Evan is 5 today!!!

My baby boy is 5 years old today and I remember it all as if it was yesterday. I went into labor around 3:00am the morning after Ryan arrived in town. He had been finishing up some work in Rock Springs before joining us in Laramie, Wyoming. My sister Rose was there helping me move into our new house, so she took care of McKenna while Ryan and I went to the hospital. I was two weeks early but had developed preeclampsia due to my blood pressure shooting up.  My parents flew in as soon as we gave them the word and they were both there to witness the birth of their first mutual grandson. Evan was born at 2:15pm and weighed 6lb 11oz. He was perfect.

Evan has spent the majority of his life making us laugh. He is our comedian. He loves to be laughed at. He always has a big smile on his face and lots of hugs and kisses for me. For now, he is still my baby. I know he is very close to not needing me to love on him so much and I will really miss that. Ryan told me once that he soaks up every hug, kiss and cuddle he can get from Evan because there will come a point where boys don't do that with their Dads any longer. As the Mom I don't have to worry about that, but very soon he won't want to sit on my lap to watch a movie. He will just sit by himself.

I have talked before about Evan's ADHD and that he has a stubborn streak about learning. He refuses to learn anything academic from me. I couldn't homeschool him even if I wanted to (I would never in a million years want to do that) because he will tune me out completely. Thankfully he does better in a classroom environment. I am very excited for him to be going to pre-school this year. While he is technically old enough for kindergarten, Ryan and I feel that he needs to be an older kid in his class. The ADHD will be enough of a struggle. I don't want him to suffer socially because he is the youngest and smallest boy. Kids are mean. Studies show that boys who are older in the class tend to do better socially and academically. We also considered that when he graduates high school we would rather he be 3 months from turning 19 and going on a mission than he have a whole year to bum around and get into trouble. 

One thing I know, Evan will be trouble. He's too cute not to be. If he is anything like the men in Ryan's family he will be tall, handsome, have a great body and be funny. Not a good combination to keep the girls from throwing themselves at him, and a teenage boy can only resist for so long. You can bet I will be training him to respect women and not to take advantage of them. 

He wants to be a pizza maker when he grows up. He told me that one day after McKenna announced that she wanted to be a doctor. Evan quite seriously said, "I want to make pizza when I grow up 'cause I LOVE pizza." I told him that would be great so long as he owns the pizza joint.

Evan does bring a tremendous amount of crazy into our home whether it be making me crazy or him acting crazy so we will laugh at him. We all love him so much and I feel so blessed that Evan is a part of our family. I wouldn't trade him for any other boy in the world.

Today we had a family party. Evan chose to have an ice cream cake with tall blue candles. He was allowed to play wii for and extra long time. He loved that. He opened his presents and was very happy with the bounty. Grandma got him the Indiana Jones Lego wii game. He got a couple of books from Aunt Rose. Aunt Becky gave him and McKenna a kickball croquette game. Ryan and I gave him a huge Lego car center and an Ironman toy. Thanks to everyone who sent Evan presents and birthday wishes.