This morning, Zee and I made an early field trip over to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. It had been so crowded and hot and uncomfortable two days ago, so I wanted another chance to experience it. So we left at 7am and arrived around 7:20, and there were so many fewer people. It…
Garden Tomb and Welcoming Shabbat
After getting back to our apartment–wilted, sweaty, and exhausted–we all collapsed for a siesta. I awoke earlier than most of the kids, but Hebs and Dad were up. Hebs and I decided to walk over to the Garden Tomb, which closes at 5pm. It was still hot as we walked, but the Garden Tomb is…
St Anne’s Church and the Pools of Bethesda
After finishing the tour of tunnels under the Western Wall, we trekked back to the Grandmas’ apartment. (Side note: we got a weird email from the AirBnB host, asking why we had so many visitors without telling them. Ooookay? We wrote back that the apartment was being rented by two older ladies and the visitors…
Western Wall Tunnels
Today we started our morning with a guided tour of the Western Wall Tunnels. These tunnels are the excavation of the land underneath the Muslim Quarter of Old Jerusalem, following the course of the 2000+ year old retaining wall for the Temple Mount–which is also the same wall as the Western Wall. The holiest place…
Holy Sites
This morning, I was awakened at 5:30 by some noise–it turned out to be EVERY. SINGLE. ONE. of my children. Who apparently had been awake since 3am. Jetlag, man. It’s a killer. I went back to bed…but couldn’t sleep, thinking about everything we want to do. So by 6:30 I was up, and we started…
Day One in the Old City
Our plane arrived in Tel Aviv at 12:30a, June 1. To say we were tired would be an understatement. I felt practically no thrills at all at the signage in Hebrew, the Israel flags, the gorgeous mosaics on the wall. On maybe two hours of sleep for the last 30, I was barely keeping it…
Heathrow
London’s Heathrow Airport did not disappoint—in fact, it was exactly as we might have expected. Rain? Check. Crowded? Check. Confusing? Check. Awesome stores? Check. Our favorite was the Harry Potter store, naturally. (Though I was charmed by the convenience store, with GIANT Toblerones and small bags of Skittles (American ones) for approximately the same price.)…
Here we go!
Getting to the airport was a “process”, according to 11-year-old Yum. We don’t fit into one car, so we decided to take the Front Runner train to the airport. Getting to the train station was accomplished by Bradley, Gee and Yum taking the bus to the Lehi station, and my sister driving the rest of…
Political Israel (plus some wildlife)
I have a little presentation to the kids today to talk about the political situation of Israel and Palestine. It made Yum sad, with all the displaced people and wars and anger. But we thought it was important to understand, at least a little, the nuances and complexities of the region. I’ve added my slides…
The Packing (5 weeks x 7 people)
The sheer amount of STUFF it takes to run this family for five weeks…and we are being super limited. I think. I hope.