An Alaska Adventure

These past several months have been quite busy for us in many ways, which should be no surprise since I am sure most of us feel like life, jobs, family and ministry have a way of keeping everyone busy. 

I know this post is about a trip from awhile ago but it was really quite a fun and adventurous trip so we just had to share.  

In June, Tyler and Neal were able to go up to AK for a little over two weeks.  This was a TWR trip that Tyler was taking to visit a few more of our supporting churches, ones we were not able to visit on our last furlough, and share with them an update on ministry with TWR. With such a short time frame to get up to AK (during Neal’s school break) and just the long distance that it is to fly there from the other side of the country, not all of us were able to go on this trip. However, Neal was thrilled to get to go on a work trip with his dad, and they have been sharing lots of great stories of their AK adventures from fishing, hiking, flying rafting and even getting to see a pod of orca whales that they could almost touch from the small boat they were on.

It was quite the adventure and Neal was beyond excited to finally "go on one of daddy's work trips."   They also got to spend some time with family in Anchorage and Neal had a great time playing with his cousins and just enjoying a special trip over school break.

Seeing their pictures and hearing their stories make me miss AK summers, you just can't beat the incredible views of the mountains and the ocean together.  They also had some of the most amazing summer weather that AK offers while there so it made for a extra fabulous trip. 

Home for the Holidays

Is it really 2016 already, and the middle of February at that?   I think it's about time I updated this blog with some of the many things we have been doing over the past several months.   I guess I'll just start back at the beginning of the holidays -- (get ready for lots of pictures)  

With our growing family and the unexpected blessing of the twins we had to change our plans for our ministry furlough, which in turn changed our plans for the holidays.  Instead of going back home to AK and WA over the summer (since the twins arrived this simmer) we decided to take a shortened furlough during ones of Neal's longer school breaks and visit our supporters and churches over the holidays.  This change of plans really was special for us because it meant that we would get to spend the holidays (Thanksgiving and Christmas) back home with family. 

We not only were looking forward to seeing family and updating our supporting churches and friends about the ministry with TWR but we were also excited to finally have a long stretch of time together as a family.   Right before our furlough Tyler's travel schedule with TWR had been very busy and had traveled to over 15 different countries in the span of a few months.    So needless to say we were ready for some time together as a family, and being back home in AK was just an extra special blessing in the mix.  

We had a great time being back "home" and it felt so familiar and comfortable to us.  Our home church had a house on the church property for us to live in while we were in AK for almost 5 weeks.  This house was probably one of the biggest blessings for our family while away for so long since it allowed us to have somewhat of a normal routine to our lives and not have to be living out of suitcases.  

Lot so help feeding the babies 

A small tree for our temporary home

Loving the snow

Our evening were filled with many dinners and ministry nights with supporters and churches and our afternoon were filled with visits with friends and family.  

Ministry night sharing about TWR 

What an encouragement it was to see and reconnect with some of tour closest friends, the Lord has used the friends we still have in AK in our lives in many ways and it was refreshing and encouraging to get to sit and have coffee together again.

As close to real wildlife as we got, except for a few moose we saw in person

Fun with good friends in the snow

We also had a wonderful time with Tyler's whole family who all came back to AK for the holidays.  It was great to have his parents house filled once again with everyone, and lots and lots of kids (way more kids then last time we were all together).   Our time with family was filled with coffee, quilting, computer games, movies, lots of stories, flying and of course food, LOTS of food.

The whole Gates Family

All the Gates Grandkids 

Flying with Uncle JR 

More fun in the snow

A few days before Christmas we boarded the plane and headed down to Seattle to be with my (Laura's) family for about 10 days.  

Movie time while flying

We had a great Christmas celebrating with family and were so glad that we were able to spend some precious time with my older sister and her family before they headed back overseas for their next term in ministry.   We had lots of fun playing games, eating food, watching the kids do a Christmas play and even getting to go to Zoolights.

Gwen and her Poppa 

Grandma and Donny boy 

The cast of the Christmas play

Enjoying Zoolights

New Years day

We were gone for a total of 6 weeks and though we were away from home it felt almost like being home again.    It has been a little hard to get back into the routine of life and ministry again, but we are relying on the the Lord and remembering the encouragement and support that we received while back "home" with our support team.  Living so far away is not always easy, and I still feel at times like we are still adjusting to the transition of the twins but the time we had back home was wonderful and I am so glad that we were able to all be together for several weeks.

Disneyland!

We had the great privilege of getting to go to "The Happiest Place on Earth" while we were in California.  That's right we went to Disneyland!

I, Laura, have so many fun memories from Disneyland growing up from my trips there while in college.  In fact Tyler and I first hung out together at Disneyland (in a group of 20+ people from school), though we don't really remember each other from that day.  It was another 2 years after that trip that we started hanging out.  But that's an old story and this post is all about our recent trip to Disney and Neal's first Disneyland experience.  

We were able to go for 2 days and got to see both Disneyland and California Adventure.  Neal LOVED every part of those 2 days.  He was the perfect age to take and was tall enough to ride every ride he wanted.  His favorite rides were Star Tours, Buzz Lightyear, Thunder Mountain and Space Mountain.  Thunder Mountain was his first roller coaster and after that there wasn't anything he wouldn't try.

I was impressed how brave he was riding everything.  I am not a fan of roller coasters but there was nothing that intimidated Neal.   We got to go the first day with Tyler's whole family and all the cousins.

The kids had a great time all together.  I spend most of the day relaxing in the shade keeping company with those who didn't want to do every ride while I watched Gwendolyn.  Most of the time you would find Gwendolyn sleeping....She did however really enjoy the parade.

She was such a great sport hanging out all day in the stroller and the heat.  It was 104 and 106 degrees the two days we were there, so it was HOT!   My favorite day however was our second day.  We were able to leave Gwendolyn with Gigi and Grandfather and got to spend the whole day with just Neal. Getting to ride everything with Neal was extremely fun and loved his expressions and comments while both waiting in lines and after the rides.  My favorite was after all the roller coasters when he would say, "that was so awesome!"  

We still get to hear stories from him as he remembers all the fun we had and all the "awesome" rides.  Now if you ask about his favorite ride he will pretty much list off every single ride at Disneyland.  It is hard to pick a favorite when they are all so fun, right?  I have always loved Disneyland but going with your own kids is even more fun.  I hope we can go back again one time 'cause it really was "so awesome!"

CA Family (Vacation Part 2)

Some of the best memories and moments of our trip were seeing all the family that we have in CA.  It was not only great being away as a family but also getting to spend time with my (Laura's) extended family that we don't get to see very often.  It's was special to not only see most of my extended family but also to introduce Gwendolyn to everyone.

One of my favorite visits was the day that we spent at my grandparent's house.   The health of both my grandparents has deteriorated lately and we were so delighted to be able to have the chance to go and visit them again.  We loved being able to introduce them to Gwendolyn and for Neal to get to see them. The smiles on their faces when we showed up with the kids was priceless and we could tell that our company was greatly appreciated and enjoyed.

Neal sat in the room with us all and watched the cuckoo clock for quite some time.  That clock is one of the biggest memories I have of visiting my grandparents.  It would always wake us up in the middle of the night and was always in the background of all our playtimes and movie watching when we would visit.  Neal was fascinated and overjoyed every time the bird would pop out.   

My Grandpa loved talking to the kids and my Grandma loved hearing us visit and tell her stories of what we have been doing over the last few years.  Gwendolyn wanted to sit as close to Grandma as possible and was always trying to reach out and grab her hand (or arm or anything).  My Grandma would get the biggest smile on her face each time Gwen would look at her.

It was an afternoon filled with lots of great stories, memories told about my Grandpa's old taxi driving days and about how he and Grandma met.   I will treasure our visit with them for a long time and hope that maybe we can see them again soon.

The rest of our trip was filled with visits to see other extended family and we had so much fun getting to see and catch-up with everyone.

We didn't get pictures with everyone but we sure did have fun mixing family visits with swimming, hiking, movie watching and of course Graduation!

Congrats Aunt the Bud! (Natalie)

She loves the water

Vasquez Rocks

Star Wars watching

Getting ready for the beach