Truth Told To Taylor

Well tonight at dinner Ryan and I decided that we needed to break the news to Taylor about his best buddy Kenneth, and lets just say it did not go over very well. Taylor started crying and crying and crying. It was so hard Ryan and me, I tried but was not able to hold back the tears. Taylor was so sad. After he cried he started to yell “Kenneth is not my best friend anymore.” Ryan and I assured him that they would always be best friends but that we would just get to find more creative ways to visit with Kenneth. It is so hard to see your little ones hurt. I just wish I could take on all of the pain, that he will ever have, for myself so he does not have to hurt in his little heart. I love you Taylor and I am so sorry that you are missing your best buddy so much.

Great Pictures

Taylor and his “Imporation Trap.” Don’t ask me what in the world an “imporation trap” is, but Taylor feels that he needs one in his room “so the dogs can’t have their secret meetings.” Some days I worry that he is going to grow up to write weird TV series like Star Trek.

Taylor with Emma’s Halloween costume on his head……

The Imporation Trap

Emma and Gymbo

Sad Day...

Yesterday was such an emotional day for me. First I went to the gym (where have not been since before Emma Grace was born over 3 months ago). I know that is bad that I have not exercised in over three months, but I have just figured out how to find time for it in my busy schedule. I don’t know if I was sad because I was going thru a routine that I use to do when Emma was still with me, in my tummy, or if I was sad because my dear friend Ellen was not walking with me. Ellen for those of you who do not know is Kenneth’s mom (Taylor best friend), and the two of us have become so very close over the past four years. Taylor and Kenneth use to get in so much trouble at school because they would bite each other all the time, and thru there bad behavior Ellen and I got to know each other very well. Ellen and I were pregnant together with our second babies (also with our first but we did not know each other then) and we use to meet up after work every day and walk at the fitness center to help keep the weight off. Time would go by so fast when we would walk and talk, and yesterday time did not go by fast. As a matter of fact the whole experienced really sucked.

To make my day that much harder Ellen called while I was walking, and while it was so wonderful to talk to her and catch up she dropped some really sad news on me. Good news for her because I know this is something that she has been working towards, but sad news for me. She informed me that she took her children out of playschool this week and that she has started working from home fulltime. I have not had to the heart to have the conversation with Taylor yet. For, Taylor thinks that Kenneth is still on vacation in Branson with his grandparents, and he will be back soon. He is going to be heartbroken when I tell him that Kenneth will not be in school anymore. This news was also so hard on me because Katherine and Emma Grace will no longer be in school together and might not ever have the opportunity to form that type of relationship that Kenneth and Taylor have. All four of our kids will still have the opportunity to see each other at Church, and Sunday School. And Taylor and Kenneth are going to do Youth Wrestling together this fall. And I know that Ellen and I will do everything that we can to keep the kids close but it is still hard. I think this is harder on me then it will be on Taylor - if I ever get the nerve to tell him where is best friend has gone during the day.

Emma to the Doctor

Today I took Emma to the doctor because she has not been feeling well – she has a cold and I really just wanted to get here ears checked to make sure she did not have an ear infection. Darn that playschool – three weeks in and she is already sick. Oh well I guess I cannot shield her from it forever. Her ears were fine by the way she just has a little cold. The reason I am writing this post is because at the doctor today Emma Graced weighed 11 pounds and 9 ounces. She is getting very big.

Saturday with the Kids…..

I had the most incredible day with my two babies today. To help set the story up I will start with the fact that Ryan had worked all night Thursday night, all day Friday, most of the night Friday night, and then he had to get up early and work this morning and most of today (darn that Wal-Mart IT department). If you can’t tell I really don’t care for when Ryan’s gets the Wal-Mart pager. With all this being said we had to get out of the house today to leave daddy to his work. We started off by going to the Bake Sale/Pumpkin Patch at our church. Taylor has really enjoyed picking out pumpkins this year. Against my better judgment I did let Taylor pick out one pumpkin and one gourd, well I told him one pumpkin but some how he talked me into a gourd. He is quite the negotiator and one day he is going to be a great lawyer or sales person. I say against my better judgment because we have at least 25 pumpkins and gourds on our front porch already. Oh well the money goes to the youth group at our church. And the money that we spent at the Bake Sale actually goes to Taylor’s playschool, so I keep reminding myself of that every time I take a bite of the scrumptious Kentucky Derby Pie that we brought home. (And I wonder why I can’t loose all of this baby weight that I have put on.) The highlight of my day though was going to the movies with Taylor and Emma. We went to see the Beverly Hills Chihuahua– terrible movie but awesome relaxation time with my little ones. I got to snuggle with Emma for two hours straight and Taylor leaned up next to use close while watching the move intensely. It really was one of the best days that we have had in a long time. My Taylor is growing up so very fast so I just treasure the time when he snuggles up to me close like he did at the movie today. When I was tucking him in tonight I asked him “if I could just sleep in his bed with him tonight so we could snuggle all night,” and his response was “Mom this is a one man bed.” Oh well I guess I enjoyed it while I could.

Emma Grace - 13 weeks old

Check out my baby girls mullet. She is getting so bald – as you can see she has a really bald ring around the back of her head.

Taylor always has his finger in his nose and I guess he is starting to rub off on Emma Grace:

Emma in Taylor's old PJ's:

My Family

The Pumpkin Man:

Taylor and his Teacher Ms. Deb

Taylor and his corn:

I don’t think that I will ever let Emma wear this outfit again

because she looked too grown up in it.

Friend in Need

Dear Friends-
As many of your know one of my friends/sorority sisters, Laine Virtue Harper gave birth on August 24th to a beautiful little boy named Leighton Clement Harper who has Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome. On top of Leighton’s heart problems Leighton was born 10 weeks prematurely. As you can imagine Leighton and his family have had a long and stressful last two months. Laine’s little boy is currently still undergoing treatment at the Little Rock Children’s Hospital where he is expected to be for several more months. At this point the doctors are saying that he will need a heart transplant before he is able to return home.

Before taking up a second residence in Little Rock two months ago, Laine and her husband Rich lived in Lowell, AR, where they both run their own businesses. For those of you who are unaware, Lowell is roughly three and a half hours from Little Rock. As you can imagine, the past two months has been emotionally and financially draining on their family. I would first like to ask that you keep this beautiful family in your thoughts and lift them up in your prayers. In addition, I would ask that you prayerfully consider donating to the Harper family fund. You can make donations by choosing any one the three options listed below.

If you would like to follow Leighton’s progress you may do so by visiting: http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/leightonharper



Options for Donations

Arvest Bank Deposit Directions:
You can mail a check to the following address. Please include with the check a brief explanation that says “you would like the following deposited into Leighton Harper’s account, account number 54236370.

Arvest Bank – Bentonville
P.O. Box 1229
Bentonville, AR 72712

You can wire your donations by calling 479-271-1253, and giving them Leighton’s account number of 54236370.

PayPal Directions:
Or if you would like you can use PayPal and send your donation to me, and I will be depositing all money into Leighton’s account on a weekly basis. My email address is coblelaura@hotmail.com – if you already have a PayPal account set up my email address is all that you to send your donation.

Laine, Rich, and Leighton all need our thoughts and prayers right now. Thank you so much for your time and donation consideration.

God Bless,
Laura

Emma Grace Is Three Months

Oh my – I can’t believe my baby girl is three months old today. Three months equals 13 weeks, or a quarter of a year, or 92 days – however you look at it is a significant amount of time that is going by so very fast. Time has gone by fast with Taylor also, but it seems like it is 10 times fast with two babies. I say all this to say that I can’t believe my baby girl is already a fourth of a year old. Every night from 8-10:00 Ryan and I sit on the couch together and I just hold Emma tight, and the whole time I am thinking if this time could only last forever I would be the happiest person in the world. I know they have to grow up but I just wish it were not so fast.

Now that Emma is 92 days old she is able to hold her head up on her own, laugh out loud, sit in brother’s lap on her bottom, watch Baby Einstein movies, and sit at the table with us in her high chair while we eat dinner. She loves playschool and all of her teachers just love her. She is doing artwork at playschool which includes coloring with markers, crayons, and finger painting. She is a great baby and we are so thankful she is in our lives.

Happy 3 month Birthday Emma Grace – we love you bunches!!!

Upcoming House Plans

Well as I mentioned before my parents are picking and moving to Baton Rouge for a few years. They will be keeping their houses, land, and all 5000 of their animals. Well 5000 is an exaggeration but they have quite a few: 3 dogs, 10 horses, and a ton of cats. They are going to need some help with all of this while they are gone, so they have asked Ryan and I if we would be interested in helping with their animals and moving into their house to housesit. Ryan and I have talked about and decided that since we are going to be looking after their animals for them it would be a lot easier to be down there with them all the time instead of commuting back and forth. Therefore, we have decided to put our house on the market and move to the Bullington’s farm. I think it will probably be a lot of fun (even thought it is going to be a ton of work). My parents have much more room than we do and the kids will enjoy playing on the farm and spreading out in their house. I always enjoyed living there when I was growing up and I hope that we can create some special memories for our children. By the time my parents get back from LA we plan to have our dream house built and moved into.

I say all this to say that these next few weeks will be crazy getting the house ready to put on the market. It is amazing the things that you put off doing until they have to be done. For example we have been meaning to landscape around our shed for 3.5 years, but have never gotten to it. Ryan got started on it this morning and it has taken him all of about 4 hour to get the hard part done.

If anyone knows of someone who is in the market for a nice 3 bedroom, 2 bath house in Bentonville please pass our info along.

I am going to miss this house. This is the house that my Taylor has grown up in and the house that we brought Emma Grace home from the hospital to. It has done us good.

Emma Update

This week I insisted that Ryan take some cute respectful pictures of Emma right before she was getting in the bathtub. Well evidently she did not appreciate it because she tinkled all over me.

This is Emma handing out in her high chair during dinner. We were tired of watching her in her swing from across the room while we ate dinner, so we put together her high chair so she could join us at the dinner table. When I was looking at her in this great big high chair all I could think was isn’t amazing how something so small can take up so much room in your life.” I just love by babies so very much and I thank God for them and Ryan everyday.

Emma wearing one of Taylor's old outfits.

Taylor and the Pumpkin Decorations

Each year Taylor loves to decorate for the holidays, and every year it has been a struggle to help guide him to make his decorations look presentable. Well this year with two children I just don’t see to care because outside my house right now, right on the sidewalk leading up to the front door are three rows of pumpkins that Taylor strategically placed there. They have been there all week and have not bothered me at all. I am glad that I am finally starting to get over that obsessive compulsiveness. Below are some pictures of Taylor at work.

Finished Product:

Taylor and the Otter

Taylor’s teacher Ms. Deb is absolutely the best teacher ever. She keeps the children so entertained and they are learning so many valuable things. One thing that Ms. Deb had talked Ryan and I about is Taylor’s lack of participation during circle time. She said he get really shy and refuses to talk when the other kids are around and all looking at him. (She says that is absolutely not the case when he is one on one with either her or one of the other children. She says in setting like this sometimes she has to ask Taylor to go play in a center because he is talking so much she cannot get the things done she needs to do.) Back to the story – Ryan and I have been working really hard with Taylor and trying to do thing that will help him participate in group settings. We are really making progress because this week he brought in a pumpkin/gourd that looked like an acorn, and he talked about it during circle time. The week before he brought in a dinosaur book and talked about it and then Ms. Deb read it to the class.

Each week the children get to take home a bag of books and a stuffed animal - they call these kits book buddies. This weekend in Taylor’s book buddy was a magazine about Sea Otters. Taylor absolutely loved this magazine and loved learning about the Sea Otter. So this week for circle time he is going to give a book report over the magazine and he is also going to bring in a stuffed sea otter that his Aunt Emily gave him last year.

Another good story – the reason Emily gave Taylor the sea otter was because I had taken him to see the documentary Artic Tale. It was about the current environmental impact global warming is having on the Polar Bears and the Walruses. For some reason during the whole movie Taylor kept calling the walruses “sea otters”, and for a long time after that he refused to call them anything but a sea otter. Emily picked up on this and found him a Sea Otter lovey at the NYC Central Park Zoo. I promise I do not make my children watch documentaries but Taylor asked to go and see this Artic Tale and he loved the full two hours of it. He loved it so much we now own it on DVD. I do highly recommend it though for adults it is great movie – very eye opening.


Thank you Ms. Deb for working so hard with our little boy, and thank you Aunt Emily for the Sea Otter.

AD Space

I have a HUGE favor to ask everyone…. If you get the opportunity please click on the corporate advertisements that you see on my blog. I decided to try this functionality as mostly a test to see what paid advertising is like. Don’t know if I will keep it up, but wanted to try it to see what type of revenue you can actually earn. I will follow up in a future blog as to the outcome of this test. Thanks for your participation.

Emma and Lucy

Attached are a few shots of the girls that I stole from Mary's Blog. At least one of us always has our camera!

And She Poops – Finally….

Well poor Ms. Emma sometimes has a hard time going to the potty and as of last night it had been three days since she had gone potty last. So yesterday I called the doctor (they are so sick of hearing from me) and she suggested a ½ teaspoon of brown sugar or Cayro Syrup mixed in a bottle, so we tried both. Well it seemed to do the trick because today she has gone potty 8 times!!! Hip Hip Horay!!! It is amazing how the little thing stress mom out.

Flowers for Mom

On Saturday I took the kids to the park to try and get out of the house while Ryan was recovering from his gunk. While we were there Taylor picked me a precious little yellow flower and told me “it was for me, and it was beautiful like me, and how much he loved me, etc.” The flower looked like the one below.



By the end of our trip to the park it was past our naptime and Taylor was cranky and he mouthed of to me one too many times. I finally said “alright we have to go now” and I started to walk to the car. To my surprise when we got to the car he handed me several of these not so pretty white weed flowers, and said “here you get the ugly flowers because you are not nice, and you are not my best friend anymore, and I am mad at you, etc.” The flower looked like the one below.



I love you little boy and we will get thru these tough times.

First Day Back To Work

Well yesterday had to have been the world’s worst day, I guess because I was simply dreading the fact that I had to come back to work the following day. But, today has not been too bad. I did tear up when I thought of Emma but I just sit back and remember that she is at a wonderful caring and nurturing place and that everyone there just absolutely adores here. Don’t get me wrong I would much rather be at home holding Emma and watching my line up of daytime TV, that I have become very accustomed to. But I do work for a wonderful company and with a wonderful group of people and they have helped make the transition much easier for me.

Emma is actually in a class of 12 kids, and I personal know 4 of the other children and their parent’s very well. Max is in there and he is one of my sorority sister’s son. Katherine Lewis (Kenneth’s sister) of course is in there. Reese Reid (Tia’s sister) is in there, and Sydney Ferguson who is our church youth directors daughter. For those of you who don’t know Kenneth and Tia are both children and very good friends that Taylor grew up with at Wee Friends.

I just keep telling myself each day will get easier. Each day will get easier. Each day will get easier.............

The Coble’s Have the Stomach Bug

Well today marks the day that three of the four Coble’s have gotten the stomach “garbage” (in the words of Taylor Coble) that is going around. I had it on Wednesday, Taylor had a touch of it yesterday, and my sweet Ryan has it today. I just pray that little Emma does not get it – I’m not sure how her little body will handle it.

I hope that we have not spread it to anyone else that we have been in contact. If we have I am so very sorry. Good news is it only last 24 hours!!!

Taylor calls everything “garbage” these days. My favorite is when he says “Oh garbage” and he does not really pronounce the “r” in Garbage. It is pretty funny, but we try to laugh to ourselves, and encourage him to have a more positive outlook in life.

Picture Update

I don't really have any great stories right now but I do have some new pictures that I wanted to upload.

I do have a prayer request though. I would ask that you keep my friend Laine and her family in your thoughts and prayers. I don’t know what to do for her family right now but pray and ask others to pray. Her precious little boy Leighton was born on August 27th with Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome, and they have been in Children’s Hospital with many emotional ups and downs, ever since then. He is only 7 weeks old and is getting ready to have his second heart surgery. Please pray for Leighton and his family. You can click on this link to view the wonderful blog that his parents created for him. Thank you.

Lucy and Emma 10-10-08 at Mana's:My sweet Taylor in that darn Tie-Die T-shirt. He loves this shirt so much, because his Nene gave it to him, and he request to wear it everyday. That is why you see it in so many of our pictures – I promise do buy him other really nice clothes but he loves the Tie-Die shirt. Thanks so much Nene!!!

Tummy Time 10/11:
Emma saying to me “take this stupid elephant rattle off of my arm.”

Taylor his snake lovey and his gigantic T-Rex lovey.

Just Swingin
G-daddy trying to get Taylor to wear the tackiest Alabama hat that was ever made. G-daddy kept telling Taylor that it was an Arkansas A on the hat, but after he refused to put it on his head I assured my dad that he was not stupid and he knows the differnce between Alabama and Arkansas.

Emma
Emma and Lucy

I did want to put this in writing so I don’t ever forget that at age 4 and a half my Taylor sat down and played a two-hour game of Monopoly with his daddy and me. He played by all the rules and did very well. He had the most money at the end of the game and we figured that made him the ultimate winner. I hope my readers don’t mind my randomness but I really chose to use this blog as more of journal for myself and my children. I love it when others read it but please know that is my number one goal and why things don’t often flow like a book.