Birthday Wrap-Up

Both Mike’s and Michaela’s birthdays are behind us now, as is Christmas. Honestly, I don’t know where the time goes!

Mike requested Korean BBQ for his birthday, so Michaela and I gladly indulged him. We were too busy eating to snap any pictures, but I think (I hope!) Mike started 42 off right.

As for Michaela, she had a looooong birthday celebration. The weekend before her birthday, we hosted 10 of her friends at Cerami Cafe, a place where you can paint your own ceramic figure.

The girls had a blast painting and then we had pizza and an amazing cake Mike and Michaela made from scratch. It looked like a cat emjoi with heart eyes, and when Mike cut it, the girls literally squealed because take cake inside was blue and purple swirls.

On her actual birthday, Mike was out of town. As I posted on Instagram, I was really worried about how her actual birthday would be. She’s a huge daddy’s girl, and every time her birthday came up in the weeks leading up to it, Michaela cried because Mike would be gone. I tried extra hard to make it a good day for her, making her requested birthday breakfast of chocolate chip-Nutella pancakes (and I *never* make pancakes!) and taking her and her best friend to the movies. Heck, I even splurged on movie theater popcorn/soda/candy packages!

(Side note: how do people afford to go to the movies? We went to a weekday matinee and our three tickets were nearly $30, plus another $30 for the food. It’s nuts!)

After the movie, we wandered the mall and then had dinner at Fuddruckers. We’d never been there, but Michaela requested burgers and there was one at the mall, so that’s what we did. It had a small arcade in it, so the girls played after eating… Before we headed for frozen yogurt! It was hours and hours of fun, and that was before we got home and Michaela saw the helium balloons and presents I’d put around the house for her.

By the end of the night, she was pooped, but had just enough energy to talk to Mike on the phone. It was a good day!

And that wasn’t the end of the celebration. A couple of days later, we went to Corvette Diner, a local restaurant that Michaela really likes. She ordered a giant burger, we got her a balloon animal, and we listened to classic feel good tunes throughout our meal.

The following day, Michaela finally opened her presents from her grandparents, and she spent the rest of the day enjoying them.

Hard to believe she’ll hit “double digits” for her next birthday!