Fast Decisions, Perfect Timing

You know how with some decisions or plans, the parents' gears grind painstakingly slow. On rare and highly treasured occasions those aforementioned, slow gears suddenly switch into high gear and all is completed before you have time to process what happened. Such was the case two weeks ago when Darren and Maggie heard through one of Caleb's little friends about a kennel in the Galilee that bred, showed, and sold miniature schnauzers. Having been looking for just the right dog and waiting for just the right time, the decision was made and Darren, Maggie, and Beka went north to pick him up. He was just as wonderful as the reports they had heard. He was friendly and playful but was balancedwith a mellow personality that makes him great company. He loves to play catch, as you can see in the video, and the way he pounces on the ball and prances around is adorable!

Artistic Bugs

Here are more of my Nathan requested creations. This time our materials were mini pipe cleaners. Our theme was bugs. You may think that my rolly-polly (potato bug) looks like a caterpillar and my spider looks like a ladybug, but my excuse is my limited color options. You can judge if my excuse is legitimate or not! :)

It's All In Who You Know

When we were living in Maryland, we attended a small Presbyterian church about 25 minutes away. Also attending that church was another military family with five kids. Their dad was in the air force and is one of the pilots for Air Force 2. While we didn't have the time to get together often, our similar goals and lifestyles made us good friends.

Now, with all of Condi's visits to the Middle East, we have been able to visit the dad whenever he flies her over. Each time he comes, he has offered to give us a tour of the plane and on this trip, the timing was perfect. They had a long day with a flight to Egypt and back, but once they had cleared the plane (we didn't get to see Condi. Bummer!), they let us back to the secure runway. As the flight and security crews were shutting down the plane for the night, we got the grand tour from the entrance to the tail and back up to the cockpit. It was tempting to ask for a picture in Condi's chair in the private lounge under the Secretary of the United States plaque, but we contented ourselves with just looking. Everyone got to sit in the cockpit, though.

Aquaba Adventures

What are some of the advantages to being blond in a Middle Eastern country? Most recently, the advantage was driving our dive boat. A group of seven of us travelled to Aquaba, Jordan two weeks ago for a weekend diving trip that Alex had planned. Every day we walked next door to the dive shop, gathered our gear, and drove out to the "Royal Yacht Marina." Wow! What a beautiful black and with gold edging yacht that we are walking up to. Oh, that's the King's boat not ours. Keep walking past it to the one a few boats down. Oh, a rowboat...th-th-that one is nice too. Just joking. Here is the bridge on the upper deck where I got to drive. Good thing it was all the way from the Saudi border to the port because it took me a bit to figure out how to go straight. The delayed reaction to the wheel had me veering in a zigzag pattern until he covered the compass and I focused on a far away object and just headed straight for it.

Every day we did two dives with lunch and relaxing in between. This is Jody and AnnMarie on the upper deck of our boat. The underwater sights included reefs and wrecks. The wreck was the most fun because we could dive in, under, and around it. Cables, decorated with bright coral and seaweed, were strung like Christmas lights up to the ship's highest tower. It no longer proudly rose over the ship's deck but jutted out into the "deep blue" running parallel to the ocean floor which quickly dropped out of sight below it. As we swam between the mast and it's cables, we saw a slender, solitary fish, about a meter long, suspended above the wreck. It's lower jaw jutted out, and if you swam closer than was comfortable, you could see his uneven fangs jutting out. The barracuda just hung there, overlooking his surroundings. We gave him a wide berth and continued exploring.

On the dive that was the most fun, we swam down to a flat surface on the ship and let all the air out of our BCD vests so that we could stand flat on the metal floor. After removing our flippers, and hanging onto them for dear life so that they don't float away, we were able to experience the weightless, moon-walking sensation. Leaping, flipping, toe-touches - all are performed with an extra height and slow motion grace not possible on gravity-bound earth. We used up much of our air laughing at each other's antics.

Here, the crew is pulling in a tuna that they caught on a trailing line. They caught a pretty big one and had plans to fry it up later that night. Too bad we were headed back to Israel!

Boy Scouts Big and Small

Darren has begun a Boy Scout Troop for the boys in the area. Caleb and another boy are too young to be scouts, but they are working toward that goal. They are Weebeloes (the level below boy scouts for those who are as unfamiliar as I am about the boy scout ranks), and they learn and participate in the activities right along side the other boys. Josh is old enough to be a full member and is eagerly learning and participating.

Although they weren't sure how many other boys would be interested, Darren started the troop as an educational, extracurricular activity for the boys and so that part of his "busy-ness" would be specifically focused on spending time with Josh and Caleb. Since laying the groundwork and starting the meetings, the troop has grown to 8-10 scouts and 4 enthusiastic dads.

There is one boy, however, who would love to join but can't - Nathan. He can barely say "weebeloe" but he wants to be one. His voice squeaks with excitement each time the scout stuff comes out or a troop meeting begins. "Oh, sure!" he'd say if the invitation were given for him to join them, but he still has a couple years to go. So instead, he sits as close to the open door as he can or stands on the kitchen counter near the window, listening and watching. He wanted his own flag to wave around after watching the troop salute and pledge. Since we didn't have an actual flag he could have, I taped a flag napkin to a broken broom handle, and to him, it couldn't have been more authentic.

What?! There are Two of Them!

I'd like to introduce you to a friend of mine. Actually, she and her family are gone now taking a vacation in the States before moving on to their next posting. Her name is Anna Rhea (pronounce just like Reay), and her dad was working here as part of the State Department. I had met her dad at a few parties, but it wasn't until this year that I began to spend time with Anna. Her mom was looking for a math tutor for her, and I volunteered. We had so much fun, and I promise, we even got some math done! Anyway, I mentioned before that I had met her dad at parties but I didn't really get a chance to meet Anna and her mom because they were gone most of last year to Fiji, where they were last assigned. They had adopted a little girl from Fiji and were trying to adopt her younger brother. Despite many difficulties and setbacks, they were able to adopt Micah and bring him home. Joanna, yes, Joanna Rhea now had her little brother with her. She and I are as opposite as we can be - dark and light - but it was so much fun to share the same name. Every time I came over to visit Anna she would always say, "Hi, JoAnna!" and I'd say "Hi, Joanna!" back. And every time her mom called her or corrected her, I would automatically straighten up (a sure sign of a guilty conscience, I think! :). What are the odds of finding a good friend and her having a little sister who shares your first and last name!

The First in a Long Time

When my family was here, I wanted to stop by the new church building so that they could see what it looked like and the opportunities it would provide for Grace and Truth. Darren must have read my mind because he stopped by on the way to the Maozes. The only problem was getting in. Because of the threats and vandalism, it is necessary to post a guard at the building site. The only problem was that the guard spoke Russian and said he didn't speak Hebrew. None of us spoke Russian so we called one of the elders to see if he could talk to the guard and assure him that it was safe to let us enter. No luck. All assurances were useless because the same language barrier stood in David's way. What to do now? I know! I teach English to four Russian women from church, maybe they could talk to the guard and get him to let us in. I called Natasha, but my explanation was above her English understanding. So I handed the phone to Darren, and he explained to her in Hebrew so that she could explain to the guard in Russian. What a language belagon! It worked, though, and the guard let us in.

They had just finished laying the tile floor, and it looked so much more completed than before. There is still a lot to be done before it is ready for use, but it will give the church so much that they do not have now - namely, room! This will be the new sanctuary which will fit the entire congregation comfortably requiring no one to sit outside or down the hallways or adjoining rooms. The facilities downstairs can be used for Sunday School, VBS, or even a future Christian school. The building and grounds would be used as a community center for believers: a place to meet and fellowship outside of just the scheduled church services. There are other church buildings in Israel and even a few Israeli church congregations, but this would be the first Jewish-owned, Jewish-filled church building since the first century. While Christianity in the West along with our churches have a history of hundreds of years, churches in Israel are very much first generation churches. It's exciting to see that work grow.

Welcoming the New Year

I had planned to spend three days up in the Galilee, resting and touring during the busy travelling of the Israeli New Year. But an invitation from the Maozes changed those plans, and we drove down to Rishon Leziyyon to enjoy "New Year's Eve" dinner with them. There were, however, a few things we had to do in the Galilee before we could leave. The first was a baptism. With cunning and sneaky intent, I dunked not sprinkled Kait so that she would have the whole baptism experience. After checking out of the hotel, we stopped by Capernium and visited the synagogue remains, a fourth century ruins built on the foundation of the synagogue in which Jesus taught. In this synagogue is a small back door - I don't know the purpose of it but it is just the perfect height for Annette and Kait. :) There is a current Franciscan church built above the ruins of what is believed to be Peter's house and the location of a first century house church.

Not that it is a good thing to rejoice in the misfortunes of others, but as we drove back home it was so nice not to be stuck in the holiday traffic going north for vacation. It almost felt like we were making better time than we really were because we were passing so many cars slugging along in the other direction.

After we stopped at the house to rest and to bake Mom's wonderful bread, we loaded up all our contributions to the feast and headed out. What a New Year's Celebration! I don't know which was better - the fellowship or the food!