10 Years Ago....

I gave birth to my first baby...Ian Kenneth Shannon.

It was not an uneventful birth. After my water broke early, the contractions stopped and 19.5 hours later I was finally ready to push. Unfortunately, due to an epidural that never completely "took", I was forced to push without much pain medication.... it took 2.5 hours of pushing to finally hold him in my arms. 2.5 hours of pushing, puking on the nurse, and tearing....a lot. Lets not forget the fact that the doctor had to twist him a full 3 times to get his gigantor shoulders out. "Here is your future football player" the doctor said... all 9 pounds 13 ounces of him. Well, guess what Doc.... Football player he is not. What I got though, was the most lovable, squeezable, kissable, teddy bear of a son that a mother could ever hope for (and he would probably be mortified that I wrote that :) I cannot believe it has been 10 years already. It feels like it was just a couple of years ago..... Words can't express how much I love this kid so I wont bother trying. I am so proud of him....my little Alex P. Keaton :)



We promised him a big birthday party for his entrance into the "double digits". He has been very excited to hit this milestone...much more so than I have - that is for sure. So we invited his entire school class since they have all been together since Kindergarten. I figured half might show up.... out of 24 kids, we had 18 come to the party! It was a smashing success. I rented out the bowling alley at the University of Utah for 2 hours and let the kids go for it. Self contained entertainment....it was awesome, and loud, and crazy but totally worth it. Ian was on cloud 9. Denver was in town for a visit too so that made it even better for him. Also, my mom was in town helping my brother with his boys since Alisa had been out of town on business....it was fun to have her at the party as well.

Here is Addie striking a pose for the camera since she wasn't doing much "striking" on the bowling lanes!

And here is Ian methodically explaining the scientific facts about bowling and how to properly pick up the ball and throw it down the lane.....

Here is my nephew Soren, "secretly" assisting his big cousin in the gift opening department ;)

If you know me, then you know I love to make my kids' birthday cake from scratch each year. This year however, Ian was kind enough to allow me to purchase his cake from Sams Club #1. because I would have had to bake 3 cakes to feed all the guests..... and #2. between my school and our weekly chaos, I would have never had time to do so. It killed me to do it but I have to admit it was such a huge relief!!! By the way, I have to say that for store bought cake, this was pretty dang good...and I am picky.

He got a lot of really fun gifts and his friends were all so cute...they were huddled so close to him while he was opening the gifts that I thought they might literally smother him. It was Awesome....he had such a great time :)