Well, the girls fed the ducks.  Spencer fed a dog:

When the bread was gone, Brooke tried to catch a duck:

Caroline posed among the tulips:

Brooke was very proud of herself for finding some duck eggs.  We were proud of her for not disturbing them:

Caroline found a duck to chase.  They were a perfect match; they ran at exactly the same speed so Caroline never made any headway…

…until the duck stopped and she snuck up on it.  Then she gave it a few rough pats:

It was so cold, so of course Brooke didn’t want to wear her jacket.  I put it on Spencer for an added layer of warmth:

We ended the evening with swinging:

The girls were dying to find the eggs but had to wait until everyone arrived:

Caroline’s age group was first:

Then it was Brooke’s turn:

Spencer enjoyed popping bubbles:

After the hunt Brooke inspected her loot.  Notice her outfit – her Easter hat, necklaces, a skirt, and a tutu.  She insisted on the skirt, the hat, the necklaces, and the tutu because she was marrying Wyatt and needed to look “super beautiful.”  Yes, apparently she still fancies Wyatt.  I asked her why she is going to marry Wyatt and she said because he’s a boy.  I pointed out that she has other friends who are boys and she never says she’s going to marry them.  Her response was, “Oh, it’s because Wyatt has such a cute…”

In the split second after she said “cute” I nearly died thinking she was about to state how cute she thought Wyatt was.  I mean, I do think he’s a really cute kid, but surely she’s too young to notice or care about that, right?  RIGHT?

Thankfully she ended her sentence with “bunny.”  Yes, that’s more like it.  The way to Brooke’s heart is certainly through stuffed animals.

When we returned with the inspector now that reality of actual ownership is upon us, this is what we saw

Hopefully with some tender loving care we can return to the higher vision of our new estate and our home can be the mansion it was in our mind .  It is still over double the size of our current home.  In my mind it is still a mansion because we have far more space than we know what to do with.

Why are kids so fascinated with throwing rocks in water?

Really.  This would entertain them for hours.

And if throwing rocks wasn’t fun enough, they found a big one to climb on:

Spencer busied himself by pushing the stroller all around.

Spencer was merely 18 pounds at his checkup.  That put him at about the 6th percentile for weight.

He’s also the 2nd percentile for height and the 60th percentile for head circumference.

He’s such a little guy.  The part of me that wants him to stay little forever is loving this.

The last couple of days Spencer has been transitioning from a crawler to a walker.  Walking now seems to be his preferred mode of transportation.

So I suppose even if he’s not getting much bigger, he is still growing up.

But it did take some work to catch that shot.  The first picture I snapped was quite unfortunate:

A garbage truck drove by causing her to plug her ears:

Not sure what’s happening here:

Awkward arm placement:

Not the greatest pose:

Bingo!

I’m glad we persevered.

I made his cake from scratch.  Coincidentally my mom needed to make a chocolate cake also.  I sent her the recipe I was going to try and asked her to report to me.

She said the batter made so much cake, she filled three cake pans.  The only problem was all the cakes were caved in.  She sent a picture of her attempt (we loved the sunken heart-shaped cake):

I was pretty sure that my mom did something wrong and I was convinced that I could follow the recipe with exactness and my reward would be a perfect, delicious cake.  Imagine my horror when I pulled this out of the oven:

So all you bakers out there — what did we do wrong?  What makes a cake sink in the middle?

Luckily Spencer didn’t care what his cake looked like and Dallas thought it would be great to just fill that hole with a gob of frosting, so we managed our way through that little hurdle.

Spencer opened his presents:

While Dallas was assembling the toy I told everyone to smile.  This is the picture I got:

Cake time!

Despite the crater in the middle, it was a delicious cake.  Spencer loved his piece…and the next day when I pulled it out again, he nearly hyperventilated from excitement.

We held a little photo shoot to document his one-year-old cuteness.

Yes, I am posting a million pictures of my kid in the same pose.

With the same prop.

Yes, I know you think the changes in his face and posture are minimal

and that he looks pretty much the same in all these shots

and that posting one picture would have been (more than?) sufficient.

But I am his mother.  I’ve studied his little face for 365 days.  I’ve memorized his looks and expressions and features.  I see and appreciate the subtle differences in them.

I know that in another 365 days he will have replaced some of these looks with new ones, and the baby that I know now will have evolved into a toddler with a whole new array of quirks and mannerisms.

And at that moment I will be just as familiar with that two-year-old toddler as I am currently with my one-year-old baby.

But at that moment I will be a year removed from this moment, and I will have forgotten things about my baby that I had meant to remember forever.

Thus my compulsion to capture every nuance of this baby while I still have the chance.

‘Cause babies don’t keep.  And that’s a cryin’ shame.