Saturday with Mingus

2.23pm - Milk fortified with cream and Midnight Moo chocolate syrup - Mingie's favorite, and one tasty concoction! He'd emptied his sippy cup, so I mixed him a refill and decided to make some for myself as well. Heated it up, too, on account of it being a chilly day, so it was perfect for dipping that toasted whole wheat croissant that was leftover from breakfast - and Mingie agreed! I was worried he might not want to eat or not eat enough, so I was super happy to see him gobbling up one piece of chocolate-milk soaked croissant after another... This was in between two outings to the park, on a sunny but fabulously windy day. And just for the record, Mingie was a perfect little angel the entire day. What a great kid!

I tried to take a picture of Mingus running along the wall, but he was just too darn fast! At the park near his house.4.36pm - a cutesy monkey cupcake that I didn't really think Mingie would eat all on his own....

4.37pm - but once he got ahold of it, there was no letting go! All I got back was the empty wrapper.... Good thing I got a box of six of them :)

5.05pm - and then Mingie wanted some of these, so I had some, too, just to try - and they're nice! Not too sugary.
This is while watching Finding Nemo - we didn't know it yet, but by this time, Mingus was already a big brother! We were totally unsuspecting, though, as we'd gotten a call from the hospital earlier saying that the baby was in no rush and that we might have to put Mingie to bed if it got too late...

but then, low and behold, at 5.40pm Nady called to say that Mingie had a baby brother born at three minutes to five, and that we could come over and see him!

Mingus didn't quite grasp the big news, but he was very willing to interrupt Finding Nemo and go see Mommy and Daddy and some baby that Petra kept going on about and got all teary-eyed over.

So off we went to the hospital, and Mingie fell asleep in the car.

Ritesh came to the hospital, too, and brought flowers and champagne, which was appreciated and enjoyed although I for one was too in the moment to take any pictures. I'm hoping the happy camera-wielding uncle might have captured something. There was so much happiness and excitement it's all a bit of a blur. Suffice it to say that the baby is adorable and has a very catchy name (that I hesitate to disclose as Nady is very concerned about privacy and the name is quite distinctive. So we'll see if I get permission :) and to top it off, we were asked to be the godparents, and very happily accepted. Happy days indeed!

Once everyone went home, Ritesh and I still felt all festive and wanted to celebrate some more, so we decided to go to Robata-ya, a Japanese restaurant that I'd heard about from Nady. In fact, the last email I got from her before she gave birth was a link to a review of this place, so we decided to give it a try in her honor. Plus, you know, our new godson is a quarter Japanese, so toasting his arrival with sake felt like the right thing to do.

9.10pm - sake and Kirin, at Robata-Ya, with Ritesh

9.17pm - an appetizer on the house. Fried chicken skin. Hmmm.

9.20pm - Ritesh's miso soup

9.36pm - rice cake in fish broth

9.40pm - grilled rice cake filled w/ umeboshi plum, plus some grilled asparagus skewers

9.41pm - grilled gingko nuts!

9.42pm - Kobe beef, plain on the right, filled with foie gras on the left. Nady's grandmother is from Kobe, so this was a must.

9.42pm - grilled okra

10.07pm - and some grilled tuna w/ mountain potatoes and okra

Welcome to the world, little Spike!