Two days after Brian's birthday we celebrated Lincoln's First Birthday.

I can't believe it was a whole year ago. He has grown a little since then.


I took advantage of the nice weather and took some pictures of the kids in our yard.


Opening presents with a little help.




The boat cake that I made...


and a fish to go with it.


We were trying to get a picture of him with his cakes, but he was more interested in eating the cake.



He loved the cake!
Audrey made the extra letters for Lincoln.


Yummmmmmm!!!!!!!!!!!!


Carter was a good big brother and tried to clean him up a little.

Here are a couple of videos of Lincoln eating his cake.

The best part of spring is bouquets of dandelions lovingly picked by little hands.

I am not much of a baker. Mostly I do holiday baking, sweet rolls for Deer Season and Christmas, strawberry pies for the couple weeks they are in season, and Hot Cross Buns for Easter. So I made big plans to get some baking done while my parents were here the weekend before Easter. Mom and I had planned on spending a day working on Hot Cross Buns, bread, and whatever else sounded good that day. 

We didn't get started quite as early as we would have liked that Saturday. Taking care of kids (and Grandma cuddling with the kids) along with talking and catching up took up most of our morning, suddenly it was afternoon and we had lunch to get and all our baking to be done.

While I got lunch going mom started mixing the dough for the Hot Cross Buns. I put potatoes in the oven and waited, and waited, and waited. They were sure taking a long time to cook. Opening the oven, I felt heat come to meet me, so I closed the door and waited some more. Wow, they still were not done yet! Wait a minute, shouldn't that bottom element be red from the heat?  That's right, the element was burnt out. We turned the broiler on and ended up with potatoes that were still slightly raw, and very well done on top.

Now what to do? There is no way we could bake the hot cross buns now! A quick call to the neighbors and we discovered they were not home. Another quick call, "pretty please can we borrow your oven?" and we had a plan. We raced out the door with our rapidly rising dough. As I drove, mom sat in the passenger seat forming the dough into rolls, it was growing and growing! Every time I turned a corner the rolls would slide across the greased sheet pan. Finally we arrived at our destination and were able to cook our rolls, which turned out beautifully, despite the circumstances. And we had the added benefit of getting to spend some time with a great friend!

Thanks Carrie, for saving our rolls, and letting us invade your house on such short notice!

We looked at our old oven, it was not a deluxe model. In fact it was one of the cheaper versions available 30 years ago when our house was built. It cooked really hot, so hot that I usually had to reduce the temperature by 25 to 50 degrees and it still took less cooking time than was called for! I learned to watch everything closely or I would end up with a burnt mess. This was the second time in less than two years that the element had burnt out for no apparent reason. We debated just buying another new element and seeing how long this one would last or investing in a whole new unit. We have been wanting to update our kitchen ever since we moved in, and even though a full blown remodel is still years in the future we decided to just go for it and get the oven that we have been wanting.

We hit a couple of stores to see what was available. Sears had a good selection (and sales!) and also knowledgeable salespeople. We looked and discussed models, looked some more, browsed the store while thinking it over (where I found the cutest sweater on clearance for $8!) and finally went back to place our order. The salesman punched the code of the oven we had chosen into the computer. It would not be in stock for 2 weeks! He looked at some other models, every single one of them was either not available at all or at least a 2 week wait. We had really been hoping to have a new one within a couple of days, now we were looking at a two week wait. How hard could it be, right? We had our grill and the stove top still worked, we decided we were willing to wait the two weeks. To make it up to us the salesman was able to get us an oven two models up from the one we had originally been looking at, for the same price! WooHoo!!!

We really missed having an oven for two weeks, but we didn't starve. In fact, we may have put on a few pounds!

I was not one bit sad to see that ugly old oven go.



I love my pretty new oven! I am almost inspired to do some baking.

We have had a few Doctor's appointments lately. I finally got around to doing Carter's 2 year well check (only 2 months late!) and Lincoln's 6 month well-check (Only a month late!). The boys are both doing great, Carter didn't even cry when he got his shots! It was a miracle!

Lincoln's weight at 7 months is 22 lbs 6 oz.

Carter's weight at 2 years is 24 lbs 5 oz.

Here are some pictures from a couple of weeks ago before church.
I don't know why Audrey has this cheesy, fake smile.


Lincoln is sitting up really well. I just keep the pillow there because sometimes he forgets that he can't lean back and then...BOOM!


Carter wouldn't join them on the couch. Apparently Lincoln thought that was hilarious!