THE GORA LIFE

Sunday, April 15, 2012

Rigby is 2!

alright, well thanks to blogger i can backdate my posts...so although this will be dated as april 2012, no one has to know that i didn't post it until december...yikes! i feel so bad not posting rig's second birthday. i honestly didn't even realize i never did until i was looking back thru the year. ok, here goes!

we decided to keep rigby's party on the smaller side and just invite grandpas and grandmas this year. we figured since he's only two, he won't mind :) and there was actually enough commotion that the party was still a party. rigby requested "elmo" if you can't tell...so we got him a big elmo balloon and an elmo cake. he was in LOVE.

we had some excitement when the balloon got away from it's weight and floated up to the top of our living room ceiling. can you say major toddler meltdown? we decided to get the vaccuum out and use the extensio and believe it or not, once we got the string within reach of the tube, it sucked it right down! whew. disaster avoided.

other than that, we had pizza and cake and a good ol' time :)

some of rig's gifts were:

a big wheels from daddy

a semi with cars on it from papa dan

a winnie the book from mimi and papa overman (with papa's voice recorded in it)

a yellow pick up truck and some cute shirts from grandma and grandpa gora

and a few other things that i know i'm forgetting!

rigby's thoughts..."you.will.be.mine"

hugs for elmo!

the elmo face was actually a ring...rig loved it

MOOOOOOM, MORE CAKE!

uh oh!

men doing man stuff

Monday, April 9, 2012

Easter 2012

the kids did a lot of this....

and some more of this...

and yes, i'll have a little of that

"condeeee" (candy) says rig

and again..."moe condeeee"

(rowan's thoughts)..."this just might be the bestest day ever"
(rigby's thoughts)..."condeeee"

cousins

a family picture...rare...i know

rowan got to stand next to the easter bunny
rigby was not happy about it either

and yet another easter egg hunt

Wednesday, January 4, 2012

Mickey Mouse Parade 2011

We took the kids to Chicago before Christmas to kick-off the holiday season with the parade of 1000 lights or whatever they call it... to us it's the "Mickey Mouse Parade". This year we got there a little later than anticipated and had some trouble parking (we were stuck in a parking garage that was full for quite some time...round and round, ugh) but eventually made it to the parade. Barely though, we almost missed Mickey Mouse! We started to pray with the kids while we circled around in the garage, just asking the Lord to help us find our way to a parking spot and out of that crowded garage. After about 45 minutes we made it to the exit and Derek decided to pull over on the side of the road to let me and the kids out to head to the parade on our own while he looked for parking. He pulled over in front of a restaurant and as we started to unpack the stroller and get the kids in, a valet for the restaurant came out and asked if we wanted him to park our truck. Derek explained that we weren't eating there but going to the parade and the valet wanted to help us out anyway....which of course was a total answer to prayer. Thank you Lord! How often does a valet offer to park your car for $10 bucks in the city...and we weren't even eating at that restaurant. We totally believe it was an answer to prayer. :)

We've been making our outing to the parade an annual thing with our friends Joe & Kelsey Starkey and their two little girls...which is fun. We ate at the Rainforest Cafe, which seemed like a great idea to begin with. Have any of you been there recently? Well, it's not so much fun when you're adult! They pack you in tables like sardines, and it's super sticky and humid. Not what we would call and enjoyable dinner. Plus, we had limited time since all the kids were always a second away from a complete meltdown...oh the joys of being out late with little ones :) We laughed our way through it though like always. I think the trickiest part is finding spots for coats and purses and diaper bags and strollers in the winter in a crowded Chicago restaurant. I think next year we're making an early start and are also dining in (at the Starkey's condo)!

thank you daddy!!

rudolph

keeping warm...it was actually like 55-60 degrees out that night believe it or not!

they weren't too sure about the snake
at the rainforest cafe

rigby liked the alligator though :)

Tuesday, December 27, 2011

merry CHRISTmas!

christmas was super fun this year! especially now that both the kids are old enough to enjoy the thrill of opening presents. derek does such a great job of being the man of the house on christmas morning...he gets up before all of us, gets the fire going, coffee brewing, praise music and jesus pic in place (no joke, this year he had the laptop set up with jesus' bright and shining face waiting for us when we woke up), casserole out and oven pre-heated, bible story prepped and everything ready to go...and then he rings his little santa bell that his dad used to ring when he was little letting the kids know it's safe to come out. rowan and rigby were in bed with me by the time derek got to the bell ringing and rowan jumped out of bed and asked "what's that mommy?" all excitedly. i look forward to the future years when the kids know what it is and wait for it...

the kids got too many gifts this year - seriously - too many. i think next year we might try something different...although i'm not sure what just yet. that's going to take some serious thought and prayer. we want our kids to enjoy all of christmas, but i don't want them to lose sight of the real meaning. the REAL meaning. i keep thinking back about how much focus we all put on gifts and buying just the right thoughtful/wonderful gift for someone...which is a good thing. but how much time do we actually sit and ponder and glory in our Lord? how much did I do that or did we do that as a family??? i'm guessing the one outweighs the other by hours/days to just mere minutes. and that just breaks my heart. it makes me want to re-evaluate my whole life. seriously.

here is some of the awesome-ness we enjoyed at christmas this year :)