Shalom Friends and Family,
It seems hard to believe that February has come and gone, but it has ... with many pleasant, fun and joyous memories. James 1:17 says, "Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like the shifting shadows." Do you have a good, exciting memory from the past month? (I surely hope so!) Please share it ... we would love to hear them (Proverbs 27:17). Maybe you have a memory of something that was not necessarily joyous and exciting, maybe it was sad, or hard ... please do not hesitate to share them as well. How did the Father work through it? In Ecclesiastes 3, it talks about there being a time and a season for everything under heaven. Often in the hardest times, HE is revealed much clearer. Always remember that ... "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; For You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me." Psalm 23:4. So please, feel free to share whatever the Father has laid on your heart ... you don't know how it may bless another person.
Now, for the February Month in Review! The first week was rather normal ... nothing really eventful.
Samuel (with Sophie) resting and relaxing on E'rev Shabbat :)
My "little" brother is getting taller than me ... but that's not hard to do :) By the way ... Abba got out the level ... Abigail judging with the book wasn't working out too good.
Samuel is always trying to make friends with our neighbor's horses.
On our Shabbat walk.
Abba and Ima wanted to talk with Josh and Latoya so they dropped behind the children.
To have some fun, SOME of the children decided to walk backwards so they could watch the parents, and try to hear what they were talking about :)
I, along with all the children younger than me, decided to explore a logging road through some woods.
Team work getting up the hill!
Back at the end of January, we went and applied for passports for all of us children, except Hannah and Tommy ... they already had theirs. We were extremely thrilled and excited when our passports came in the mail 8 days later. It was amazing and we are so thankful and grateful that our Heavenly Father worked it all out and helped us get them so quickly.
Showing off our passports.
The next few pictures are of animals. I had a hard time deciding whether to include these in this blog post or not, but I decided to. YHWH made all the creatures and they show His handiwork. There are different Bible verses that talk about "considering" the animals (Proverbs 6:6, Matthew 6:26, etc.). I am reminded of the chorus of a song that says, "And all of creation, sing with me now ... Fill up the heavens, let His glory resound." You can listen to the song by clicking HERE.
This is one of our neighbor's kids ...
... And her good ol' donkey!
Abba and Ima.
On another Shabbat walk!
After we got back from the walk, we had Bible study and then we played and sang for awhile. Rohan wanted to help me play the piano, which was really sweet. I asked her parents to send me the pictures they took on their phone!
Abigail took the camera out in our woods and enjoyed capturing His creation. Have you ever heard the song Creation Calls? You can listen to it by clicking HERE.
I love when she captures pictures of the moon!
Tommy was supposed to fly back from Israel and arrive in Nashville at about 11:00pm on Tuesday night, February 11th. He flew from Tel Aviv to Newark, then was supposed to fly to DC, and then to Nashville. But ... his flight from Newark to DC was delayed which meant he missed his flight to Nashville. At first we were a little disappointed that he was not coming home that night ... but it ended up better for everyone that his flight was delayed. The airlines put him up in a really nice hotel, which meant he got to sleep a little bit, and we got to sleep that night. So, we were all refreshed and ready to have a blast the following day (Wednesday).
Clinton, Abigail, and Lydia made a sign for Tommy. The "Tav" on Tommy's name somehow got washed out in the picture ... but Tommy actually corrected us when he got back and told us that his name was suppose to be spelled with a "Tet" (later Clinton corrected the sign).
Abba and Ima went to pick Tommy up and we stayed busy at home cleaning, etc.
Our fabulous sweeper, Lydia!
Our amazing ... *Ahem* ... Boss ... I mean MANAGER :) Just teasing!
Abigail helping prepare lunch.
Clinton, Samantha, and Lydia keeping our house lively with music.
We washed up Tommy's truck and parked it in the front yard. When Abba pulled in the driveway with Tommy and Ima, Samuel started revving the engine and honking the horn!
"Almost here!"
It was SO good to see Tommy again after 3 months!!!
We invited some good friends up to help welcome Tommy back, and they got to our place about 20 minutes after Tommy arrived! To say that our house was whirling with excitement would be an understatement. By the way, thanks to Jay for a few of these pictures.
Tommy and Aliyah.
When Tommy was in Israel, we asked him to go by a tichel shop and get some head-coverings for us and our shop, because our stock was very low. We gave him a list of what we wanted. He was such a good brother and got 119 tichels from one shop. It cost him a lot of embarrassment though, because the workers did not understand English, and he did not know enough Hebrew to explain why he was getting so many ... so they were outright laughing at him! Poor guy. Thank you Tommy, you are the best big brother in the world!
Looking at a colorful display.
If you read the January blog post, I shared about Clinton and Sharon's son, Sh'muel. We needed to go put the headstone over the grave, but since Tommy was not able to be with us at the funeral, we decided to wait until he was back to lay it. Clinton and Sharon also wanted to lay the stone before Samantha left ... so Wednesday was the only day to do it when both Tommy and Samantha would be there. So that afternoon, we all loaded up (including the Williams) and drove to the graveyard.
Ruger loves riding in the car!
It was very cold and drizzling, but we had a sweet time together as a family. It was very healing.
Clinton made the headstone ... he did a really good job.
We went back home afterwards and hung out.
Lydia with Isaac and Aliyah.
Abigail and Isaac.
The Williams had planned on going home that night, but due to a snowstorm that hit their area pretty bad, they decided to spend the night. That evening Clinton and Sharon brought out a game called Take Your Pick. Have you ever played it? It is a group game and when you play, each person gets two cards. There are two words on each card and you have to pick which word you think the person next to you would pick (example: think it out, or talk it out). When it is your turn, you tell the person the two words and if you guessed them right, you get to keep the cards; if not, you turn them in. After the first round you have to guess the person 2 down from you, and so on. It was so funny to see how some of the cards matched the person SO good!
Sitting around playing ... Hannah and Sophie!
Clinton, Sharon and me.
During the game, we heard someone get stuck on our hill, so us children all bundled up and went out to "help":) Tommy was thrilled to pull someone out with his truck the first night he was home. After the excitement was over, we went back inside to finish the game :)
Ima, Jay and Britney.
That night we stayed up till 1:30am looking at and watching Tommy's pictures and videos from Israel. We went to bed for a couple hours later, only to wake up to tell Samantha good-bye (she had an early flight back to her home). It ended up, due to all the ice and snowstorms, her flight was cancelled and delayed till the following morning. So, they turned around and came back.
Clinton, Sharon, Abigail, Lydia and I, all went for a walk. We had a lovely, sunny day after the "snow blizzard" the night before :)
Friday the 14th, was a very exciting day! We had been hoping and praying to go back to Israel and the Heavenly Father opened up the doors for us to buy our tickets! The reality that we were going did not kick in for awhile, but I think it is finally kicking in. We are very excited. Please pray for us as we will be leaving March 10th and we will all be staying there for 6 weeks, except for Tommy ... he is staying an additional 6 weeks.
Israel Bound!
On Shabbat our friends came over. That evening we played Take Your Pick again.
These three musketeers have a lot of fun together!
On the following Friday, Ima, Sam, and some of us girls went and helped out at our friend's factory for several hours. On Sunday, Abba and all of us children went back.
Tommy and Abba working together.
Lydia and Cadence labeling products.
Samuel working hard!
Little Josh.
On the previous Wednesday morning (very early), Miss Latoya gave birth to a beautiful little girl named Eliyah. Ima and Hannah were blessed to be able to be at the birth. Anyway, Miss Latoya came to the factory for lunch and Ruthie and I got to see and hold Eliyah for the first time!!!
She is SO tiny ... only 8-1/2 pounds!
Lydia and Eliyah.
I think these pictures are simply adorable!
Abba and Eliyah.
Oh, I forgot ... Abba had seen Eliyah before, but this was the first time he held her.
Well, I think that's all the pictures for now. We have been staying very busy getting ready to leave ... it is still hard to believe that it is for real though :) Praise YHWH. But, we are very thankful for the break and rest of Shabbat!
Until next time, Shalom!
"Let the words of my mouth, and the meditations of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O YHWH, my strength, and my redeemer."
Psalm 19:14
