For Better or For Worse by Lynn Johnston for April 01, 2021

what’d you expect one-year-olds to wish for?

“April got her first wish….And Michael got his first viral Yu-Toob video!”

Happy First Birthday, April! I have two friends whose birthdays are April 1st. Oh boy, the stories their mothers told me about their births….

She won’t even remember this one! ;D

The Happy Birthday Song was copyrighted, so you had to pay royalties if you used it back in 1992. Notice how Lynn Johnston cleverly avoids that by having April’s “AAAHH!” obscure some of the lyrics.

When babies finally get to eat sugar

What is that thing growing out of St. Michael’s head? Is he turning Borg?

This is why you give them their own small cake to destroy.

Only one year old, and already that crawling, babbleling and doing all these activities: a well advanced baby !

And a large baby as well

April’s first on April first.

This is why you give a cupcake to a 1 yr old.

Well… Happy Birthday anyway, April : D

Attempts to preserve such perceived “Hallmark moments” on film (or digitally, as it would be now) more often than not turn into exercises in futility, such as this one did. Oh well……

As it should be. Smile Ellie.

This is why you either don’t make a birthday cake for a 1-year old, or you make 2. One for them to destroy, and one for everybody else to eat.

…because mothers have no control over their babies…

Why would it be fun to let the birthday girl destroy her cake? I was looking forward to a piece of it!

Well, it is her cake. You be you baby. We’ll work on manners next year.

One would think that a white lens cap would be noticeable on a black camcorder. But Michael isn’t that observant. Otherwise, why would he have to ask that question in the third panel?

Happy 30th, April!

And this is why the “smash cake” was invented – a tiny cake for the birthday kiddo to destroy while everybody else gets an unmolested larger cake to share. ;-)

Our one year old put her tiny foot in the cake and we have the picture to show everyone.

That’s one good thing about real albums: we can take it from the shelf and find the picture in no time at all….not this long search that my daughter has to do with her kids’ pictures. She remembers that they took a picture, but finding it is another job, since labelling was put off until “some other time” …

Some people take the fun out of reading comics. Get a sense of humor!

Yup dive right into the cake.

Sometimes the work of a mess is worth the joy in a small child’s face!

Where did the candle go?

My kids never did that when they were one year old. They were raised in a civilized home. Why would Elly get so close to the cake with the baby anyway? Dumb.

That’s why here in the US we’ve learned to make/buy a small “smash cake” for the first birthday.

And if Elly had her way, to avoid any mess, the cake would’ve been a painting on the wall!

We share the same birthdate. Not the same age by far. Glad my parents didn’t go with April for my name, bad enough my mother just picked some random name out of a baby book. Or so I am told.

It’s an April Fools joke

How appropriate. Her showing up unplanned made a fool out of them. My youngest was unplanned. Her birthday is March 31st. I still feel like a fool though.

When my cousin Andy was 1 year old, his folks tried to get a picture of him sticking his hand in the frosting. Wouldn’t do it. Finally they stuck his hand in for him, thinking to get one of him licking it off. Nope – he shook it off.

Hence the tradition of letting the kid have their own cake.

people celebrate a baby’s birthday who will never remember it, while elders cry in nursing homes because no one cares to remember them. Depressing Reality I know. Happy Birthday April Baby.

Grabbing the icing on the cake while saying “Ah gah”? This will be both April’s first birthday, and Marian’s last birthday! :P

My grandmother always resented being born on April Fool’s Day, she felt it beneath her dignity.