Israel!!!

I had such a great time in Israel. If anyone ever has the chance to go, you should. It was an amazing experience. I loved every minutes of it. Here are the people I went with. This is Josh's family, his mom, his step-father, his brother, Roger and his wife, Molly, and Josh's step-sister Stacy and her husband, Joe. I had such a great time. Here are just a few pictures of the places we saw. The spacing is weird because its annoying me. Sorry.

The Old City Jerusalem

Here you can see the Dome of the Rock, which was built in the same place that King Solomon's temple and the second temple were built. I was standing on the Mount of Olives when I took these pictures.
Some Israeli Soldiers

They were everywhere and they all had huge machine guns.

Kendra

We ran into Kendra, our friend from our old Colorado Springs ward. It was totally random. She was actually one of Josh's old seminary students.

The City of David
We were able to take a tour of the City of David. It was amazing to be able to walk where Jesus actually walked. Hereis a road that remains by the Pool of Siloam, where we know that Jesus spent some time.

and here is a road that led from the pool up to the temple.

The Wailing Wall

The Garden Tomb

Some believe that the Garden Tomb was where Jesus' body was buried after he was crucified. It was a beautiful garden. Here you can see pictures of the trench where the stone would have been rolled and the actual place where his body would have been laid.

The Garden of Gethsemane

The Roman city Schitopolis

The Jordan River

Capurnaum and the house of Peter

The Sea of Galilee

The possible site of the Sermon on the Mount

Shushi, the Camel

MASADA

Masada was a very cool, but kind of creepy place. We started out by going in a cable car up to the top of this

Ok, so the story goes like this. In 70 AD the Romans destroyed Jerusalem and the Second Temple. The few Zealots who remained fled to Masada, a fortress built by King Herod on the top of a huge plateau. They lived in the fortress and held out for three years.This is a picture of the snake path. Obviously, anyone climbing it to attack the fortress would be an easy target, so instead the Roman camped out and built battering rams and other weapons. The dark brown circles are what remains of the Roman camps. When the Romans realized that their battering rams and their catapults would not reach the fortress, they began to build a ramp that lead up to the fortress. This is what remains of the ramp.When the Zealots in the fortress realized that they could not win against the Roman army, the men killed their wives and their children. They killed one another, until ten remained. They found ten pottery sheards with one name written on each. They believe that these were used to cast lots to see who would have to be last man standing, either to finish himself off, or to face the Roman army alone.

Me in the Dead Sea

This is the cave where the first of the Dead Sea Scrolls was found. They think this may be the location where David and Goliath fought.

The Archaeological Dig

On our last day in Israel, we went on a Archaeological Dig. It was really cool.

We started out by going down into this cave and we stared digging.

I think Dean found an ancient b-b-que pit. He unearthed lots and lots of animal bones. I just found a few pieces of broken pottery.

Then, we went up and sifted through our dirt buckets to make sure that we didn't miss anything.

We did. Here is a piece of broken pottery that we found while sifting through the dirt.

Then, they took us through a cave that they has yet to be excavated. We crawled through lots of small holes.

Stacy going through a hole.

Dean going through a hole

Stacy and I felt like we had gone miles underground through the cave, but when we finally emerged, this is how far we were from our starting point. It was funny. The Mediterranean Sea

It was really windy. My hair was out of control!

Colorado Adventures

To see some of Mikayla and Gwenyth's adventures while I was away, please click here and then click here.

From now on, I think I'll just let Jenny blog everything for me and I'll just provide the links. Thanks Jenny. Love you!!

My Israel Adventures are coming soon. I promise.

Mikayla's Gender Issues

Before we left for Colorado, we were sitting in the airport waiting to board our plane. Mikayla looked at the row of chairs directly behind us and noticed a young man who had his ear pierced about 8 times on each side. I saw the horrified look on her face and before she could say anything, I quickly assured her, "It's OK honey, sometimes men have their ears pierced." She looked back at him and then said in a loud and shocked voice, "Mommy, that man's a woman!"



QUESTION: Was that young man within hearing distance?

ANSWER: Of course.



So, I quickly told her that it was rude to say that and that sometimes, its OK for men to have earrings. She shook her head and said, "No Mommy, it isn't." I just let this go because I was hoping she would drop the whole thing and move on to something else within the realms of her little three year-old brain. I thought it was working. She was quiet and thoughtful for a moment before she blurted out, "It's ok. Sometimes my daddy is a woman."



QUESTION: WHAT????

ANSWER: Someone enlighten me, please, because I'm dying to know.

(Sorry for those of you who already commented. I wasn't done writing this. Gweny turned off the computer. She knows how to push all the right buttons and I mean that both ways.)

So then, Mikayla was chatting with my mom and Leeann before I went to airport to leave for Israel and Mikayla casually mentioned to them that sometimes, her daddy wears tights. Now, I happen to know for a fact that Josh is NEVER a woman and Josh NEVER wears tights. Trust me.

Then, later in the week, my wonderful sister, Jennifer, took all the kids for a walk. Apparently, Mikayla has more issues than I though. Click here to read the whole story .

So, just to remind everyone, JOSH IS NOT A WOMAN and JOSH DOES NOT WEAR TIGHTS. EVER!!!!