Oh hi hello today my first-born turns TEN which means I’ve been a mom for a decade.

Evan’s birth story post part 1 and part 2 / Evan’s First Birthday / Second Birthday / Third Birthday / Fourth Birthday / Fifth Birthday / Evan turns six / Evan turns seven (I didn’t blog this? weird) / Evan turns eight / Evan turns nine

Getting pregnant with my first baby is what inspired me start this blog, and why it’s called bebehblog. The 2008 internet was a much different place than the 2019 internet, and blogging my thoughts about pregnancy and new motherhood was often my only connection to ANYONE who had been through those things. I didn’t even own a smartphone when Evan was born.

I am incredibly thankful that I have the last decade documented, even the super TMI embarrassing stuff. The older Evan gets the less he wants shared in this space and I am totally find with that. Ten seems REALLY old – I clearly remember my own tenth birthday party and my thoughts and fears and inner dialogs and how I started to worry so much about social situations and clothes and all that stuff. I’m hoping Evan is spared some of that because he’s a boy, but I want to be prepared and available if he does start to feel anxious.

At ten, Evan is a soft-hearted weirdo. He loves to read and build Legos and play video games. He takes trumpet lessons at school and he’s excellent at karate. He has zero fashion sense and couldn’t care less about his hair. He is very kind to his brothers and sister and still loves to cuddle.

This morning when I went into his room to say “Happy Birthday!” I made a point to pick Evan up, like he was still a toddler, because I once read something that said “One day, you’ll put him down and won’t ever pick him up again” and I figured I didn’t want that day to be anytime before today. Having a big kid is both amazing and terrifying and I am looking forward to being his mom for many many more decades.

I asked Caroline what she wanted to do for her birthday this year, since it was just a family celebration and not a party. She said she wanted to get giant milkshakes, like we did for Lincoln’s birthday back in July. Lucky for us, Saturday also happened to be the reindeer visit at Foxwoods and their PR department invited us, so we were going to be headed there this weekend anyway.

Besides the reindeer, they also had a wonderful Santa and tons of Christmas decorations. It was very festive and joyful. My kids were almost well-behaved during our long, backward, sugar-filled lunch. They sang to Caroline and it was the highlight of her month. We learned a lot about reindeer – did you know their antlers fall off every year? Those giant antlers are only a few months old! And when we got home, Finnegan took a 3 hours nap because he was stuffed with french fries and worn out from fun.

We also did presents (all cheerleading-related), made her favorite dinner (spaghetti and meatballs) and had a small grocery store cake for dessert. She told me I am the greatest birthday planner in the world and it was the best day of her life. Considering the effort I put into her elaborate birthdays of the past, I’m just relieved she wasn’t shockingly disappointed. I do think from now on we’ll always have to go to the Sugar Factory for birthdays. Evan already requested it for his day in April.

Tomorrow is her actual birthday and we’ll do our traditional birthday interview. I am guessing every answer will be “cheer” or “unicorns”.

Linc was annoyed we had to wait for 3 whole minutes to see Santa.

Isn’t this the most gorgeous gingerbread house???

We went back to see the reindeer again after lunch.

My husband just got back from severals weeks underway on his submarine, so the amount of laundry in my house went from “a lot but almost manageable” to “mountains”. I’m going to catch up on these posts in the moments when I can’t handle folding one more plain white undershirt.

Sunday:

SUPER PROUD 3 YEAR OLD

Really excited about his insane milkshake

Making the exact same face as Evan above

Monday:

He loves this, I swear

Upsidedown Lincoln

Lego Batman on repeat

Tuesday:

Sunflower day

Family picture

Ready for the cow train

Wednesday:

I’m signing him up for gymnastics

Friends who love your baby are the best

Thursday:

The ocean

Looking for rocks

Weirdos

Friday:

The kids were fascinated with this thing at Stop & Shop

More lake

Finn really likes Cheetos

Saturday:

Pretending I’m a good Navy spouse by making calendar pages

In between laundry loads I also managed to order the week’s groceries and plan the kids fall activities schedule with reminders to register them for various activities as soon as they open. I still need to find Lincoln a morning activity besides swim (the gymnastic class I wanted is only in the afternoon) to help him get some of his wiggles out before afternoon pre-k. The plan is to make all four children as tired as possible so they go to bed by 7:30 every night. A+ PARENTING.