scenes from Eric's birthday

• Our blue-eyed beauty was the BEST little helper while I baked :) I actually really hate baking but it was kinda fun to see how interested Mia was in everything I did. Maybe I'll enjoy it a little more with her around? 
• Eric's favorite... German chocolate cake. I never make the cake from scratch but I always make the frosting from scratch. And I'm proud to say this is the first year (5 years of making him cakes) that I got it right the first try! Mia must be my good luck charm ;)  
• I realize I have pretty small feet... but that's a card that Mia and I made for daddy ;)
• We have been so fortunate each time we move to make some pretty amazing friends! I threw together a little surprise "birthday party" at Dairy Queen for Eric. What can I say? The man loves his blizzards! When we got there, I told Eric I wanted to go eat inside. He was a little irritated because he just wanted to take it home. When we parked he was complaining about how full the parking lot looked so he told me to go check inside and see if there was even a table to sit at. I laughed and told him of course there were tables. He asked me a second time to go check, and I told him no! His reply? "YOU'RE DRIVIN' ME BONKERS!" Ha! And thennnnnn we walk inside and see all of our friends :) It took him about 60 seconds to put it together and then he gave me a pretty sheepish grin and told me I got him good!
• Did I mention that we celebrated Eric's birthday all week? We went to dinner at a hibachi steak house another night! Pretty sure we couldn't even eat half of what was on our plate!
•  I think this birthday was pretty special for Eric. His first one as a family of 3!
• Not pictured: I kicked off Eric's birthday week with a lemon butter cake. I posted the picture on instagram, but you can find the recipe here. We loved it!