn’t have done it without you!
I’m so happy we could come together to shower Mimi with love and wishing her the best! She looked so happy with a newlywed glow to her, and just seeing her and Sujay makes us so happy. They are such a great couple and are just so adorable together when you watch them because you can see how in love they are. With that, I’ll end with this breathtaking picture from their wedding that shows just that!
I’m finally wrapping up on posting on our trip to California from earlier this month! Besides getting to spend a lot of time exploring San Jose, Monterey, and the San Francisco Zoo with Dan’s parents and visiting our dear friends in El Cerrito, we got to also spend some time seeing some of our favorite familiar faces in the area and eating at our favorite spots! There were some delicious eats that I had seriously been missing and craving, so I’m so glad we could get a fix while catching up with some of our dearest friends!
It always feels like our time with friends is too short (especially taking into consideration toddler bedtime), and we wish we could have stayed longer with each of our friends, but we were so happy that we could see them again even for a short time! We are truly sorry for all of those who we were unable to see because of our limited schedule, but rest assured that we will be back soon enough to visit again! :) Thank you also to all of our friends who showered Mio with such thoughtful and generous early birthday gifts… it was totally unexpected and so sweet of everyone. ♥ Our family is so blessed just to have the pleasure of knowing all of you!
Continuing from Day 1 in Los Angeles, we stayed in and relaxed for most of the day on Day 2. March 3 also happened to be Hinamatsuri, or Girls’ Day in Japan, and Megumi went all out to celebrate this special day!
For lunch, Megumi was preparing a Hinamatsuri feast and invited a bunch of her Japanese American girlfriends, as Hinamatsuri is a celebration of girls everywhere! We were all floored by how much food she prepared, all according to the traditional dishes that are served for Hinamatsuri. Of course, she put a few of us to work to help with the food prep. 😉 I love helping Megumi cook/bake — it’s part of the fun, I learn new tips and techniques, and all the effort is rewarded with good eats!
Our time in Southern California was short but so sweet! The LA portion of our trip was over, but we still had lots of fun times ahead of us up in Northern California. Stay tuned!