Cherry Dr. Pepper Cake

When I saw those words on a click bait ad I just had to check it out. Haha!

It was a super easy recipe. Basically get a box mix of fudge cake. Pour one can of Cherry Dr. Pepper. Add some cut up maraschino cherries and the batter is done. We made a buttercream frosting with butter and powdered sugar. We added some cherry juice from the cherries. Then topped it with more cherries. SO EASY!

It is a very yummy treat! If we made it again I would cut up less cherries for the batter (but that's because I actually don't like maraschino cherries very much). Otherwise I say this is a winner! Easy, yummy and kids can help bake!

Yum!

Chicago

Dan and I went to see the band Chicago! We got tickets from his sister for Christmas! Such a fun gift idea!

We really enjoyed ourselves!

Birthday Boy

It's hard to believe that the youngest member of our family is FOUR!!!! Wow, how did that happen!?!?

This year we had his first "big" birthday party. We went to a local trampoline park and had pizza and cupcakes. It was a blast!!!

Thanks to everyone who came and celebrated our special boy!

Max is such a fun preschooler. He is smart, organized, funny, determined and shy.

We are so so thankful for his sweet life. Our family wouldn't be the same without him!

Happy Birthday, Max!!! We love you so much!

Our new addition

Over the last few months (and truthfully much longer) Saffryn has been begging us for another animal. She just loves animals. I originally said, "nope!" I know how much work a puppy or kitten is and thanks, but no thanks. Well Saffryn was able to slowly warm us up to the idea (first Dan then me. For the record). We started thinking about what a puppy would look like and what we as a family would want from them.

We obviously need a good family dog. We also wanted one that is pretty easy to train. Saffryn wanted one that would be cute and playful. I knew we would need a medium to large sized dog for our crew. Since we have had such good luck with Crash we started there. After a google image search of boxer puppies Saffryn was sold.

I was able to find a breeder a few hours away and got in contact with them. After a few conversations we put our name on the list for a puppy!

They had a litter born December 5, 2017! We had to wait several weeks before we knew if we were going to get to pick from this litter. The kids had no idea any of this was going on. Dan and I kept it under wraps.

Finally in January we got the go ahead to pick a puppy!!!

These were the first pictures the breeder put up of her!!! We decided on a girl and went with this one.

A few weeks later the breeder updated their pictures to shown how much she had grown!

When we decided to tell the kids we had a little scavenger hunt that led them all around the house that stopped at a picture of her. They were totally shocked!

Saffryn came up with a list of names she liked! So fun!

The big day FINALLY came! Time to go get our new family member!

Introducing Skywalker Diamond Mahoney. Sky for short. Bonus points if you get the full scope of the name :)

We all instantly fell in love with her. She was so tiny and so so cute!!!

Crash is the top picture and Sky is the bottom!

We are all so obsessed with her. She loves to be held and will just snuggle in and go to sleep!

We have had her for about a month! She is really doing great! She is so smart and playful. She is really good with the kids (except when they get her worked up and she gets too rough. We are still working on training all of them. Haha!). She is able to hold her potty and sleep through the night now, yay! She is a really snuggley dog and a fun addition. We love her so much!