Baker Man

When I was a kid, my best friend's sister had an Easy Bake Oven.

On special occasions - Christmas, her birthday - she got the mini cake mixes. Russ and I eagerly awaited those baking days.

 But mostly she was allowed to bake sliced apples sprinkled with cinnamon.

In those days, the Easy Bake Oven was clearly a girl's toy. Well, a couple of years ago, a 13-year old young woman named McKenna Pope set out to change all that. Her 4-year old little brother, Gavin, was hoping to receive an oven of his own - the only problem was he didn't like the pink and purple models. Nor was he comfortable with the packages featuring happy girls. So McKenna went to Change.org and gathered over 40,000 signatures to get Hasbro to join the 21st Century, and start marketing their ovens to both girls and boys. The company listened - and brilliantly invited the Popes to help design the newest ovens, which hit store shelves that Christmas.

Well this Christmas, Niko used the money he received from his Theia Laura (and some he had saved up) and bought himself an Easy Bake Oven.

So far he's whipped us up some pretzels. They were, well, interesting. But I am proud that he is comfortable enough with himself to know that it's OK for a boy to cook!