Our First "Monthoversary"

Well, we are approaching the one-month mark for our stay in Israel, and what an adventure it has been! I continue to home-school Caleb Sunday through Thursday while trying to include Josiah in some educational activities and meet Abby's needs at the same time. I am thankful she takes both a morning and an afternoon nap. When she is awake, she is quite patient and enjoys exploring the apartment while we do our schooling. She is very mobile now and has even started pulling up on the furniture (yes, she's not even 8 months old yet; she's growing way too quickly for me)! Four days a week, we have "recess" in the local park with other homeschool families. That has been a blessing for the kids to have interaction with other children, and for me to have interaction with other moms.

Abby pulled herself up under the table and then considered herself stuck!

We made creations with raisins and toothpicks the other day.

Josiah had a little help with his. :) He just wanted to eat the raisins.

We've been doing a lot of reading at our house, and Abby wants to get in on it!

(Prayer Request: This week we only made it to co-op recess once because of Abby's naps on two days and because Caleb threw up this morning, so we didn't go today (I think he's okay now though). Please pray that the Lord provides for us to go every day since it is important that we have the interaction with other people and the opportunity to build Community. Also please continue to pray for our health. Abby threw up last week, but she's fine now. My cough is finally gone as of this week. Thank you for your prayers!)

Tim continues to attend classes at JUC Monday through Friday, with field studies on the weekends. This weekend is a holiday, however, so he has Friday and Saturday off. Yippee! We will be celebrating Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement) on Saturday with our friends who helped us get our apartment. No one drives on that day, so we hear that everyone roams the streets - walking, biking, sitting in the middle of the road, etc., so I'm sure we'll have pictures of that for you!

Last weekend, as Tim wrote, we had the privilege of witnessing the celebration of the Feast of Trumpets (Rosh Hashanah) here in Jerusalem. As he noted, our family went to the Western Wall a couple of times to observe what was going on. Here are a few pictures of our experience there. (Photos are not permitted near the Wall, so the pictures you see were taken from up above, outside of the secure area.)

Many Jews wear white on special holidays.

Michelle, Caleb, and Josiah sharing fresh-squeezed pomegranate juice for Rosh Hashanah

The route to the Old City from our house...

The City Wall from afar

The City Wall closer-up

Jerusalem University College (Tim's school) - the building in the center, not the clock tower.

The outdoor theater near the Old City: Two weeks ago, Israel's version of American Idol was hosted live here. We could hear it from our apartment.

Monday afternoon, one of the homeschool co-op families invited us to the Promenade around the corner from us. It is beautiful - a wide, stone path with lots of olive trees, pomegranate and fig trees, grape vines; and... a play structure. :) There are also several viewpoints where we could see the Old City and Temple Mount. Here are a few pictures:

One view from the Promenade path - Jerusalem

The Temple Mount

The Play Structure at the Promenade

The boys going down the slide with their friend Petra

A teeter-totter! The boys were sad when recently our local park pulled their teeter-totter out. Now we have another one we can use!

Caleb doing a chin-up

The view from the top of the play structure - Jerusalem behind them

Our friends from the homeschooling co-op

Another viewpoint on the Promenade path

Other ways you can pray for us...

There are a lot of mosquitoes here, so our kids have bug bites all over them. We have no screens on our windows (just bars), so when we have the windows open at night, the bugs come in. We are thankful it's been slightly cooler so we don't have to have the windows open at night. Please pray for continued cooler weather and for relief from the bug bites (especially for Josiah who scratches them until they bleed).

Our fridge has a personality of its own. Sometimes it reaches the 50's during the day and we have to transfer food to the freezer. Other days it stays cool. Our oven went out on Monday just before we had a friend over for dinner. I had to use our neighbor's oven. Please pray we can get our appliances repaired or that God just heals them! :)

I praise God for the wonderful homeschooling experience we have had so far. I see Caleb learning and working very hard. Please pray for Josiah as it is hard to meet his needs while I am working with Caleb. Even when I have activities planned for Josiah, his attention span is so short that he's ready to be on to the next thing. Pray for creativity for me in working with all three kids.

I am thankful that the heaviness of Ramadan is gone. I was feeling a strong spiritual heaviness when we arrived, and now it has mostly lifted. We have a strong, growing burden for the many lost people here in Israel. Pray we can shine the light of Christ to our surrounding communities.