We had a couple a days of no field trips. Janny cuaght us up on the wash. We have a washer but no dryer, so she and kids have become experts at hanging the laundry outside in the courtyard. It is dry and hot here, allowing the cloths to dry fast. She has been so super helpful to me in doing this service.
We laid low without big field trips, although the kids and Janny and I went to the soccer court and played soccer and exercised. The best part about the cement soccer court is that is was sloped. So we put Jayne kicking on the down hill slope and she felt like a rockstar. In the evening we drove to the BYU Jerusalem Center (which is the campus for Near Eastern Studies for Brigham Young University- I forgot to put that in before), so Ellie could go to activity days and Sam to young mens. They had a super fun time, but maybe not as much as Jake and Jayne that got to run wild in the gym with other little kids that lived at the center because their parents were faculty. Seth and I were able to talk with the Branch President, President Shafer, and let the kids get their energy out. Below is one of the students, Megan, who Jayne fell in love with. She was so sweet and kind and taught Jayne hand cheers.
The kids have been begging for Hebrew lessons. Our friend, Paul, who is watching over the house for our wonderful landlords set up lessons with a college student named Jonathan. He came to our home on Wednesday morning and taught Hebrew for an hour. All the kids and Janis and I attended. They learned how to say, My Name is ______, I am ___ years old, a name song, as well as the start of the alphabet, and how to write their name in Hebrew. Jayne has since vandalized all paper surfaces with her name in Hebrew. Obviously it is a very different laugage that English and would take a lot of memorization- which the kids are better at than I. Jonathan will return next week for a second lesson!
This classroom is our front patio- a great place to have lessons.
The second letter in the alphabet is Bet as you can seen in drawn below.
A little memorization game. Janny only looks like she was taking a nap, but she was awake.
Jonathan, happy with his students, even though they have terrible accents.
In the afternoon we visited the Jerusalem mall. We were looking for certain things that we found super expensive. But a mall is a mall, where you are. I am obviously not a mall shopper :).
After the mall, we were invited over to some neighbors, some friends of the house owners. Judith and her sons were very kind and the kids had a fun time being with other kids. Jake especially liked being with the boys and cried when we left. He is really missing his best friends Landon and Ethan "who live far away over the ocean" (in his own words). The girls liked playing with the five dogs and the little foster kitten who the dogs were hoping to have as a snack. Most of the cats here live out of the dumpster. There are tons of wild cats everywhere. Jayne started naming the ones that live in our little parking area- one was Garbage Can, Chocolate and Cupcake, then Sam joined in with some creative ones like Scabby Tabby and Molting Melvin. This little kitten was a lucky little one who Judith was taking care of.
This was a little girl that Judith had invited over to play with Jayne. She was 7 or 8 and she only spoke Russian or Hebrew. But kids don't need language. She and Jayne played with the kitten and took about 20 pictures of it. Then they played some board games, without communicating accept through pointing, nodding their heads, or shaking their heads, with some grunting involved to get each others attention. It was my favorite part of the visit to see them playing without words. Judith was very kind and lent us some children's books, since we were sick of the three ones we had at our house.
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