Colton's 6th birthday

I cannot believe my last boy is six!! He is still my baby and in fact I still call him my baby boy every night before bed. He still gives me lots of hugs and kisses and I love that he is still young enough to be genuinely happy when I show up in his class room. I brought him treats today at kindergarten and he ran right up to me and gave me the biggest hug! Made this mom's day:)

He was born 3 years after the 3rd boy. When I was first pregnant, I was convinced this was my girl. He had to be as how could Heavenly Father give me 4 boys? He was also going to be our last child so he had to be a girl. I have to say I was so upset when they said he was a boy at the ultrasound that I cried. Kind of silly but I did. I am so glad he was a boy as we were intended to have 4 boys in our family. I always teased Grandpa Rhoton that he kept praying for boys and to stop. He wants to have the Rhoton name carried on. He did pray for a girl with Camryn!

I was put on bedrest with him at 7 months and wondered how I would ever do this with 3 other kids. I had 4 of the best friends in the world step up to the plate and bring me dinner for the entire time I was on bedrest. No one asked them to, they just did. It was such a relief for me and Colton only came 2 weeks early so I know the blessing of them bringing in meals helped relieve that stress part for me.

He was born at 9 pm at night after laboring and walking the halls and outside of the hospital for 5 hours. He had red hair just like the previous 3 and looked just like them too. Rich and I laugh as we said we have a mold going on and he did not break it! He weighed 7lbs 3 oz and is the biggest baby I had. I feel blessed to have had smaller babies as it made for easy delivery. We chose the name Colton as it was one that my dad had said he liked and we liked it too. His middle name is Mitchell and we stole that from a family friends little boy. We thought it sounded good with Colton. The funniest part is he has a first and last name that sound similar- Colton Rhoton. He got used to the noise at our house very quickly. I could put him in his swing and he would fall alseep all on his own. In fact, when he finally moved to his crib we could not get him out until he was 4! I figured he would not sleep in it forever and he now is in a bunk bed with his sister.

He had a hard time when Camryn was born as she was 22 months behind him. He cried for 2 days straight and reverted back to baby behavior for awhile. There were times I wondered if something was mentally wrong with him or if he was autistic. Come to find out he is just stubborn! If he does not want to do something, he won't. A perfect example is his first day of preschool. He was 3, cried when he got there but I did not get a phone call so I figured he must be ok. I went back to pick him up and he was sitting in the same spot as when I had left. The teacher said everytime she said "Come do this Colton, he would just scream no". Now that he is in kindergarten he has stopped that behavior at school but we do see it at home sometimes.

He also was very shy and was not a talker until kindergarten this year. Our nickname for Colton was BooBoo. Not that he was a mistake but we called him that after Yogi bears little friend. The name stuck for about 3 years. He is now just called Colton. Now I cannot get him to be quiet as he has just blossomed being in school. Our friends, the Nussbaums, say that Colton will talk and talk to them where before he was just quiet. Just ask my dad about the last time they came to visit. Colton talked and talked for the whole first hour after they came. My dad kept asking if it was his bedtime and Colton kept saying nope!

He is finally playing T-ball like his brothers did and is having the best time. He has wanted to play for the last 2 years and is so proud that he is playing. It helps to have 2 of his best buddies on the team too. He actually has a game tonight so I am going to take some pictures. Rich actually cancelled his baseball practice so he could come to his birthday game.

We are so glad to have him in our family and I am truly happy to have 4 boys. Heavenly Father did know what he was doing when he sent him to be a part of our family. Colton, we love you!!