Shabbat in Mevo Choron

Taking the exit off route 1, route 3 was a quite road through fields, vineyards and agriculture. The hills stalwart and welcoming. our hosts wave to us from their house and usher us in. the sun was bright and there was an air of calm, peace and tranquility, SHABBAT! This quaint, quiet and beautiful little yishuv was a breath of fresh air.

our hosts had the most wonderful family, and orly had a few friends to play with.

ben went to shul to a powerful minyan, singing, praying and meaning; very good vibes of unity and community. we all met up to go to another family for a friday night meal. great people, conversation in worldly, as well as jewish matters - and, in particular, the synthesis of the two. it was most enlightening and good to hear and see.

shabbat morning and orly thought it was funny (after a late night) to wake up at 6.15. breakfast. coffee. lauren stayed at home with the kids whilst ben went to a different shul, full and thriving. again a great community feel and powerful davening vibe. we then met at the park after the womens shiur and there were so many kids running around and playing. orly was in her element! we went to lunch at our hosts and had some great food. orly had already made friends and was playing very nicely, whilst yael was showing off her impeccable crawling skills.

ben, orly and yael, and a couple of the kids went to the 'childrens shiur'. again, loooads of children orly's age. there was a dramatised story reading of the parasha and a general happy interactive session in judaism for 10mins. before a treat of juice was handed out to all the participants. orly gulped the whole thing down. it was very hot the whole day, and orly was running on such little sleep! back at our hosts and we had a little down time before we took a trip. we were going to go on a 'crazy hike', but it was outside the eruv so not child-carrying friendly (!), next time!

all the while the inhabitants were all very friendly and welcoming :)

there is an animal area at the edge of the yishuv. it is set back through a field of yellow flowers and fruit trees. we went passed a large cage filled with about 100 love birds, very pretty. when we got there there were a number of dog kennels, a donkey, some camels and lots of horses (the yishuv take horse/camel trips). orly was being very brave and decided to stroke all the horses noses. one even sneezed (or should i say sprayed!) nose shmutz all over us, it was gross! lauren and yael were even in the firing line!

ben went to mincha and we went to our final seuda shelishit meal at an australian family. more children to play with and people to talk with. great people, conversation, food and relaxation. we brought shabbat out a bit late, said our thank yous and gratitudes and got in the car home. the kids were flat out. and all orly could say was "mummy and daddy, why are we leaving?" :)

Friday fun

After much discussion about whether we need a keter machsan (plastic shed) for storage ""we"" decided it would be best to get one. our flat is full with stuff and a shed, strategically placed outside in the garden could offer us some much needed storage space. we also need an oven and hob for pesach. where to go?! talpiyot!

we get to the keter shop and purchase the shed for a small fortune. "we'll take it in our car", "which car", "renault kangoo", "sure no problem, swing it round".... parking in the middle of the road, "sure its fine, no one minds"... ok. they then proceeded to tie, rather precariously, our massive shed to the roof of our car. after a while we were good to go. with an oven and hob as well. lauren then drove (mostly) carefully home.

ben called our next door neighbour to see if he was available to haul the beast downstairs to our flat. As he came up and i was about to cut the string to remove the shed he said "wait! i have a shed just like that that is not built but unused, come have a look and see if you want it". and we did. it turns out it is exactly what we had bought... Ben went shlepping back to talpiyot to return the shed that we had just bought, whilst trying to think of a good excuse for returning it, whilst remaining truthful, sort of. "its not right for the space, my wife measured it out", to which they responded "never trust a woman with measurements like that!". lol

we picked up orly from gan and spent some time in the garden playing in orlys tent and eating flowers.

we packed up and headed for mevo choron for shabbat.

Yael showing off her sitting skills in the car. the cutest thing to sit in a car?! i think so!

teddy bears picnic in the garden. orly made flower tea for all the soft toys

busy parties

orly camping out in her new room. its easier this way.

The girls

2 months in and Orlys hebrew is already better than Laurens! 'Mummy its not like that', 'mummy can you say avital?'  And then she breaks it into syllables to help me out! 'Mummy please stop talking your giving me a headache'

Orly with her tanned face, long hair and lack of shoes is fitting in great. Today she skipped into school. Probably because she gets a 'biscvit' as soon as I turn around!

She was singing the mah nishtana flawlessly last night and when asked where she learnt it she repled 'I just know it'.

And little yaeli (or not so little yaeli). If you look really closely you cn spot her double chin. She still doesnt sleep but is nearly sitting and can get around quite efficiently on her belly. I lost her the other day and then found her in the corner eating the hoover. Things aare about to get busy here.

Her favvourite past time is sitting on the buss smiling at old people. She loves it!!!

Whilst making frinds with an old man today I commented on her lack of sleep. He gave me the best pieace of advice yet. Apparently all I need to do it rub wine on her gums and shell sleep like a baby...... will see how it goes......

orly having a teddy bears picnic in her tent in the garden

orly in the park

yael making tea for the guests

Purim!

sunday was spent making mishloach manot and doing zoo stuff. festivities were around everywhere, although it wasnt purim for us yet.

ben had a dilemma for purim on monday. quantum mechanics lecutre 9.15-11.00am monday morning! grrrr.... after 4 years of university in the UK and having to miss lecture after lecture because of chagim; finally in the holy land, and i have to go to a lecture on purim! good thing it was a great lecture! i came back home in time to find lauren, orly and yael giving out mishloach manot on many people and increasing the general feeling of joy all round.

orly and yael were dressed up as beautiful butterflies, and lauren and ben were dressed up as cocoons (chrysalises to be precise) but looked like big brown blobs than chrysalises, but at least we were dressed up!

we went to seuda to some old friends of ours from england, and were greated with more english speakers! it was nice to wine and dine and relax in a festive atmosphere with torah and wine. no crazy drunken stories to tell this year :)

but all was good... apart from the car, which was making a rather annoying regular bumping noise. lauren had to go to the garage the next day to get it checked, not an easy fete with non-english speaking car mechanics! turns out there was a bolt stuck on the wheel. sorted.

two beautiful home made butterflies

princess fairy orly shmorly

painting

yaeli giving mummy a bracha

generals and shabbat

lauren is doing an excellent job of bringing up the kidlets. orly is enjoying gan more, learning more and more hebrew and being generally gorgeous. yael is still in a perpetual state of motion. perhaps she will be a dancer like her savta. perhaps this is why she is to lean, constant movement! having said that, yael is eating more, bananas, avocados and so forth.

we enjoyed ourselves at the zoo again. because it was purim there were clown men on stilts and, surprisingly, orly didnt run in the opposite direction! we saw the bears, leopard, fire salamander (which orly recognised), chameleon (which orly recognised), falingos and pelicans, giraffa, rhino, zebra, you name it. really good fun. a mandrill even came up to us and gave us a good stare, quite a moment.

we spent our first full shabbat at home, cooking both meals (thanks lauren), and hosting a number of guests as well. lauren must be credited here for her awesome cooking with many twists and adventures. getting to know the produce of the land!

Orly enjoying a bus ride

orly and yael on the swings!

weizmann...

So theres much to discuss in the kayser adventures of Israel. some updates are required...

Ben has now registered as a student and is working on some courses in the sciences and labs. ben partially fainted after a the first lecture of a theoretical physics/maths course (4hours). after finishing his homework in quantum mechanics, things, thank G-d were looking up though. He's doing a lab course in scanning probe microscopy, which includes many cool techniques to image things that are rather small. pay is nice and i've got friendly with a bunch who carpool to and from jerusalem every day, which is really handy.

my research group is interesting. they mainly deal with biomolecular electronics and solar cells. its very interdisciplinary. mainly biochemistry with heavy glosses of physics and semiconductors. I am on a trial for at least 3 months, by which time i really hope i will settle into a project and be accepted onto a phd track. i'm leaning mostly towards bio-electronics, which is relatively new, and the lab is mainly concerned with developing new techniques to generate interesting data. cool.

i've not yet been approved for animal testing... (probably ben's only route into zoology, his real passion) since there are serious restrictions in access! campus is beautiful, although they could do with a prayer room! how very annoying. mincha is carried out every day in a corridor somewhere... havent managed to find the sefardi 'corridor' minyan yet, but will try. long term goal: establish proper place of prayer at weizmann. politics!

Tuesday, kaysers united and the kotel

Tuesday brought the kaysers to the Old City of Jerusalem. Danielle was still around so it was a great opportunity for us all to be together.

Burgers bar is awesome!

Our eternal holy site of the temple.

Buggy antics

Kayser clan

Wild cyclamens growing in our garden, stunning

Shabbat at Beit Meir

The long windy road off route 1 led us into the mountains, stunning views in every direction. breathtaking scenery and a really relaxed feel. The Lehmann family let us into their homes with tremendous hospitality and hosted us wonderfully.

Friday night and Yaakov brought us to the Breslov minyan. There was a really chilled and relaxed feel. Kabbalat Shabbat was said in unison with song and dance, great spirituality and a good vibe. We went back to the Lehmanns and had a great friday night meal with wonderful company, wining and dining. Yael and Orly played together nicely and Yael has even begun with beginners crawling!

Shabbat day and there was more prayer and relaxation. Wonderful scenery, in the mountains all round. we made kiddush with a few people and Yaakov took us on a walk around the yishuv for a pre-lunch walk; quiet and peaceful. Lunch brought us some more wonderful food, new cuisine, flavours and textures. We're rapidly expanding our repertoire of israeli and world foods.

More strolling in the parks, mincha and a smooth exit to shabbat.

A truly wonderful shabbat with great people a great scenery.

Yael twisting, turning and minor-shuffling ;)

Orly and Yael getting to know their shabbat surroundings

Happy times on friday

Ben travelled to the Weizmann Institute to see if he could further pursue PhD inquiries....

Having woken up in total excitement Orly anticipated her 'ima shel shabbat' role. She got to gan and was got to sit at the shabbat table, light the candles, drink the grapejuice and have songs sung around her with dancing. She also got the 'ima shel shabbat' bag, which she brought home, with her own candle stick, headscarf and 'ima shel shabbat' book. it was so sweet on many levels! she loved it :)

(Lauren had received a phone call mid morning "where are the sweets?!" apparently the 'ima shel shabbat' needs to bring sweets for the children. QUICK!)

Ben met with a professor who said that he was happy with a deal that had been proposed. Spend a semester on a trial period working as a student in the labs, whilst taking a few courses. after the trial period a phd route would be discussed if all was well! I was shown to 'my desk' and bobs your uncle! admin stuff will be sorted out next week and hopefully some kesef will start to come in! please please please G-d :) i'll get to meet the team next week, and i've met some great people already. Please pray for all to go well with Ben!

NOTE: Ben is NOT YET (!!!!) starting a PhD. Please G-d soon :) if all goes well, and enough family and friends support me through davening x

The Koffler accelerator at Weizmann

Sheer Joy

The Shabbat Mummy herself! Nachas :) Bless her, she had such a good time

The Epic croc adventure

Thursday. When Orly finished gan we took her to the Biblical zoo and obtained year passes for all of us. The day was fresh and we were lapping up the beauty in the zoo.

Orly walked in the enclosure with the kangaroos, met some lizards, a cassowary, meerkats, and the crocodiles.... we spotted the a tragic event unfolding. The crocodile had a plastic bottle in its mouth and was attempting to swallow it! Ben (heroically) ran to the nearest zoo-keeper and the 'croc man' was radioed in. the scene was tense, crowds were amassing. "will he pry open the jaws and retreive the bottle?" cried one, "will he wrestle with it" cried another. the answer was no. But thankfully (with shabbat approaching) whole plucked chickens were brought to entice the crocs to one side. The croc left the bottle and was directed away, whilst the zoo-keeper retrieved the bottle! success!!

Orly also saw the nubian ibex and arabian oryx, and quickly pointed out that they have shofars on their heads. the 'Giraffa', 'rhinocerous' and 'hippomotamus' were all seen as well. a great afternoon out.

Orly had also been chosen to be 'Ima shel shabbat' (the 'shabbat mummy') in gan. She was SOOO excited all week!

Orly directing us through the zoo with her map, with spider monkeys residing in the background.

Of course orly recognised the tapirs from her puzzle! (and the baby tapir in the corner!)

A whole chicken.... and it wasn't even shabbat!

The brave zoo-keeper and the big daddy

Orly and Lauren pretending to be meerkets

The offending item, finally relinquished from the jaws of the beast... will he move away to tastier pastures??!?

Chilling with the kangaroos

Yaffo

After a gruelling 4hours of packing the kaysers were on their way to a beach-side shabbat in Yaffo with the remaining kaysers. Arriving on thursday, we were able to put our stuff down and head straight into the pool. orly was over the moon, not quite deciding to let go, but improving on her swimming skills greatly.

Ben sought a place of prayer on thursday night and after having been told that there was a 'yeshiva' on the next road down, ben and avigail went to check it out. It turns out it was an awesome hesder yeshiva with around 40 guys. Mum spoke to the Rosh Yeshiva whilst ben went inside to find out the times.

On friday morning. Orly and Ben went down to the shore to collect shells. they built a shell mound, which consisted of a pile of sand with shells stuck all around. Orly also built an island out of rocks and shells, with a lake and some houses inside. It was awesome. Orly, bless her, found a "flossil" of a doggy (not a "fossil" a "flossil"!)... just like charlie and lola :)

ari and the rest of the kaysers arrived. friday night was a spiritual journey with song, dance and praying in the yeshiva, really nice, a really great vibe. after an over-hyper-excitement filled evening with children, there was relative silence...

shabbat day brought more prayers and fun. the extended family came and it was the first time in a long time that we were all together. We sang happy birthday to lauren (belated), dad and safta zila. all was really nice. orly and odelia played really nicely and even got a chance to go to the go to the local playground.

Motzei shabbat brought a party to Yaffo. Even more family friends came to say hi. The evening closed out and everyone breathed a breath of calm!

A croc was used to sieve clean all the shells we collected. shell mountain was created.

Auntie Dan Dan and Yaeli living it up on the beach.

Savta and Sabba with Orly Shmorly and Yaeli Shmageli