{Recap} February 2016

February is here!

That means Carter's Birthday and Baby Boy's Birth...and you'll never believe it! 

Read to the end to see what else happened!

My sister did it again! Blew me away with another amazing cake. We've been telling her for years to go into business! But she won't! And you know what...  I'm okay with that! More time for my kids' awesome cakes!!  This is 144 mini cupcakes! Talk about a labor of love for a nephew!

Whipped up these shirts the day before my pre op appointment.

When we had Ellie both boys wore Big Brother shirts, but I thought this lineup fit us perfect!

Baby Brother, Big Sister, Bigger Brother and Biggest Brother!

When I went to my pre op appoint I found out the kids could not come to the hospital to meet baby!

I was devastated! Anyone else ever have this happen?

NYS put an age limit on visitors because the flu was high in the region.

With all my babies that has never happened!

Here he is! Practically perfect in every way! 

Baby boy was nameless until after he was born!

Mommy and Daddy could not agree! 

Mommy and some of the kids wanted Nolan. While Daddy didn't

Once baby was born Daddy came out with Everett. 

I had mentioned once after we found out he was a boy, and Daddy wasn't in love with it.

But clearly he let it sink in, and that was that. Once he saw him, he said He looks like an Everett.

So Everett it is!

Now onto the "fun" of the month.

This is my kitchen. This is my kitchen just days after having baby Everett.

That hole in my cabinets? Used to hold an ancient oven. It finally died.

We guessed it was from 70's but upon taking it out there was a date of 1954 behind the cabinet.

So your guess is as good as mine.  

Either way, because of the age of the oven. New wall ovens are not the same size. 

Our opening for the oven was 28" wide. We were able to find one oven that size, on clearance because it was discontinued. I knew it wasn't going to work. But was hopeful since the price was right, so I came home. Picked out my largest pans (turkey roasting pan and biggest cookie sheet) and went back and sure enough neither fit.  

Back to the drawing board.

With that said, we had to take out the cabinet the oven was in, plus the cabinet under the stove because we now had to look for a one unit stove/oven.  

A little irony for you.When we bout the house in 2007 I though "oh no! This setup is so dated." 

And over time fell in love with it. No bending over to pull turkeys, cookies and casseroles out of the oven. So when we had to get a one unit, my husband and I were a little bummed!  

Now, about that one unit...

Ah. A five burner gas unit.

I am in cooking heaven. 

My husband knows I love to cook, and can.

We went back and forth over electric vs gas quite a bit. But in the end gas won.  

A huge factor was my All American Canner. It is very heavy and it is recommended to not use on an electric glass top stove. Most electric stoves are glass topped now. And if they aren' they are super cheap in price and look/feel.

Now that I have been coking on gas for a couple months, I can say I'm not sure I would go back to electric.  If we bought a house with electric, fine. But eventually I would switch it over to gas. It definitely has its perks!  

So there it is... what a month! 

Don't worry, my kitchen does not look like that anymore! 

Even with a newborn we made progress!