The English's

Christmas and Chairs

2012-01-10T10:24:00.002-06:00

Christmas this year was with my family in Nashville. Two weeks before Christmas we finally finished our hardwood floors, put our doors back on, and were slowly taking loads over to the house to start the process of moving in.

First load... Christmas decorations :) This is just one of the many reasons I have the greatest husband in the world.

Here's our tree before any ornaments were on it. I could stare at this all day long.

Since we only had a few weeks before Christmas, I only put up a few things. Since my pinterest-inspired wreath was on the front door, I decided to put our Christmas wreath on the door to the porch.

My one food contribution to the Family Christmas was going to be cookies. JT and I love these and good thing Marcy (my MIL) showed me the easiest recipe!

- Buy peanut butter cookie mix (where you only add water, eggs, & oil)
- Mix the dough
- Roll 1 inch balls in pure sugar
- Place on a cookie sheet and bake according to package
- Once removed from the oven, let cool for 3 minutes and then pace a kiss on top!
- To harden the chocolate, stick the tray in the freezer for a few minutes
- Enjoy! YUM-O.

For the last 7 months we've been eating at a coffee table and sofa. We sold our old table and chairs before we moved from Dallas and have been looking for the perfect set to stay in our family for years to come. Something sturdy that will last up to the wear and tear of many parties, family dinners, work space, etc. We found our table at Crate and Barrel and wanted to find chairs that we could mix-match. Ikea had the perfect grey/brown slim chairs we were looking for.

Our family all pitched in and gave us our table for Christmas. What a blessing. Crate and Barrel delivered it in one piece and now all we were waiting for was chairs. In saving money with Ikea, you are required to assemble the furniture yourself. After Christmas, we took a day trip up to Cincinnati, bought our chairs, drove home and assembled them. After just a few hours, we were finished and we finally had our table and chairs!

And here's the final product! (The love seat did not stay in the dining room... it now is where the Christmas tree stood)

We had a wonderful Christmas with my side of the family and absolutely adored my little nephew every minute. I can't lie... he was the highlight of everyone's trip :)

One afternoon we went on a walk and took some family pictures... JT and I couldn't take a serious shot... we had too much fun!

One of the best family pictures we've taken in a while. Merry Christmas everyone!

Merry Christmas from Louisville

2011-12-25T08:00:00.000-06:00

Today we celebrate Christmas in Nashville, TN where my brother Charlie and his wife, Kate, and baby Emmett are the hosts this year. We're so thankful for all that 2011 has brought our family: new jobs, new school, new city, new house... our lives are full and we are blessed.

This Christmas, we take time to remember Christ's birth and eagerly await his return during this season of advent, the Latin word for "coming". We wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

jt & macy

The Hardwoods Are Finished

2011-12-11T19:22:00.001-06:00

After 45+ hours of hard labor, they're finished. Last weekend we celebrated the completion of a project that we thought would take forever. Our hardwood floors. We were installing these throughout the entire first floor, minus the master bedroom. One thing I'm sure of is that our backs will never be the same :) But it was worth every pain and grown. We love them!

Now that we take time to examine things, there are a few rows we would've done differently, areas we would've been more patient on, and cuts that we would've perfected. To the naked eye they're good enough for resale! That's the lens in which we view most of our renovations... "What are the potential buyers going to think?" We're not thinking of selling anytime soon, we know the earliest would be in roughly 4-5 years.

I know what you've come to see, more before and after photos. Enjoy, and let us know what you think! As always, if you have questions about specific steps, let us know. We were only able to do this by learning from others (thank you DIYNetwork, The Home Depot, and YouTube).

Friday Night Agenda
- Get as far as you can installing floors

Well...take a look at the bottom photo and you'll see how far we got... from the far left wall that sticks out till where the wood stops. Let's just say there were 4 doorways that we had to work our way around and those definitely are the most time consuming.

Saturday's Agenda
- Finish installing the floors

We got over to the house around 10:30AM and told ourselves that if the end came close in sight, we would work as late as it took.

Like I mentioned before, doorways are the hardest to work around, especially when the doorjams are not cut all the way and you have to chisel or cut the space open. Here JT is using his handy Dremel saw. He loves this thing.

We had to lay tar paper over the entire sub floor before installing the hardwood.

JT installing the last row in the breakfast area. Yes, it's a mess.

Tight quarters to install underneath the dishwasher. As JT said "This is not JT size. In other words, Macy will fit just fine in this small space." This is the second to last board to install!

And here's Macy installing the last floor plank! We're officially done on Saturday :)

Sunday's Agenda
- Fill nail holes & stain the wood filler
- Install air returns
- Chisel door frames
- Sweep the floors
- Install washer/dryer
- Clean the garage
- Put appliances back in place

Note to self: dark floors show white dirt easily. Imagine how your black pea coat shows lint in the middle of winter. Yes, it's that similar. Looks like a lot of sweeping is in our future!

What happens when you try to screw back in the electric unit to your stove with an electric drill? You get shocked, sparks fly, and the evidence is left on the wall. Good thing JT still has his limbs! That was a close call.

After putting in so many hours indoors, JT couldn't wait to get outside and trim some things. Not sure if this is the best time of year to be doing yard work (due to freezing temperatures), but who cares! It's fun and looks so much better.

Now, drum roll please... here's the before and afters!

BEFORE

AFTER (future dining room)

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER (breakfast nook)

BEFORE

AFTER

That's it for last weekend and now we've officially set our move date. Looks like we'll be in by Christmas!

4 Weeks Later

2011-12-05T21:51:00.001-06:00

I know, I know. Weekly updates were consistent for 5 weeks and for the last 4... nothing. Let's just say we've been a bit busy and in moments of silence we've been resting and enjoying time with our family.

So with 4 weeks of waiting comes quite a few photos as well as things to write about. Grab a cup of apple cider or coffee, wrap up in a blanket, and enjoy reading. We've got a lot to cover!

WEEK OF NOVEMBER 7TH
Mom came to town and my brother Chris drove in from Ohio. The Wednesday before they arrived we started some prep work on the house of doing little things here and there. Knowing that we would be tackling the floors (wood & carpet) before we left for Thanksgiving, we knew we needed to get some details out of the way. The more people the merrier!

Wednesday Night
- Chisel the doors and casings so that the hinges would fit
- Put all the face plates back on the outlets/switches
- Install the doors upstairs for the carpet installers to come the next day

JT chiseling the door to the garage.

Yes, I sell Binford Tools and am Tim Taylor's right hand helper.

Friday all Day
- Examine the carpet installation
- Clean the upstairs bathroom
- Clean all the windows and put them back together
- Touch up the stain and paint on the stairs

Since mom came into town, we worked one day on the house with all hands on deck and then spent the rest of the weekend enjoying our time together.

Me giving mom the grand tour.

We have way too much fun cleaning windows.

JT painting our patio door white. It's beautiful!

Chris was super helpful with touching up the stairs.

How do you clean your screens?? Vacuum them!

After a very long day of work, we went back the next day for just a few hours and finished the final touches. Here's some afters of the upstairs (including carpet but minus the screens)! We'll save the before/after comparisons for the final post once we're done done :)

The highlight of my weekend with mom was when we saw Emmett! We had lunch with Charlie and he surprised us by bringing my favorite little man. Isn't he a doll?! I just love him to pieces.

I like to think that I'm the one who's making him smile like this but really it's his dad. The boy loves his dad so much!

WEEK OF NOVEMBER 14TH
JT went to San Fransisco for his annual ETS conference and rather than working at the house by myself, I decided to be crafty and catch up on Parenthood episodes! I've seen quite a few things on Pinterest that have caught my DIY eye and decided to make just a few things in time for Christmas.

One is a burlap wreath for our front door. The unique thing about this one is that you can use it all year long!

The other is my NOEL sign. Thank you Pottery Barn for the inspiration. Total cost $7.

Once JT got back into town we knew we had Friday night to prep all our tools for the laying of our hardwood floors and then Saturday to get as far as we could.

Please note: if you are EVER thinking about laying your own hardwood floors you'll need three things.
1. Patience
2. Persistence
3. Perfection

If you think you'll be lacking in one of those areas, just hire the right people to do the job. I'm blessed to have a wonderful husband that I work tremendously well with. Believe it or not, we haven't fought once during the whole process. What can I say, we just work really well together. It's a blessing!

After reading many articles on the DIY network and watching plenty of videos on YouTube, we felt we were ready to start laying our floors. The one thing we knew was the most important was the first row. You want to measure, measure again, and then remeasure after you install.

After two rows and everything still being on target... we knew we were off to a great start.

JT's job: Using the table saw

Macy's job: measuring

Teamwork: Installation

JT's work station

And by 6:41PM we were officially half way in one room! Talk about a long day. Remember, patience is key. Oh, and our backs really hurt by this point.

Once you get close to the wall you have to use a finish nailer so you don't bang up the walls.

Getting through the front great room was our goal. And we finished! At 1:30AM we called it quits and headed home for the night. We were exhausted and also really excited at what we had accomplished. The end is officially in sight. Just so we can all get a full picture, here's a before and after.

BEFORE

AFTER

Okay folks, there's still more to show... but I have to give you something to come back for! If you're thinking about installing your own hardwood floors, we'd love to give advice and answer any questions. Feel free to leave a comment and we'll be sure to help however we can (beside physical labor).

Stay tuned for more in the coming days. We're almost done y'all!

Painting, Prepping, & Staining

2011-11-07T20:18:00.000-06:00

Two weeks ago I wrote about all the painting we were doing. Last weekend we were painting doors. This past weekend we finally painted the last walls in our home. Frankly, I'll be okay if I don't pick up a paint brush for a while. Sad thing is, I know of a few small projects that we still need to do here and there. Nonetheless, it feels really good to have all the walls, windows, and trim done.

For the last two weeks we were waiting on our contractors to complete some electrical and framing on our load bearing wall (don't even try to attempt DIY on something that technical). So Friday night we got to work on painting those areas.

Friday Night's Agenda
- Finish painting the entryway and upstairs loft
- Paint the great room

We got started around 5:30PM and didn't stop until close to midnight. Here's a few pics of the process:

First, I trim all the edges.

Then JT goes through and fills in the wall space. Don't you just love this color? "Perfect Taupe" by Behr.

Told you we worked late.

After a good night's sleep it was back at it on Saturday for a good 14 hours.

Saturday's Agenda
- Paint the dining room
- Paint the kitchen
- Tape, sand, and stain 1 coat on the stairs

Lots of edges to sand on the stairs.

Thankfully JT was a loving husband and sanded all the stairs for us :)

BEFORE KITCHEN

AFTER KITCHEN

AFTER DINING ROOM

After changing our kitchen/dining room color 3 times, we finally settled on this green shade. And it's perfect! So by 5pm on Saturday we had 2 coats painted in the dining room/kitchen and it was time to start taping off the stairs so we can stain them once before we left for the night.

Note to self: taping every edge of every spindle and stairs takes time and staining takes a lot longer than painting. Once again, JT and I made a great team. I did the taping, he did the staining. Besides, I wouldn't want my hands and nails to look like this:

You can start to see the great color!

HINT: The stairs will match our hardwood floors that are waiting for their debut :)

While JT was staining the stairs, I put all the faceplates on the wall outlets and then cleaned up the floors with the shopvac. Possibly one of my most favorite tools we own. This thing cleans up ANYTHING! All the dust on our subfloors and around the edges and in the windows was driving me nuts. Now, it's all clean and I'm so happy. You can even see our beautiful taupe walls behind me.

And here's what 1 coat of stain will do to some beautiful oak stairs!

Sunday's Agenda
- Put second coat of stain on the stairs
- Install hinges on closet doors and install them

BEFORE STAIN

AFTER 2 COATS OF STAIN

Thanks to daylight savings, it got dark too soon, so this picture on the iPhone doesn't look fantastic... but you can see the potential with white trim and white doors!

Stay tuned for a really long post after this coming weekend. Carpet is getting installed on Thursday PLUS this beautiful woman is coming into town and I CAN'T WAIT to see her! See you soon, mom!

Doors, Chainsaws, and Jack

2011-11-06T20:57:00.000-06:00

Last weekend our bodies hit a wall and we needed a bit of a break from the home renovations. Good thing Jack had planned a visit and NO home renovations were a part of the agenda :) We enjoyed good food, good company, and relaxation.

Here's a photo of JT and Jack at a local dive called Drake's. It's a great sports bar and will definitely be on our list of places to frequent when Jack comes to visit. Frankie's was our place of choice for our annual March Madness weekend with Jack in Dallas and Drake's just might be the place to go this coming March... we'll see.

Isn't that sign so properly placed?! Jack is such a gentleman :)

Jack headed back to Houston on Sunday and that left us with a good portion of the day to get some things done on the house... we just can't stay away!

Sunday's Agenda
- Paint all the doors
- Paint the downstairs baseboards
- Chop down our backyard

On our way over to the house, we called David, the guy who cut down our cedar bush in the front yard, to see if he would supply us with a free quote to remove 3 trees and 2 bushes from our backyard and then also cut down the massive amount of branches from our neighbors tree that are encroaching on our roof. Don't worry, all the trees/bushes were dying and nothing was able to be salvaged.

We don't own a chainsaw and don't have a trailer to haul off the massive amounts of debris, so David came knocking on our door just in time!

Here's a picture of what our backyard looked like when they arrived and then one of what it looks like now.

BEFORE

DURING

AFTER

We have a yard, people!! Now all we need to do is pull up the weeds and ivy all over the ground, remove the rocks and concrete, lay sod, and then add a beautiful yellow lab :)

While David and his brother were demolishing our yard, JT and I were inside painting all of our doors. We had NO idea how many doors were in our house.

13 doors and 22 sliding panels to all our closets. That's a total of 35 doors that need to be primed and painted with 2 coats of semi-gloss white paint.

Our minds had us moving much quicker on this project than our bodies had energy for. While the 1st coat of paint was drying, we went and painted the baseboards.

We stayed WAY to late that night and still didn't get all the doors done. Turns out we had to go back this past Wed night to finish up. Enough about doors... here's what you've been waiting to see. Before and After's.

BEFORE

DURING

AFTER

Even though we only had 1 day of work underneath our belts, we still accomplished a major task that we both were dreading. But hey, we've got some pretty clean lookin' doors! Can't wait to install them and see what they look like.... more on that in the next post!

Help Wanted: Landscaping

2011-10-29T15:23:00.000-05:00

I need help and I'm not afraid to admit it. When we bought our house, JT and I had the perfect vision of what we wanted to do with the place and how we were going to fix it up. It's easy for us to see something and realize it's potential.

However, this is not the case when it comes to landscaping. I see a patch of land and I can imagine either grass or trees and that's pretty much it.

Many traits and wonderful qualities have been genetically passed down to me by my fantastic mother, however a green thumb was not one of those things. I never managed to keep plants alive in college and since then have shied away from owning them with the intention of waiting till we have a house that has sunlight and a yard... well, the time is here and now I need some help.

We have a spacious circular drive in front of our house and smack dab in front is a hideous cedar bush. I HATE cedar. It's horrible.

Good thing we had it removed yesterday! Here's a pic of them cutting down the monstrosity of a bush.

BEFORE

AFTER

Tada! It's GONE!!

Now... what should we put there? We need your advise. Take a look at what it looks like from the street and give us your ideas by commenting on this post.

Here's a few things we're considering:

1. Put a nicer looking shrub there

2. Put a small tree

3. Rip out everything and just put grass over the entire area.

4. Take advise from our friends and redo the entire area with new landscaping.

Can't wait to hear what you think we should do!

Painting People

2011-10-26T21:02:00.001-05:00

So what have you done for the last three days?

Oh, we've painted. You can pretty much call us "painting people".

On Monday we purchased all of our paint for the house and were eager to start. After reading blogs and watching multiple youtube videos on how to paint, painting techniques, etc. we felt like we were ready to conquer the entire house. The question that had us wondering for a bit was how in the world we were going to edge all of the walls, around the windows, and around the doors. There's a little tool that is a 50/50 split on painters opinions whether it "does the job" or not.

If there's any phrase that we've resonated well with during this process it's definitely "get the right tool for the job". That's half the battle for any DIY project. Don't skimp on your tools. Ben Carlucci would be so proud to hear us say that.

So let me introduce the best tool in our kit of painting supplies....

The Shur-Line "Edge Like a Pro"

One word: AMAZING! Just look at our edges and you be the judge. It takes probably 1/10 of the time it would take had we done everything by hand. Also, keep in mind that we've already painted all the baseboards and trim in the house, so there's no room for mistakes there either. Some painters refuse to use this tool... but I say it's the best thing you could ever use when painting your home!

Enough talk about tools. Let's get on to the agenda for the last week.

Wednesday's Agenda:

- Paint the Laundry Room

- Paint the Downstairs Half Bath

With the laundry room being the room guests will go to the least, we thought it was a safe area to test our new tools and skills found on Youtube. Plus, this is the color I'm most excited about because I was able to pick it out on my own. I told JT that if this was going to be the room I'm in the most, I was the one who could choose the color :) Fair argument, am I right?

BEFORE PAINT

AFTER

Don't you just love this color?! It's much brighter in person and super happy.

Thanks to our handy Shur-Line tool, the painting process went a lot faster than expected. So we decided to get all the bathrooms downstairs done. This included the his/her baths in the master as well.

HALF BATH BEFORE

HALF BATH DURING

HALF BATH AFTER

"HIS" BATH AFTER

"HER" BATH BEFORE

"HER" BATH DURING

"HER" BATH AFTER

Friday's Agenda:
- Paint the bedrooms upstairs
- Paint the hallway upstairs

It was a hefty goal, but we knew we could get it done. At 2AM that night we were finished. And guess what. I totally forgot to take pictures. What can I say, we were in the zone and focused.

Saturday's Agenda:
- Sleep in :)
- Work out (I know, we're crazy)
- Pick up our hardwood flooring
- Paint second coat on upstairs areas
- Paint Master Bedroom, 2 coats
- Paint entryway and high ceilings, 2 coats

We were super excited to pick up our flooring.... no sneak peek yet. Those will make their debut here in a few weeks.

All 26 cartons unloaded into our dining room.

UPSTAIRS BEDROOM #1

We paint the closet storage door too :)

UPSTAIRS BEDROOM #2

UPSTAIRS BONUS ROOM

(no outside light... hence being called a bonus room and it looking yellow, but it's really a cream color)

HALLWAY AFTER

JT decided to do some yard work to break up the monotonous painting.

Yes, this purple root is the base of the largest weed in our backyard. Roughly 2 inches thick.

Isn't this weed massive? I hate weeds.

Either my husband is super strong or this tree is extremely weak. After a few shoves and one good pull on the base, JT removed this right out of the ground.

Can't wait to clear out this whole backyard and start fresh... so many weeds.

MASTER BEDROOM BEFORE

MASTER BEDROOM AFTER

Remember how much we believe in getting the right tool for the job? Well, when we examined the really tall narrow areas of our ceiling we could've sworn that we needed to call professional painters to get those areas.

#1 - the ceilings are close to 20 feet tall

#2 - the corners are super narrow and impossible to reach with our Shur Line

Good thing we have the Mini Shur Line! With just a quick slice to the side of it and then securely tapping it to the end of our extension pole, we were professionals in a matter of minutes... so we hoped.

OUR MAKE-SHIFT MINI SHUR LINE

JT USING OUR SHUR LINE TOOLS TO GET THE TOP OF OUR CEILINGS

(I'm secretly laughing as I take this picture thinking we're so crazy. The things you'll do to get the job done and not pay professionals. Oh my.)

IT'S WORKING!

ENTRYWAY AFTER

(at night)

(during the day)

Didn't JT do a fantastic job?! He's such a pro. At 10:30PM that night we decided to be done for the day and then take Sunday off. We needed a day of rest and had painted enough for one weekend :)

Sunday's Agenda:

- Visit the house for 45 minutes and clean up

All the painting started to take a toll on our bodies and our shoulders, neck, and back were in uncomfortable pain. Football, eating good food, and napping through the afternoon were on the agenda.

The process of painting every wall in our house is on the downhill side and we can't wait to be finished painting! The room were standing in will become a "Perfect Taupe" this weekend and that will be my most favorite room to show you. I can't wait till it's done!!

Until then... have a great week and we'll see ya this weekend!

Chris & Some Contractors

2011-10-17T22:10:00.001-05:00

This past weekend we had 6 hands instead of 4. My brother Chris came into town to help us out with our house. Unfortunately, major demo was not on the agenda... instead, steady hands, a paint brush, and lots of paint was.

That's right. The final coat of trim needed 6 hands and an entire weekend of labor to finish. Rather than posting tones of pictures of trim... I'll just post a few :)

Chris came in at 7pm and we grabbed dinner and then got back to work. No rest for this English fam!

Friday's Agenda:
- Patch all the drywall
- Remove all wallpaper glue from the walls
- Sand all the patches and wipe down all the walls

If there's one thing my dad taught me and my brothers about painting, it's that you always do a thorough clean-up of your tools at the end of each day.

Saturday's Agenda
- Paint final coat of trim
- Paint oil-based primer on all the wallpaper walls (you have to do this so latex paint doesn't cause the wallpaper glue to goop up)

Yuck. Oil-primer is disgusting. Stir away bro. P.S. It's a horrible smell.

JT giving Chris some lessons on painting the windows... or maybe it's vice versa.

Prepping the stairs for trim paint.

JT doin' clean-up at the end of the day. Sush, don't tell him he has paint all over his arm. He's oblivious and has no idea. Too bad I'm a nice wife and pointed it out. I can't let him go out in public like that :)

After all day of painting, our hands were starting to do "the claw" and we were so tired. Frozen pizza and wine it is. Gotta love relaxing with fam and watching some college football.

Sunday's Agenda

- Final touch ups on trim

- Clean up the house for the contractors to come Monday morning

Because no one wants to see pictures of touch-ups, here's a few before/afters for the weekend:

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE (with 2 coast of primer)

AFTER

(don't you just love this light fixture?)

A HUGE THANK YOU to my oldest bro, Chris, for helping us out. He's so wonderful to come a slave over our home for a weekend! Glad to know this will be a family effort and everyone can put a little "sweat-equity" into our home. A few other family members will be coming in the weeks to come also. It's gonna be a family affair.

On to a huge announcement... we have big plans to "open" up our first floor. It's a bit too closed off for us and we're open-floor-plan-kind-of people. We've looked a few contractors and after making our final selection, it's time to get started...

Monday's Agenda

- Meet our contractor crew, Bailey Remodeling

- Visit the house at 5:30PM to see what progress they made

8AM, Getting set up

5:30PM, After 1 day of demo

Can you believe how different it looks?! AMAZING! I can't even imagine how awesome it's going to be once everything is finished. The entire job will be completed within 2 weeks and I can't wait to show you the steps through the process.

Stay tuned for updates y'all. This is gonna be good.

It's All In The Details

2011-10-11T22:00:00.000-05:00

Last Friday we stood in the future Great Room of our house and looked at each other in crazy amazement of how much we put our bodies through within the first week of home-ownership. We were so focused on the task at hand that we really didn't take many moments to step back and look at what we were doing... that's what we hope this blog will do. Document the craziness of DIY that we'll be looking back on day and say, "What were we thinking?".

However, until our bodies tell us to stop, we're gonna keep on going at this speed. We've committed to working only 1 night during the week (Wednesday) and then we'll work as much as we can on the weekends. Yes, we'll have to sacrifice making some friends for a few months, but we'll be much happier home-owners come Christmas :)

Speaking of which, some of you might be wondering why you don't see any furniture in these pictures. That's cause we're still living in our apartment while we make the major updates to our house. The timing worked out well so we have about 2 months to make as much of a mess as we want so we don't have to be careful about tip-toeing around our furniture. This also has another benefit that we have an "escape" from the mess we call DIY. Don't worry about it, it's a few miles away and in another building :) Out of site, out of mind... kindof.

Okay, now let's get down to the good stuff.

Last Wednesday's agenda
- Remove all the wall paper

It's hard to remove wallpaper quickly when you have TWO LAYERS to remove. We started out in the laundry room where this lovely wallpaper was on display...

But keep in mind you can't start removing wallpaper until you've moved the washer and dryer out, uninstalled all the pipes, and then removed all the items & faceplates to all the outlets. Sounds simple, but it takes some time. The wall paper came off really quickly, so then we were on to the kitchen. At this rate, we're thinking we're going to get all the wallpaper off tonight.... think again.

Here's a picture of what the kitchen looks like before wallpaper...

And now it's gone! Too bad it was already 10PM and we were beat. The rest would have to wait till Friday night.

Friday's Agenda
- Finish removing all the wall paper (3 bathrooms and Dining Room glue)
- Prep the home for trim priming

The electrical had to be removed in order to get the wallpaper behind it. Don't worry, I've done these types of things before :).

All of the wallpaper was off and it was only 8:45PM! Next step was to take off all the doors & hinges so that we could get rockin' and rollin' on Saturday with trim & window priming.

BUT FIRST... it's time. That's right, it's time to remove the worst eyesore in the whole house. The gold shear curtain above the front door.

WOW. It's crazy what it does to just remove window treatments.

Doors off and ready to go for tomorrow.

Saturday's Agenda
- Get coffee/breakfast at Starbucks
- Swing by Home Depot for paint primer and a few other things
- Prime all the trim and windows downstairs once

To be consistent, we started in the laundry room first and then made our way across the first floor of the house. After one coat on the laundry room door we knew we were in for an exciting day.

Look at how different it looks!!

We packed our lunch and while we were eating it we walked around our neighborhood and then stopped in our backyard to pull some weeds. JT made the statement that he's more comfortable doing renovations outside than inside... by all means! Help yourself :) I don't have a green thumb in my entire body.... but somehow I want a garden someday in this little area... my mom will come teach me, I'm sure.

After 1 coat on every nook and cranny on the first floor, we were pooped and ready to get some sleep. The second coat will have to wait for tomorrow.

Sunday's Agenda
JT was preaching at a small church in Springfield, KY in the morning and we knew we wouldn't get back till about 3PM or so to get started on the house.
- Finish the second coat on the first floor
- Start priming the first coat on the second floor windows

Lots more of the same... and now we realize that the largest task we've decided to take on is painting. We're literally painting every square inch of this place.... and patience is what's going to get us through this crazy thing.

Here's a few before/afters to help us see the progress.

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER

One last before/after picture to show you what a little paint will do. Notice the closet trim and the 3 posts in the vanity.

BEFORE

AFTER

Tomorrow night is more of... you guessed it, priming trim/windows!! More updates this coming weekend. Stay tuned and add us to your google reader or subscribe to the blog.

There's Potential

2011-10-02T20:34:00.002-05:00

The moment we walked into this house, we knew it had to be ours. That evening we put in an offer and 2 days later we were under contract. Wahoo!

For the last month, we've been shopping for paint colors, flooring, and contractors who will knock down a few walls for us.

There's so much potential. That's what we keep telling ourselves and everyone else. Some think we're crazy and then others can't wait to help us tear down a few things and rebuild.... the later folks can stop by anytime. There's plenty to do.

On Friday, September 30th at 4pm, it was official. The attorney handed us our keys and we looked at each other with huge smiles on our faces like we were just given the largest Christmas present ever. Our realtor, Cindy Kelly, has been FANTASTIC and we are so glad we found her. She helped us every step of the way.

As soon as we got those keys, we went home to change clothes and then went straight to our house to start demo! I guess you could say it's first-time-home-buyers adrenaline :)

Here's a few "before" pictures so you can tell where we're starting from. Now, keep in mind... potential is the key word.

Entry

First part of the living room and entry. Notice the marble shag carpet. Original with the home in '84.

The living room continues to the dining room.

This is the wall in the living room that we will be knocking down to make it one great room.

This is the family room on the other side of that wall and it opens to the kitchen. This will ultimately be our dining room and the front room will be one great living space.

Screened in porch off the family room/future dining room.

Kitchen. Don't you just love the stained glass rose?

Laundry room off the kitchen.

Garage.

Master with vanity and 2 bathrooms... much work to be done here... but that'll be next year.

Yes, I have a phone on the wall in my bathroom. No, I will not be using it.

Now to the upstairs.

This is the open loft area.

First bedroom

Second bedroom.

Bonus room. Don't you just love this carpet?! Why in the world would be ever want to get rid of it I'm not quite sure :)

Basement.

Okay, now that you have a general idea of everything, here's a series of photos of our weekend warrior work. We started at 6:00PM on Friday night and by 9 we had all the carpet and pads removed from the entire house. Booyah.

The wallpaper in one room was just peeling off like magic. Awesome.

Pulling back the first piece of carpet.

TIP: Make sure to cut your carpet into strips. Easier to remove, easier to carry.

This was by far the hardest part of carpet removal. Someone went crazy with the staple gun on the stairs.

Good thing I like meticulous work and am apparently good at pulling staples from wood.

Here's the final pictures of all the carpet and pads once removed from our house. Now who would like to come and dispose of this for free?? Any takers?

After carpet is removed, staples and tac-strips had to pulled up from the floors so that we can install hard wood floors. This was tedious and I pulled up the tac strips while JT pulled up staples. After 2 hours of this, our backs were killing us and it was midnight.

Saturday's Agenda:

- Buy carpet and hardwood flooring (they were on sale!)

- Get started on wallpaper

- Start sanding the stairs

- Start ripping up linoleum

- Remove all the baseboards on the first floor

The day went so fast I forgot to take pictures till the evening. JT removing wallpaper.

Removing linoleum in the entry... we're gonna need a larger crowbar.

Making some headway in the 1/2 bath.

Sunday's Agenda:

- Finish pulling off all the baseboards

- Remove all the linoleum

- Finish prep for all the floors

Here's JT with a 3-foot crow bar ripping up the last parts of the entry.

We learned how to remove a toilet! JT is conquering his thrown :)

Tada! No toilet, baseboards, or linoleum. Making progress.

No on to the laundry room. I swear I'm doing work too, I just can't help but take pictures of a really hot guy at work.

After we sanded the stairs down and striped the finish off, you can really start to see the potential!! We will stain our stairs and railing to match the Whiskey Brown 4" Hand Scrapped floors we purchased. I can't wait to install these.

We had to remove a few doors through the house to get up all the flooring. This is the long front room that will be our great room.

Doesn't the laundry room look so much better?!... just look past the wallpaper.

Mexican food is something hard to come by in the great state of Kentucky. We're still making our way through trying various ones and on the way home today, we saw Salsaritas, a quick-dine mexican restaurant. Similar style to Qdoba. The chips and salsa were AMAZING!! And we even got out of there for a total of $13. Definitely worth every penny.

Our bodies hurt. Our joints are tired. And we're so happy we're doing this together. I really can't say enough about how much I love working laboriously with my husband. He truly is so encouraging and great to work with. I grew up in a family that always did DIY to our homes and I can't tell you how much that has helped in the last 3 days of my life. I'm excited to document all of our projects and if you have any questions on any steps we take, feel free to leave a comment on this post and I'll reply.

We're not planning on working during the week so that we can rest our bodies and focus on our real jobs :) More updates to come next weekend. Stay tuned...

It's official.

2011-10-02T19:23:00.000-05:00

We're homeowners!

Neither of us thought this day would come so soon. We arrived in Louisville, KY with all our belongings on August 3rd and on August 28th, we found it.

Our home has TONS of potential and thankfully we could see past the marble shag carpet and wallpaper (yikes). Since it had been on the market since Dec 2010, apparently no one else wanted to do that much work.... and somehow we're crazy enough to think we can do this thing :)

After weeks filled with inspections, minor repairs, and negotiations, we officially received the keys this past Friday, September 30th. Just shy of 5 weeks.

The weeks and months ahead we be filled with plenty of posts on our progress. Success and failures. So visit often or subscribe to our blog so that you can get the updates.

Here goes nothin!

Israel Day 12: Western Wall (aka Wailing Wall), Pools of Bethesda, St. Anne's Church, Via Dolorosa, Garden Tomb, American Colony Hotel

2011-07-17T15:16:00.002-05:00

Today marks the 12th and final day of being in Israel. It's amazing to think of all that we've seen, done, and experienced. I look back through some of our pictures and can't believe how many of the days start running together. This is actually one of the main reasons I'm posting a blog per day. So when I look back and want to remember the details and random things that happened, I can not only look at pictures, but have an account for what actually happened day by day.

As you probably have noticed, each day has quite a few written details to go along with the pictures. This final day I didn't take down as many notes because I just wanted to soak it all in and have a time of reflect.

Any notes that are provided are due to my memory (now over 1 month old) and also courtesy of JT's journal. So here goes...

We started the morning at the Wailing Wall. A quick glance once more.

When then took a tour underground through various tunnels to see part of the wall that are not exposed to the outside. Here is a picture of 1 of the stones that weighs more than 7 tons! On the far right of the picture you can see where the stone starts and the end of it is just past JT's hand on the wall. I can't even fathom how they got this rock into place.

As we walk through the tunnels, there are Jews praying alongside the wall, in belief that they are closer to where the old temple stood, rather than standing outside.

Our next visit is at The Fortress of Antonia. Here, Jesus was condemned by Pilate and give the cross beam. The pavement from Christ's time is still here and there is engraving of a Roman game that the soldiers would've played to cast lots for Christ.

Dr. Hannah reads from the gospel of John, chapter 8. Accusation. Interrogation. Defense. Verdict. It is finished. We sing How Great Thou Art and our voices echo through the chambers below the fortress.

We spend a moment touching the pavement and reflecting on what we've just read, heard, and sang.

Our next stop is the Pools of Bethesda. Bethesda, which means house of Grace, was built on pagan worship altars that were thought to be places of healing. Jesus is showing here that He is the Great Physician, not the pagan gods.

Right next to the pools is St. Anne's Church, which was built by the Crusaders. The acoustics in this church are amazing and after we sing a line in the song Hallelujah, we can hear our voices echoing through the whole church. I didn't get a recording of it, but you can find some examples on YouTube.

As we walked outside the city walls towards the bus, we see some guards standing casually... so it was the perfect time for a photo op.

For lunch we stopped by a local falafel shop and it was AMAZING!!! I absolutely LOVE falafel. We also wanted to grab a picture with our tour guide, Yuval, because he was so instrumental in all that we saw and learned this whole trip. If you ever get a chance to go to Israel, try to get him as your guide. It's worth the money.

Our next stop was an overlook outside Jerusalem where you can literally see all the way from Jerusalem, down the valley, and onto Jericho. Absolutely the most breathtaking view I've ever seen. Words and pictures cannot do it justice. I'm surprised that this is a view someone hasn't place a building on to capitalize on real estate.

There are a few locals there who have their camel and donkey and try to barter with you to ride their animals and pay them. A few people took rides. Definitely worth it as a spectator.

Some of you might be wondering what we traveled in on a daily basis... the coldest most wonderful bus ever. Seriously.

On our way back into Jerusalem, our final destination was the Garden Tomb. It is located right next to a bus station, which is very fitting because even in Jesus' time, all executions were done by a very public spot so that everyone could see.

This was a place of stoning. Stephen may have been stoned here. This is in your face... everyone would see what was done to you.

We start at the viewing of what is believed to be Golgotha. Right next to the modern day bus station. We then go to a beautiful part of the garden to reflect on the story of the crucifixion and take communion together and share our favorite parts of our trip. Then we end out time outside the garden tomb. This may in fact be the tomb where Jesus was buried, but more importantly... the tomb is empty. He is not here, for He is risen!

We're given 45 minutes or so to read, pray, and spend time by ourselves. I wish I could've had 4 hours to be here.

We finish our trip with a celebration dinner at the American Colony Hotel. Very beautiful. Quaint. Delicious.

With full stomachs and packed bags, we head to the airport, reflect on all the things we've seen, and head back to the US at midnight. By far this is the most impactful trip I've ever been on in my life. Now I read the Bible with a "High Definition" lens when I used to see it in black and white.

Thank you Lord for you provision in allowing us the opportunity to go. We'll never be the same.

Israel Day 11: Temple Mount, Southern Steps, City of David, Warren's Shaft, Hezekiah's Tunnel, Pool of Siloam

2011-07-16T08:31:00.000-05:00

This morning was an early start at 7:50AM. We head in the bus with curious and anxious minds as we head towards the Temple Mount. We walk through the security gate where guards are separating the men from the women and making sure you don't have any weapons and are fully covered (clothing that is).

As we walk up the wooden ramp to the top of the mount, you can look through the cracks down at the Wailing Wall and see families celebrating Bar Mitzvah's and also praying their prayers to God.

Once we arrive that the Temple Mount, my heart becomes heavy. Israel keeps the security of this place, but Muslims have the spiritual control. Muslims gather in groups of mean and women and separate while they take time to pray, learn, and be together.

Israeli's are concerned that the southeast corner of the mount might fall, but the Muslims won't do any reconstruction to fix it. Jerusalem is the third most important city outside of Mecca and Medina to the Muslim faith.

We head up to the Dome of the Rock and when you get close to the marble on the side, you can see something strange... (can you see what we all saw? Creepy if you ask us.)

Through the arches you can see the Mount of Olives.

Underneath this covering is solid bedrock, just placed outside where the Dome of the Rock is. This is where Abraham sacrafised Isaac, where the 1st temple was built, where the Ark of the Covenant stood, and one day, where Jesus will return to reign. Just another moment on this trip where my mind was blown and I stood in awe.

We head outside the Temple Mount and visit the Wailing Wall for a brief time. Women are crying their prayers to the Lord.

You can write your prayers on paper and stick them in the wall. Hundreds of thousands of prayers are everywhere when you get up close. Every crack you see has papers in it.

There were also many moments of celebration as quite a few families were going to the Wailing Wall area to celebrate their sons Bar Mitzvah's. This was very special and unique for us to be there and spectators.

Some of you know how Marcy likes to ask, "Was this the exact spot where Jesus was? Did he stand right here?" It makes it extra fascinating for there to be affirmation of what you hope and dream is true. This is a pic I finally got for Marcy... she's literally walking exactly where Jesus walked 2,000 years ago.

And JT and I sat right outside the southern gate where hundreds of thousands of pilgrims would come every year to visit the temple. These are the steps Jesus would've walked up when coming to the temple.

That afternoon we headed over to the City of David, just outside the Temple Mount and visited the beautiful garden, examined what the city would've looked like in David's time, and then those who were brave enough, slushed through knee deep water in a pitch black, narrow tunnel for 20 minutes. This is also known as Hezekiah's Tunnel. I'm sad I don't have any pictures from this... but it was too wet and dark to risk ruining my camera!

Once out, we walked just a ways to visit the Pool of Siloam. This is the pool where Jesus healed the blind man. It's neat to now be able to put visuals to everything you read in the Bible.

As I was waiting on the bus to pick up the rest of our group further up the hill, I looked to my left and saw a man working construction on a home. He quickly pulled out his orange mat, removed his hat, and knelt to pray. He is Muslim and it is time to pray to Allah. Multiple times a day Muslim prayers will ring through the air reminding the people to pray. I wonder if it ever gets to a point where Jews will drown out the sound and it becomes background music to their lives in Jerusalem... probably not. It is a constant reminder that things are not right.

Our final visit was to the Holocaust Museum. This was one of the greatest museums I've ever been to. The designers did such a fantastic job of telling the stories and facts of this awful, tragic event. As I walk through the halls and zig zag my way through, I feel raw emotion. Tears fill my eyes and I think to myself, "Pictures tell 1,000 words". I almost didn't even need to read the captions. The Horror... such evil. What they do with the photos is just amazing. I now have a greater appreciation for the stories photos can tell.

One of the most impressive moments in the museum was when I was standing in front of a 10 ft. tall photo of Auschwitz and it appears as if I'm standing right on the train tracks heading towards the end. To my right is a life size box car from one of the trains that would've pulled into that very spot. The children were separated from their parents here. Heartbreaking.

At the end of the museum you walk out and see the most magnificent view of a huge forest in Israel. This is to remind you of the new growth and the re-birth of the Jews. Off to the side is a 6 candle menorah. This stands for the 6 million lives that were lost, and 1.5 of which were children.

Come, Lord Jesus, and save us.

Israel Day 10: Herodium, Shepherd's Field, Hezekiah's Wall, Cardo

2011-07-12T08:23:00.001-05:00

After a huge breakfast buffet, I grab my small Dixie cup of to-go coffee and head on the bus. Our first stop of the day is just 15km outside Jerusalem, the Herodian Fortress which was built in 23-21 BC.

Of course, these fortresses were built on top of the highest hills they could find, so that you could spot anyone coming into your land. A great defense position.

We climb to the very top and look down at the valleys and imagine David being a shepherd, leading his flock through the land below us. Psalm 23 is read. When flash floods come into the land, the water rushes from the high mountains and down through the valleys. After the storm, there is still water, greener fields after the rain. Yuval shares a few insights with us about sheep and how they follow the shepherd at all times. They know no other way. Olive oil is also used to put on the nose and mouth of sheep to protect them from flies... and it is also used to anoint Kings.

From the top we can also view many Palestinian and Jewish settlements. It's interesting to see how close, yet how separate everything is.

We climb down into the fortress and see some of the Roman baths (post Herod's time) and view live excavations of what is being uncovered even today. This fortress is MASSIVE. This shot will give you an idea...

Think about how in the world they got all the stones up on top of this hill. Crazy to think about.

JT stole a clay shard from one of the piles from the excavation (shush, don't tell anyone). We then walk down through the water cisterns (seems like we've seen 10 or more of these... but what do you expect? It's the desert and there needs to be a way to store water) and we see more of the live excavation happening. Can you believe this is still so intact?

When we leave the site, we get on the bus and drive by a military station down below. There are tanks and what do you know, a soldier wants to hitch-hike on our bus back to Jerusalem. Get on soldier! We'll take you. (P.S. Hitch-hiking is very common in Israel)

Just before lunch, we go back to the Old City of Jerusalem and walk through the Jewish Quarter.

It is basically a community/neighborhood within the old city that was demolished in the war in 1948 and to this day it is being brought back to life. There are more excavation happening throughout this area and you can see holes down various parts where there is the old wall around the temple mount and then modern day Jerusalem sitting on top.

One of the culture shocks we experienced were large groups of 18-20 year old men/women walking around with AK47's. Odd, yet I felt totally safe.

The rest of the day is a free day, so we decide to grab the best pizza in all of Israel (seriously, so good), do a bit of shopping in the markets, and then go back to the hotel.

On our way back, I saw the cutest kitten in the whole world. I wanted to take her back to the hotel, give her a bath, and then take her home :) Too bad this picture will have to do. Just precious!

We're so beat and just need an afternoon of napping, blogging, photo editing, and then fill ourselves at dinner. Since our rest during the afternoon wasn't enough, we head to bed extra early (8:30) and watch an episode of the greatest show of all time: The West Wing.

Israel Day 9: Mt. of Olives, Dominus Flevit, Garden of Gethesmane, Caiaphas' House, Model of Jerusalem, Shrine of the Book

2011-07-10T17:49:00.003-05:00

Our trip is winding down and things are starting to become a blur. We've seen so many sights and stood in awe of so many things. It's hard to keep track of it all.... which is why my blogs will start to be more about emotions and pictures rather than facts and numbers.

We started out the day at the top of the Mt. of Olives. This is just breathtaking. Modern. Ancient. Visual. Unbelievable. All those things and more. The Dome of the Rock is shining and we are quickly reminded that things are not as they should be. One day Christ will return to reign from that very spot. The very spot where Abraham offered up Isaac, where the 1st temple was built, where the 2nd temple was built, and where Christ will reign forever. And we were standing right in a spot where we could see it all.

words cannot express....

It is really windy and chilly. We sit and look at all the sites while Yuval points out the monuments and buildings. There are muslim graves all along the outside of the wall. There are Jewish graves all along the Mt. of Olives side.

We grab a group picture and then head down the road that Jesus traveled down to the Garden of Gethesmane. It's hard to believe that all of those historical accounts happened on these few hills. Remember, it's all within walking distance.

We stop half way down at Dominus Flevit. Here we read Luke 19 where Jesus, while walking toward the city of Jerusalem, becomes overwhelmed by the beauty of the Second Temple and predicts its future destruction, and the diaspora of the Jewish people, weeps openly. This is where Jesus wept. We step inside the modern church built here and I snap one of my favorite shots of the entire trip.

We finish our walk down the hill and end at the Garden of Gathesmane. This is where Christ's concern for the 11 that were with him was greater than his concern for himself. Olive trees are survivors and there is one that is over 2,000 years old. Which means this tree was present when Christ was in the garden. Amazing.

There is also a church there that inside has the rock bed that is believed that Christ wept on.

We go inside for a few moments and then end our time outside in a secluded garden just on the other side. Here Dr. Hannah gives us a devotional and talks about Christ's humble submission to the Father which ultimately took him to Caiaphas' house. We sing Amazing Grace and also There is a Redeemer. We spend 10 minutes or so on reflection and in prayer by ourselves. This was one of the best 10 minutes of the trip. It's nice to be able to have a moment and pause and reflect.

Across the Kidron Valley and up the hill is the home of Caiaphas. There is a church there now, but we walk in the doors and down to the basement where Christ was in prison and kept in the dungeon while being prosecuted. We stand in the dungeon where Christ was chained and read Psalm 88 and also sing Man of Sorrows What a Name. This is absolutely one of my all time favorite songs. You listen here. Here's the lyrics:

“Man of Sorrows!” what a name
For the Son of God, who came
Ruined sinners to reclaim.
Hallelujah! What a Savior!
Bearing shame and scoffing rude,
In my place condemned He stood;
Sealed my pardon with His blood.
Hallelujah! What a Savior!
Guilty, vile, and helpless we;
Spotless Lamb of God was He;
“Full atonement!” can it be?
Hallelujah! What a Savior!
Lifted up was He to die;
“It is finished!” was His cry;
Now in Heav’n exalted high.
Hallelujah! What a Savior!
When He comes, our glorious King,
All His ransomed home to bring,
Then anew His song we’ll sing:
Hallelujah! What a Savior!

Just outside are the 36 steps to his house. These are the steps that Jesus was brought up.

That afternoon we stop at a large model of Jerusalem to examine what it would've looked like in Jesus' time. This is a picture of the City of David just outside the temple mount.

After that we went to view the Shrine of the Book where we examined the Dead Sea Scrolls. The scrolls are on display for 3-6 months and then go to "rest" from exposure so that they do not deteriorate.

That night JT, Marcy, and I headed out on the town to see the sights. On our way, we walked through the market and also saw some unique sites.

Our final destination was the Wailing Wall. This is our first sight of how important this monument is to the Jewish people. The is approximately 50 feet from where the previous Holy of Holies stood, which is why they view this spot so holy and reverent. Above us there is a Bar Mitzvah going on.

When we went down below, JT was asked by a jewish man if he had a cigarette. This man's name was Moti and we had a long conversation with him. Jerusalem has some of the nicest people. We enjoyed our conversation with him... which lasted close to 45 minutes :)

After a long evening strolling the town, we head back to our hotel and crash. Tomorrow's another early morning.

Israel Day 8: Bet-Shean, Spring of Harod, Qumran, Judean Wilderness, Jerusalem

2011-07-03T18:00:00.000-05:00

Wake up call: 6:15AM

Bags outside your door: 7AM

Eat breakfast and then on the bus by 8AM

First stop is at Bet-Shean where there is a current andancient city. This city has been the gateway from the Jezreel Valley and up tothe Jordan River Valley. 20 years ago the ruins were nothing but open fieldsand green area. Come to find out that once you start digging you find layersand layers of cities built upon themselves. Some dating back to the Canaanites(2,000 BC) and even the Egyptian period. To think this was once completely underground...

There's even an ancient "potty room". Haha... we had too much fun here with pictures.

There was a major earthquake here and you can see in thispicture that the columns have all fallen and even the stones from the roadexploded up. They found it just as it was back in the Roman era. None of thepieces have been moved.

A group of us hiked up to the top of the mountain thatoverlooked the entire plains and valleys all around. There is definitely anadvantage to owning the high ground. Great views, but now it’s 96 degrees andit’s only 10:30AM and we’re so hot. We get a quick drink of water and then headon the bus to our next destination.

Harod’s Spring is a natural spring that is mentioned inJudges 7:5-7 (story of Gideon’s men being chosen for battle). We were in theexact spot where they knelt down for a drink of water and God chose the 300hundred who were to fight against the army of Midianites of 130,000. There arebeautiful flowers and lavender bushes around that fragrant the area.

Here’s Marcy taking a drink of water the “proper” way!

Now we’ll drive south 1.5 hours till we reach Qumran. Lunchis a combo Shwarma meal: Falafel in pita bread with cabbage and hummus and adiet Coke. Yum. There’s a big shop with a lot of Ahava products (made from theDead Sea minerals) and the shop attendants won’t leave you alone. The entranceto the Qumran museum is right outside the restaurant and we stop inside forYuval to tell us about the Essenes and their lifestyle. They were the ones whoactually wrote the Dead Sea scrolls that were found in 1947.

We step outside and realize that it is extremely hot. Worsethan Arizona. How do these animals survive?

Right in this spot are the excavations of the Essene villageand where they used to live, cleanse, eat, and write the scrolls. We even foundthe remains of their favorite mascot… can you tell what it is?

That’s right, a longhorn. Ha! This pic is for Jared Perry. He's the biggest Longhorn fan we know.

There are 11 caves that we know they inhabited and the mostfamous one is Q4, where they found over 500 scrolls in clay pots. Here’s a fewpics of us out front of the cave.

Oh, and by the way, here’s a picture of how hot it is andwhat the humidity is:

The Dead Sea is so beautiful, yet so hot.

We must get back on the bus and head to Jerusalem! Our final destination for the day.

Israel Day 7: Chorazim, Hazor, Dan, Banias Waterfall, Caesarea Philippi, Golan Heights

2011-07-03T16:41:00.001-05:00

Note: This post was written in the present tense because I wrote it while we were out and about that day...

Leaving the hotel at another early start at 8am. Our firststop is at Chorazim, a Jewish city during the time of Jesus. This is one of thethree that he condemns in the Bible and says it will be ruined.

Today is going to be a hot day, so we start our learningsfrom Yuval in the shade and the breeze is cool. We’re 2 ½ miles off the coastof the Sea of Galilee. He taught us about various Jewish customs. The Yamaka isused as a head covering and a reminder to all Jews that they are to remainhumble and not to put themselves above the Lord (even though some still do).The menorah is always 7 candles (9 candles is specifically for Hanukah = 1candle as the servant and 8 candles for each day). 7 is the number ofperfection and the light represents the light of God. Two olive branches are oneach side of the candles, representing the servants of God = Moses and Elijah.The Menorah has always been the ancient symbol of Judiasm, not the start ofDavid (that wasn’t used as a Jewish symbol until after Christ’s time, althoughit always existed).

When we went into the Synagogue, we saw the seat for theRabbi. We then read Christ’s words on the topics of the seat in Matthew 23. Weare not to be referred to as teachers either, but as servants.

Here is Marcy and JT in front of the synagogue.

These buildings are made out of Lava Stones, as opposed tothe buildings on the coast made out of Sand Stones and the buildings in thevalleys made out of Lime Stone. The country is so small, yet so versatile.

We’re now above sea level and are heading to our nextdestination, Tel Hazor.

Tel Hazor is one of the largest Canaanite cities, housingmore than 15,000 people. It was the New York city of that time.

We read Joshua11 while sitting under the shade of the old palace just inside the gates (whichis the “Solomonic Gates” of that time = 4 walls thick). As we read the story,Joshua comes to destroy the entire city and burn it to the ground. You can seethe burn layer and the old rocks that were cracked due to the heat of theflames.

We’re also reminded of the promise God made to Abraham thathe would conquer this land and God would give it to him. Think about if Godpromised that you would one day conquer and take over New York city. That wouldbe a lofty promise and yet, it came true. God was faithful.

JT and I think about this lesson at this spot: God keeps hispromises.

We arrive at Pania (currently known at Bania) and duringJesus’ time it was known as Caesarea Philippi. This city was the central placefor Pagan worship in the land. The city was named after Pan, the idol. Herodbuilt a temple here at the base of the cave, which was also known as “The Gatesof Hades”, for all the gods lived at the top of the mountain (Mt. Hermon). Thecity sits at the base of the mountain where 1 of 3 tributaries comes out andfeeds into the Jordan river. We sit underneath a large fig tree for shade as JTshares the scripture of Matthew 16:13-20, where Jesus asks “Who do men say thatI am”? He traveled all the way from Capernaum (30 miles) to ask this question,at the heart of Pagan worship. It was later that he went up on the mount andwas transfigured (possibly the top of Mt. Hermon).

Quick drive over to the Banias Waterfall. On our long hikedown the hillside before we reached the river, we read Psalm 42 what Davidwrote, as the rushing water is too loud to hear people once you’re at the riverthat flows out of the waterfall. The streams and rapids are beautiful.

The final destination was the waterfall. The water is rushing so hard that it blows a cool breeze oneveryone. We’re sweating so bad! It’s really hot today.

Now that it’s 1:30, it’s time to stop for lunch. Deliciousspread buffet with Chocolate Cake and coffee for dessert. Something Paula Deanwould make J. Here’smy plate of food: YUM.

We get back on the bus and head to the historical city ofDan where there is the second tributary we visit. We hike through the shadedforest and cross over a portion of the river that is freezing! Might as well bean athletic ice bath.

Our feet are numb and it is a nice relief from the heat.Kids and families are in their bathing suits and are enjoying the water.

Further down on the path is the entrance to the historicalcity of Dan.

Just inside the city gates you can see the Kings Thrown where heused to judge/rule over the people. We stop in the shade and learn about theancient artifact that was found under the city road: Dan Stella. This is anancient tablet that Hazel (not an Israelite) wrote about his victory over 70kings and the House of David. This was the first artifact uncovered thatactually referred to King David (uncovered in 1993 under this road...).

Up the hill we saw the original gate during the Solomonictime period. Beyond that was the ruins that predated that gate (the gate wasbuilt on top of the Tel). Further down was more of the excavated city of Dan(only 10% has currently been uncovered). You can see the entire area of thetemple that Jeroboam built in order to keep his people from not going to thetemple in the southern kingdom of Judah (Jerusalem). He didn’t want his peopleto leave and go to the Southern Kingdom and serve Rehaboam. Many parts of thetemple were not built according to the law and ultimately led their city todestruction.

Just beyond in the distance 10 miles is the border of Israeland Lebanon.

Our final stop at this site was at an old Canaanite citygate that dates back to 2,000 BC. Here's Marcy and Dr. Hannah standing in awe.

It is amazing how much history has been built upon eachother all within 1 square mile.

We get into the bus and travel the same road that Paul didwhen traveling to Damascus when Christ appeared to him. Our next stop is at amodern day memorial site for the 1973 war where Syria and Egypt surprisedIsrael in attack. It is known as the 6 Day War and Israel was victorious.

The memorial is up in the Golan Heights which is 3,000 feetabove sea level. It is breezy and very chilly. It feels like a cool Coloradoevening. We can see the tank that was used in the war as well as the Syriancommunity across the valley.

Yuval, our tour guide, shared with us that currently inIsrael, all youth have to serve in the military for 2 years starting at the ageof 18. You are in the reserves till you’re 45 and at any moment the country cancall you into battle. Every year from age 20 to 45 men will go for a year ofmilitary training to refresh their skills and remind themselves of what actionsthey need to take should they be called to war.

JT and I really appreciate this site and the modern dayhistory that we learned. We have such an egocentric perspective in the US.

It’s late in the day and we’re headed back down to the Seaof Galilee for dinner and some shopping in the markets. More tomorrow…

Israel Day 6: Sea of Galilee, Mt of the Beatitudes, Tagaba, Capernaum, Bethsaida, Kursi

2011-06-23T23:27:00.000-05:00

We have early start at 8am. We're told this is the hottest day yet of our tour. 100+ degrees. Yikes. As Dr. Hannah would say, "Water is cheaper than dehydration" (so drink up).

I forgot to post a picture from the hotel room of where we're staying.

Can't get much better than right on the shore. This photo is courtesy of Jack Porter, my friend and fellow photographer on the trip. We both had Canon cameras, so we were swapping lenses the entire trip. So fun!

In the morning we walk down the shore to a dock where we board a wide boat that we are to take across the Sea of Galilee. We launch off from the dock and music starts to play. That's right.... the USA National Anthem.

After that, Yuval took this time to teach us about the Sea:
- It's really a lake but called a sea because it behaves like a sea.
- Largest body of fresh water in Israel
- 150 ft. deep
- Waves get to 6-7 feet high during storms

The boat stopped for a pit stop in the middle of the sea and from there we looked all around and could essentially see 80% of all the spots where Jesus' ministry was.

This is definitely a moment where we take it all in. We're seeing things we've always hoped we could see. Tiberias - where we're staying. Valley of the Doves - where Jesus walked down from Nazareth. Migdal - where Mary Magdalene was from. Mt. of the Beatitudes - where Jesus gave the Sermon on the Mount. Capernaum - where Jesus did a majority of his ministry and lived. Bethsaida - Peter, Philip, 7 Andrew lived here. Many of these places we'll visit today.

Dr. Hannah takes time to give us a morning devotional from Matthew 14. Jesus walks on water. The point he draws out is "Your either in the storm, coming out of one, or about to be in one. Throughout it all Jesus is." He then reads from Mark 6:51-52. This is right after Jesus has just fed the 5,000. Each one of his disciples had a full basket (more than the boy had to begin with) and they learned nothing. Insight: You learn nothing from good times, more learning comes from pain.

Then it was time for dancing... to Israeli music. So fun.

We dock on the northern shore and see what was uncovered in 1986: a 2,000 year old boat. That's right. This beauty was sailing on the sea when Jesus was alive. Unbelievable. There are 12 types of wood used in this boat (12 disciples??) and nails and pottery were also found with it. It was buried in the sand all these years.

We head up the hill to the Mt. of Beatitudes. Starting at the top and walking our way down the hill, we stop mid-way to read a portion of Matthew 5-7 (Sermon on the Mount). Blessed = The Favor of the Lord is on. Try reading the scripture and substituting that. Powerful.

When we get to the bottom, we head to the coast of the sea and talk about Jesus feeding the 5,000 (this is right about where they think it was). We stuck our feet in... which only made me want to go swimming! It's definitely super hot... and I'm wearing black. That doesn't help.

We stop for lunch and have a great meal together. This lunch is provided by the group. I had a whole fish (head and everything was on my plate... no worries, I didn't eat it all). JT and Marcy had pizza and pasta... yes, they're adventurous.

Next stop is Bethsaida, the city where Jesus walked and visit the Fisherman's house: home to Peter, Philip, & Andrew. JT walked where Jesus walked.

We were very surprised to see ruins that were uncovered within the previous 2 weeks before we arrived. It's 2nd century BC (Abraham's time) city gate and a shrine to Baal just outside the gate. We reference 1Kings 23:8 while we look at it.

Capernaum, which means "House of Comfort (Grace/Peace)". This was the central city for Jesus' ministry. 5-6 recorded healings in the scriptures took place here.

This is a millstone. This is what they used to grind wheat and various other foods (think of a giant pepper mill). Bread only lasted 1 day, which means every day they had to trust the Lord for food to be provided. Puts a whole new meaning on "Gives us the day our daily bread".

The synagogue where Jesus taught in Capernaum. The foundation is from Jesus' time, but the top portion is 4th-5th Century AD.

We end our day at the very southern part of the Sea of Galilee. This is where the Jordan river flows out from the sea. There spot where groups can come and get baptized or rededicated. We had a few in our group dedicate their lives to following Christ.

It's been a hot day.

Clearly we're tired and ready to go home, get some food, and go to bed. More tomorrow...

Israel Day 5: Megiddo, Jezreel Valley, Mt. Carmel, Nazareth, & Mt. Arbel

2011-06-18T12:45:00.000-05:00

We didn’t have enough time yesterday afternoon to see allthe sights in Caesarea, so we stopby 2 more places for a quick look.

Located right off a main road is a nice park with aByzantine mosaic large enough to be the floor to an entire home. Obviously youcan tell this was a mansion outside the main city walls. What shocks me is thatthere are no ropes keeping tourists off the uncovered mosaic. In the USA, you’dhave ropes and security making sure you didn’t touch history. Here, it’s almostencouraged for you to get up close and examine the details. I love that.

Jack, our good friend on our tour from Hot Springs, AR,noticed a specific animal on the outside of the mosaic: an Arkansas Razorback!

Our second stop is at the Aqueducts that led from the mountains9 miles all the way into the city. This spot is just breathtaking. The sand haspreserved all three aqueducts until now (Herod built the first one in 9 BC) andlocals are enjoying the views and shade they provide while their families playin the sea. JT’s view from the ground wasn’t good enough, so he decided toclimb all the way to the top and get the view from where the water used toflow.

We only had about 10 minutes to look around… I wish we hadthe whole morning. This beach area is so beautiful and I could just sit downwith a cup of coffee and read a book. Well, no time for sitting, on to the nextstop!

Mt. Carmel is thehighest point in the mountain range and it overlooks the Jezreel Valley. At thetop there is a monastery with a wonderful garden and we sit and read the storyfrom 1 Kings 18:20-40 about Elijah against the prophets of Baal. There had beena 3 year drought and Elijah knew that the Lord could send fire to consume thesacrifice and that Baal could not. The Lord provided fire and once again provedHis provision.

It’s fitting that the Jezreel Valley means that “God will provide”. Many battles have been fought in thisvalley between Samaria and Galilee. This is also the valley where Armageddonwill take place.

On our bus ride down the mountain, Dr. Hannah came by andasked Marcy if she wanted to try Turkish Coffee. After one sip the expressionon her face Dr. Hannah said was, “That’ll clear your eyeballs” :) Enough said.

The bus started to slow down and Yuval pointed out on the sideof the road a stone tomb built during David’s Regin (1^st TemplePeriod: 1,000 BC). Here it is, just along the side of the road. Unbelievable.

The pomegranate is one of the 7 fruits of the land(pomegranate, wheat, barley, grapes, figs, olives, and honey). Did you knowthat there are exactly 613 seeds in each pomegranate and exactly 613 laws inthe Old Testament? Coincidence… I think not. The top of the pomegranate is alsoused in a lot of décor historically because of its shape of a crown.

In the valley there is a place called City of Megiddo. Whoever held this city held the province of theJezreel Valley. It is also known as the city of “King of the Hill”. Some thinkthat this is the city Jesus referred to when mentioning a “city on a hill”. 300Arabian horses were trained here for battle. Here we are standing in the oldstables.

We also saw temple ruins of Solomon’s time, along with a 9^thCentury BC pagan alter (could’ve been used for human sacrafices).

In the city there is a tunnel that goes all the way downpast bedrock and leads to outside the city gates where there is a fresh waterspring. This is how they would’ve fetched water without having to go outsidethe city walls. Not much of the spring is left today, but there still is some.

Lunch was absolutely divine. This was my first time tryingfalafel… YUM! I knew I loved Mediterranean food.

Of course there was a great jewelry shop located at thissite and our guides all recommended that this is where we were going to get thebest quality and deal. Marcy gave me my early birthday present which is a ringwith Roman glass in it. She also got a matching set of necklace and earrings.Girls love their jewelry!

Our next site was Nazareth.We were dropped off in the city on the corner just down from the CatholicChurch of the Annunciation, which is memory of Christ’s birthplace. This is anew church that was built on the ruins of a former church that once stood here.Once you go inside you can actually see the ruins.

The Catholic Diocese gave art from all around the world todecorate this place. Everything is so ornate and beautiful inside.

We walk through the market and up the road to the Synagoguewhere Jesus taught.

We read Luke 4 and Isaiah 61:1-2. The last half of v. 2 hedidn’t preach… but he will come again. We sat in silence for a bit, sang HolyGround and Sing Hallelujah (which means Yahweh Saves). Our voices echoed in thesmall synagogue and tears started streaming down my face. What a wonderfulmemory and time. This is probably one of the most emotional moments on the tripfor me thus far. The weight of what Christ said and what it means is just toomuch to bear.

We head just outside the city to the cliff we believe iswhere they wanted to throw Jesus off after he claimed to be God. We can see theentire city of Nazareth from here on one side and on the other we see theentire Jezreel valley.

We took the opportunity to take a few pics in front of thegreat views. Here we are with all 4 of our group leaders: Dr. John and CarolynHannah & Dr. Tom and Kris Keiser.

We stop at McDonalds on our way to the Sea of Gallilee for a quick restroom break and of course… ICECREAM!! YUM.

And of course we saw your wonderful pet camel just laying down for a nice nap :).

Our first view of the Sea of Galilee. I love this spot.

Israel Day 4: Bet Guvrin-Maresha, Valley of Elah (David & Goliath), and Caesarea

2011-06-13T10:30:00.057-05:00

In Israel is it custom for all hotels to have buffets forevery meal, including breakfast. The Holiday Inn goes beyond all breakfasts.There are 5 different buffets and so many options to choose from. You can evenhave salad and sushi if you’d like.

We leave the Ashkelon area and head to the national park of Bet Guvrin-Maresha. Here is there aremany ruins that they have discovered and we take a good majority of the day tosee quite a few things.

The amphitheatre.It is large and has many details still preserved. They would fight animals andgladiators in the ring, along with filling it with water and putting onperformances. You can see the box where the Roman governor or authority used tosit. JT gives a thumbs down like in gladiator.

The tunnels underneath the complex where the animals andgladiators used to be is huge. At all of these sites its amazing to think howthey constructed such large complexes.

The Columbarium Cave(Pigeon Coop Cave). This is an underground cave in the shape of a double crossand there are more than 2,000 niches in the walls where pigeons are housed.They were used for food, sacrifices, and their poop was collected forfertilizer.

The Olive Press.This ancient olive press is one that comes with quite a bit of symbolism forChristians. In the process of crushing olives into oil there are threesteps/kinds of oil that are gathered:

First Press: Virgin Oil(Cooking/Anointing kings)

Second Press: Healing Oil/Light Oil

Third Press: Cleansing Oil

In the Garden of Gethsemane (which in Hebrew means olivepress), Jesus was crushed three times:

First: He is the anointed King

Second: He came to bring healingand light to the world

Third: He came to cleanse us fromour sins, which we could not escape

This specific olive press was uncovered from the 4^thCentury BC.

When we get up to the top, Yuval teaches us about the Carob Tree. This is also knownhistorically as St. John’s Bread Tree/Locust Tree (John the Baptist). When weread the Bible, we think that John ate honey and locust, however, what he wasmost likely eating was the Carob beans, because locust weren’t even cleananimals for Jews to eat. This makes the most sense as he stayed along theJordan river, which is covered with date palm trees (which produce honey) and Carobtrees. Carob beans were also the first source of weighting diamonds, as theweight of a Carob bean is also the exact weight of 1 karat of diamonds.Fascinating!

The Sidonian BurialCaves. Inside these inside these ancient burial caves/tombs is where Israelitesused to bury their dead. Once the body was decayed, they would gather the bonesand place the bones in a box somewhere else. Here’s JT decaying:

The Bell Caves.These are underground quarries that were used in the Byzantine period to buildhouses and buildings. A small hole is created until you reach the limestonebedrock and then they use chisels and shovels to dig out all the rock theyneeded. The caves are huge! I can’t even imagine how they must have pulled outall the rock through that small hole.

Also touring a lot of the national sites are teens in the army. We just happened to see a troop leader with her machine gun. Nice.

Remember the story of David and Goliath? That’s our nextstop for the day. We hop on the bus and about 15 minutes away we pull off theside of a road and get out into a field. Really? This is where we’re stopping?

JT and March stop to talk with a local farmer in the valley.He grows mini-zucchini plants.

This is the Valley of Elah, where the Israelites fought the Philistines. We read the story in 1Samuel 17 and you can literally see the story unfolding in front of you as youlook at the land and match it up to what the Bible records. Amazing.

JT, Marcy and I found our stones in the creek, similar towhat David would’ve used to bring down Goliath.

From there we got back on the bus and had a long ride infront of us to head up the coast to Caesarea. Along the way we pass by a largewall with barbwire at the top. This is the West Bank wall that separates theterritory of the Palestinians from Israeli citizens. Crazy to think there isstill so much hostility right across the wall. As we drive on you can seeMosques and other neighborhoods where the Palestinians live.

We arrive in Caesareaand the cool air breeze is a nice welcome. It gets hotter each day of our trip.As we walk closer to the excavation, Marcy looks at me and says this could beher future home. The people are so nice, it’s not overly populated, and thewater is beautiful. We immediately see why Herod the Great built such a largeseaport city here.

The Theatre is our first sight. Shows are still performed onthis stage today and as the audience watches the performance, they can lookpast the stage out to the Mediterranean. Just breathtaking.

This is also where Paul was imprisoned for 2 years. In thistheatre Paul was condemned and we even walked on the same stones he walked onwhile in changes.

Some say that Pontius Pilate never existed. Well, here’s thestone they discovered to prove it. His name is inscribed on the stone, thusproving his existence.

JT on the coast of the Med with Dr. Hannah. We’re so glad heinvited us on this trip.

Ever seen Ben Hur? Well, this is a hippodrome. This is wherechariot races happened. Right on the coast of the sea.

When Paul left Caesarea on his journey to Rome, he left thisport right here. His small boat he got in to get out to the larger shipwould’ve been docked right where this pool of water is. I can’t believe we’rein the exact spot that Paul was in.

I know this is random, but we actually ran into 3brides/grooms getting their wedding pictures taken. I would LOVE to dophotography here! It’s popular for a lot of the locals to come to thehistorical ruins to get their portraits done.

Also random, stray cats are to Israel as dogs are to Venezuela. Precious as they are, they're everywhere!

After a long day, we head to our hotel which is actually atthe only 18 hole golf course in all of Israel (they’re not big golfers here,too many sand traps… bahaha j/k). The hotel is beautiful and the food is good.They even give us a welcome snack upon arrival (fruit juice, sweet bread, anddates).

Israel Day 3: Tel Arad, Beersheba, Close to Gaza, Ashkelon

2011-06-12T09:34:00.034-05:00

Sunday we woke up, packed our bags, and then headed towardsthe coast. On our way we made a few stops. The first one was Tel Arad.

This is an old city located at the top of a hill and itoverlooked a Canaanite city down below. When they uncovered this site, theyfound a temple modeled after the Temple in Jerusalem. This is the only onefound in all of Israel and even the Holy of Holies was uncovered. We got ourpicture taken in it… don’t worry, this is a replica. The real thing is in thenational museum J.

Here’s JT laying down on the sacrificial alter.

At the front of this city we learned about what a SolomonicGate was. This is essentially a gate that is 3 or 4 door ways deep and makes itvery hard for any enemy to get through. Here’s Marcy in front of the one inArad.

We walk down the hill and make our way to the Canaanite citylocated below. Keep in mind that this dates back to 1,500 BC. Crazy. We foundan area where they used to have pagan sacrifices. The picture below shows thearea to the right where they would slay the animal and then there is a pit inthe ground that would catch all the blood.

Just outside the city there is an area you can sit with yourtour group and learn from your guide while sitting in the shade. We were in awewhile watching a group from Ethiopia participate in a worship service whilethey were here. They are very passionate and enthusiastic during their service.

You can see ruins of all types of homes and different areas.Here’s Marcy in the kitchen washing dishes J

On a more serious note, this is also the spot where Marcyand I reflect on the story of Hagar and how she wondered in thewilderness/desert after Abraham sent her away with Ishmael. From the city westood in, we looked out and saw the wilderness that Hagar wandered in. Wecouldn’t fathom how she was strong enough to do something like that. At herbreaking point God came to her rescue. This land puts into picture how muchthese people had to depend on the Lord to provide everything.

Our next stop in the day was at Beer Sheva (Beersheba). Thisis the capital of the Negev region and is one of the largest cities in Israelwith more than 300,000 people. Just outside the modern city is the excavationof the biblical city referred to in the Bible. Here’s a picture of the ancientcity with the modern city in the distance.

This city was founded in the 4^th Millennium BCand was where Abraham lived for some time. Just outside the city gates is theold well that Abraham drew water out of. What Marcy is standing next to in thebelow picture is the water trough that runs off of the well. This is what theywould fill so that the animals could drink. This trough is also know in Hebrewas a “cup”. So in Psalm 23:5, when it refers to “my cup runneth over”, it islikely referring to the provision of the Lord through a well that does not rundry and there is so much water, even the animals have more than enough todrink.

To mix a bit of modern history as well, we stop at a Kibbutz(farm in Israel, communal/socialistic organization) that was strategic infighting in the Six Day War in 1948 and families (yes, women and children,about 100 total) fought off the Arabs to keep them back from Tel Aviv. Yes,we’re about 10 miles away from the border of the Gaza Strip. From the angle ofthis gun (the actual one used in 1948) you can see off in the distance thePalestinian buildings in Gaza.

Yes, it’s crazy, we’re that close to Gaza and no, there wereno random missiles to hit anywhere near where we were. The Palestinians just aimand fire from Gaza and hope to hit certain targets in Israel. In the newsyou’ll hear about the Gaza Strip. Well, this is about where it is. Lord bringpeace.

Our last stop of the day before we got to our hotel inAshkelon was at an old Canaanite city gate (2,000 BC). This is the oldest citygate in all of Israel and it was only uncovered in the last few years. You cansee that they even used archways back then.

In Ashkelon we’re staying at none other than the Holiday Inn :) Yes, it even looksfun. It’s right on the Mediterranean Coast and we went for a quick swim beforedinner.

Our feet in the Med.

Beautiful sunset. The water was refreshing. Shells cover theentire beach.

Day 2: Masada, En Gedi, and the Dead Sea

2011-06-08T07:00:00.096-05:00

So it's our first day traveling around in Israel and we get our wakeup call bright and early at 6:30AM. Since we're traveling with a tour group, our entire schedule from 6:30AM till dinner time is planned. Now, when I say "planned" I don't mean in the drill-sargeant kind of way. Basically think of "someone's-thought-of-every-detail-and-I-don't-have-to-think-about-anything" kind of way :). It's fantastic!

After our wakeup call, I headed to our balcony that overlooked the Dead Sea and saw this view:

Isn't that AMAZING?! And what resort area wouldn't be official without a McDonalds. Good night. They're everywhere.

Our first stop was to a famous site called Masada. Every guide and local will tell you that a visit to Israel is not complete without seeing Masada. Masada is an ancient fortress, built by King Herod the Great in roughly 35 BC. It sits on top of a 1,300 ft. high rock plateau. That in and of itself is crazy to think how someone could build an entire retreat settlement on top of a plateau in the desert. Come to find out the Jews were able to make it a place of complete sustainability for themselves while they sought refuge from the Romans. Unfortunately after three years of battle, the Romans were able to figure out a way to charge the fortress only giving the Jews the option of suicide or becoming slaves. All but 2 women and 3 children committed suicide as they decided it was better to die with honor than to live as a slave to the Romans.

Here is a view from the cable car we're in and headed up to the top of the 1,300 ft. cliff. Notice you can't even see the cables they extend so far up to the top of that large landing building at the top. The entire site of Masada is located on top of this Plateau and you have to go to the top in order to see it.

Here's a view from the top, overlooking the Dead Sea. Notice that in the bottom right hand corner you can see a little bit of the ledge that I'm standing at. That's a steep cliff, friends.

The below picture is a pile of Roman canon balls that the Romans used to attack the Jews and break through their fortress. Each one is roughly 2-4 feet in diameter.

Here's the three of use standing next to one of the walls that the Romans tried to attack.

Herod was known for his architecture and all the cities/buildings he built during his reign. This is original stucco to the building and is still in-tact today. Keep in mind, this was built 2,000 years ago, but wasn't uncovered till the 1960's (which is why it's still in such great condition).

This is an angle shot from the side of the three tiers of Herod's palace. Impressive to think of the slaves that had to build this thing. It must have taken talent, skill, and hard work. I can't even imagine how something this magnificent was built back then.

This by far is one of the most impressive sites I've ever seen and a great way to start off our trip!

Our second stop for the day was an En Gedi, which is a beautiful green oasis in the middle of the dessert. David was there while hiding from King Saul and where he also wrote two Psalms (57 & 91). This is our first experience of seeing the scriptures "come to life" while reading them in the spots where they were written.

The hike up to the cave where David was hiding is a bit of a chore, but well worth it. On our way we saw a few rock badgers as well as the tree they believe was used to create the crown of thorns for Christ.

The final spot where we ended was breathtaking. A large waterfall is now there because the top of the cave no longer exists. Literally the water is coming straight out of the rocks of the dessert. It puts a whole new meaning on Christ's reference to himself as "Living Water". Water is gold in this region and you will die if you don't have it.

Our hike back down had beautiful views of the Dead Sea in the distance.

Once back at the hotel, we had a few hours to spare till dinner time, so bought some body mud and headed out to the Dead Sea for what all tourists are there to do: Later up with mud and then rinse off and float in the sea. But careful... you drink 1 cup of Dead Sea water and you will end up just like it... dead. And plus, that water BURNS in your eyes (don't ask me, ask JT).

You always hear of people floating in the Dead Sea, but until you experience it for yourself, you can't imagine what it's like. Literally, you'll flap around like a fish out of water trying to put your feet back down underneath you. It's hilarious. I'm sure all the locals thought we Americans were loud and obnoxious. Oh well. It was worth it!

Dinner was a wonderful Mediterranean buffet with more food than you can imagine. And the salads are so great! Since we're still adjusting to the time change, it's an early night to bed and an early start tomorrow. We'll have 4 sites to visit tomorrow before we end up on the Mediterranean coast.

Day 1: Traveling to the Holy Land

2011-06-06T14:20:00.018-05:00

We’ve always dreamed of taking this trip. So when theopportunity presented itself, we couldn’t help but say yes. It was about 8months ago when Dr. Hannah, one of JT’s favorite professors, said that he leadsa trip every year to Israel and he would love it if we would come. After muchconsideration and number crunching (p.s. it’s not cheap to go overseas), wedecided to go, thinking we might never get the chance again.

Dr. Hannah has lead this same trip every summer for the last20+ years, however the itinerary for each group varies from year to year. Thiskeeps it fresh and new not only for the Hannahs, but for the entire group aswell.

13 days. Wow. We’ve never gone on a trip for 13 days. That’salmost two weeks! We left DFW on Thursday around noon and arrived in Tel-Avivon Friday at 5pm. There’s this awkwardness of traveling with a group who ismostly from the same city as you. You’ve never met these people, yet you seethem at every checkpoint along the way. After a while you notice that you bothare giving weird glances at each other and silently thinking “are you going thesame place I’m going?”. Once oursecond set of tour sponsors shows up at our layover in Philadelphia, we all getintroduced and then the 11 hour flight ahead of us isn’t so bad.

Once on board, we snap a few pics and take our sleepingpills so that we can get adjusted to the new time zone. Jetlag is never fun.

Did I mention that we had to sit and taxi over an hour and ahalf? Yeah, let’s make that flight 12.5 hours please. Yuck. But the good newsis we arrived safely, everyone’s bags showed up, we took a group picture just to provide the proof.

Once through customs we had a 2 hour bus ride ahead of us through beautiful contry-side on our way to our hotel at the Dead Sea. Once we arrived it was time for a quick bite for dinner and then a good night sleep. Tomorrow’s gonna be a full day, so get some sleep y’all!

And we're off!

2011-06-02T08:56:00.017-05:00

2011 now brings the next English Adventure: Israel.

JT and I, along with 24 other strangers we don't know, will meet up at the airport today and head to a country we've never been to, but have always wanted to go. Earlier this spring one of JT's professors, Dr. Hannah, approached him and asked if he'd like to come this year. Dr. Hannah has lead this trip every summer for the last 24 years.

We're so excited and can't wait to get there! As usual, we'll be blogging our journeys every day and hope to stay on top of it so you all can read what we're doing. Israel is 7 hours ahead of the Eastern Time Zone, so we'll be slightly ahead of your US schedule.

Please comment and let us know if you've been before and if so, what was your favorite spot. Can't wait to send the next update!

Elementary School Videos

2011-05-16T21:44:00.011-05:00

Remember the videos you used to watch in Elementary school that taught you a simple truth in a fun way?

If you have a spare 4 minutes, you must watch this. So true and so fun to watch.
God is love. http://vimeo.com/4856208

Tacky Sweater Party

2011-02-20T18:42:00.000-06:00

Okay, so it's time to catch up from a lack of being on the Blog. Who doesn't mind celebrating a little belated Christmas?? Or depending on which way you look at it... we're celebrating early!

This post goes out to all the families and moms out there who hear about all these couples at seminary, but can never place faces with names. Not sure that everyone in this post wants this to be the picture they're known by... so maybe I'll do another post soon with more "attractive" pictures :) But for now, here are (most) of our friends here at DTS!

Note: Names are listed above the photo

Josh, Jenny, and Jayla Howlett

(haha, yes... that's a Christmas tree on his stomach)

Ashley, Anthony, and Adilyn Pratt

Kristen and Luke Mathews

Daniel and Emily Attaway

Stephen and Jared (no they don't go together)

But they do! Stephen and Megan Partrick

Jared and Abby Perry... and Joby

Jared and Abby Perry

Rylin and Joby Crane

another one of Rylin and Joby

Amber and Jonathan Holmes

Daniel and Emily Attaway

Will and Claire Cook

Tony and Vandi Melton

JT and Macy (that's us)

All the girls (LtoR, Top to Bottom: Claire, Emily, Abby, Megan, Amber, (Joby), Rylin, me, Kristen, Vandi, Brooke)

Sports anyone?

2011-02-20T18:24:00.000-06:00

Yes, let's go back to when I was 7 or 8. I pretty much tried every sport in the book for at least a season and one that stuck for at least a few years was T-ball/Softball, but never golf. Turns out there is a place in Dallas where you can play golf and while you wait for your open tee, you can play at the batting cages to pass time.

JT and I went to Top Golf to have fun on a random Saturday this past fall... when baseball was still in season and we were in the habit of watching ALL the Rockies games thanks to our MLB package (thanks Todd & Marcy)! So JT was in the spirit of being a hot-shot and decided to go to the cage were the pitches were 80 mph. Yes, I'm feeling like this is going to be good. I got a few pictures... and even a video. I however, decided to stick it safe with the 35 mph balls. That's a good safe speed at which I can hit, believe it or not. All I gotta say is, "Tulo... you better watch out". I just might become the next Rockies Franchise Player.

Good thing I got this on film...

He hit it! Way to go, babe!

Goooo Biiiigggg Rrrreeedddd.... GO BIG RED!

2011-02-20T16:48:00.000-06:00

This past football season JT and I went to as many Nebraska games as we could... so that amounted to 2 :) Our good friends, Abby & Jared Perry, are from College Station and guess who was playing the Aggies this year? None other than the mighty Cornhuskers... okay, okay, we all know how the game turned out... but at least I can say I experienced Kyle Field, which if I'm trying to be as objective as possible, was quite amazing.

We left late Friday night to head down and half way there we made a pit stop at Sonic, where else?!

We were tempted to go to Midnight yell... and yeah, that didn't happen. But our morning did start early with the famous breakfast tacos... that have the Aggie brand on them?! Now that's a little overboard.

Even though the game was "un-eventful", Nebraska for some reason couldn't pull out a win. Good thing we still have our friends!

This was one of the brightest spots of the entire weekend. Meet Maggie. Isn't she adorable! AND she doesn't shed! We love her!

I do have to admit they put on a pretty good halftime show.

The other game we were blessed to go to was the Big 12 Championship game at Cowboys stadium. Todd and Marcy flew down for the game and we were blessed to have tickets from one of Marcy's clients. How fun!

Are you beginning to see a theme here? JT and I are NOT good luck for the Huskers. We show up to a game and the team decides not to. It's quite depressing. We're all hoping for a bigger and better team this next season in 2011.

Until September... GO BIG RED!!

My Cousin Rocks

2011-02-20T16:03:00.000-06:00

So this post goes out to my cousin Alex. She and I are the only girls among all the cousins and I even remember the day she was born, "Finally! Another girl!"

This past October (yes, I know this post is 4 months too late) I had the awesome opportunity to go to her tennis tournament in Dallas and she was AMAZING! Which is not a surprise to me, she's pretty good at whatever she does. Thankfully, I had my camera and here's the evidence of her awesomeness...

And this is what she does every time she scores *fist pump/yell*... love it!

Love her so much!

Annual Goals

2011-01-17T13:19:00.000-06:00

Each year JT and I set aside a morning/afternoon to go over our annual goals. We'll take time to first review our goals form the previous year (always set in January) and then celebrate ones that we met and re-challenge ourselves on the ones where we fell short.

We've set aside this afternoon for our goal setting and I already know one on the top of my list: WRITE MORE BLOGS! Mainly this blog serves as a place where friends and family can come and read the latest on our lives... which I'm sure some of you are thinking "Did you fall off the face of the earth?" The last 2... okay 4... months of our lives have been very hectic, but filled with wonderful moments with friends and family. I'm sure I'll do a lot of back-posting in the days to come to show you some of these great moments.

For now, please check back soon... as I'm sure my goal setting experience with JT with get my head on straight for 2011 :) It always does. I wouldn't rather set goals with anyone else in the world.

Fall happens

2010-10-14T22:51:00.000-05:00

Seasons of the year come and go and then before you know it... 2 months have flown by. Can you believe it's already OCTOBER?! Craziness.

In Dallas, the summer is hotter than Hades, but once the cooler weather comes... there's nothing that feels better. JT and I have been enjoying the weather with times at Top Golf, hanging out with friends, and visiting places native to Texas.

The last time we went to Top Golf it was for JT's birthday weekend, but this time was just a random, spur of the moment kind of thing. Because we had an hour wait ahead of us, we headed over to the batting cages to swing a few. This was quite entertaining mind you because I can't even remember the last time I swung a bat... maybe 3 grade in T-ball? And it was so fun! JT decided to be macho and go to the cage with the 80 mph pitch. I think it got two solid hits out of about 15. Makes you appreciate what the pros can do!

And here's me swinging in the 30 mph cage :)

Here's my stud showing off his mad golf skills:

A few weekends ago, some girls and I left our husbands to watch football all day on a Saturday to make a hike out to the Texas Native flea-market: Canton. After an hour drive east and a few miles down an almost hidden road, there lies a 40,000 vendor pavilion that houses all types of trinkets and "junk". Mind you, junk is what we like to call hidden treasures that can be transformed into something fabulous.

YUM. Corndogs.

Seriously? Caravans of covered motor carts were clogging up the aisles of already crowded areas. Too bad they didn't have horns to warn you they were coming through.

Born in Texas!

We wanted a picture with the word canton in it... I'll take what I can get.

The past few months have also been busy with photo shoots! Business is starting to pick up and I'm loving photography more and more with each shoot. Check out my blog to see the latest!

100 Days till...

2010-09-16T08:49:00.000-05:00

The most wonderful time of the year. That's right people, my favorite holiday of the entire calendar year is quickly approaching...

CHRISTMAS!!!

Can you believe it's only 100 days away! Let the count down begin!

But on another note... where did the year go? Soon we'll be traveling to see family, going to more parties than we planned, and reminiscing about all that happened in 2010.

Before we start thinking too far down the road, let's remember what today has brought and make the most of the next 100 before us. Which will be easy for me because that just means I'll be all the more excited with anticipation over the next 100 days. Yeah for Christmas!

St. Andrews to London: Day 9-10

2010-08-29T21:54:00.000-05:00

Now we're hitting the last part of our trip. No! It can't possible be over all ready! But wait, it's not over.

Our final morning in St. Andrews started off at 6am. That's right, this is what happens when you're on a trip with two men who love to golf. You head over to The Old Course. St. Andrews Links, that is. For those of you who don't know (don't worry, I was in the boat with you until I was told) this is where the British Open was played this year. Right about now, my brothers are reading this and envy is coming over their faces as they see the course that they dream of playing on some day. Did you know that if you're a student at St. Andrews you can pay just $200/year and play as much as you want?! It's almost worth it just to come for school so that you can play on the course all year.

We wanted to get a good look around before the first group teed off. We walked down the 18th hole, took some pics on the famous bridge, and then walked over to the beach to get our last glimpse of our visit in Scotland.

Now it was back to the Inn, pack the bags, and head back to the train station for our 7 hour train ride back to London. It wasn't until about 5 hours into the train ride that we realized there was FREE wifi on the train! What had we been missing out on?? Nothing :) We got some good reading time in, that's what.

Once we arrived in London, we checked into our last hotel for the trip and then went out for our last meal in England... Chipotle :) Ha! You think I'm joking... I'm not. This is a problem when you can't go more than a week without eating eat. It's official. We're obsessed. But hey, we went straight to a pub afterwards to watch the Manchester United vs. Newcastle United. It was a great game and a fabulous way to end our trip.

The next morning we got up bright and early to catch our flight back to the states via the Tube.

All in all this was a fantastic vacation. Busy, fun, and full of laughter and great times. We saw amazing sites and learned more about British history and are so incredibly blessed to have another English Adventure under our belt. Thanks, Jack! Until next time...

St. Andrews, Scotland: Day 8

2010-08-29T21:31:00.000-05:00

After eating yet another wonderful continental breakfast at the Holiday Inn Express, we headed to the train station in Stirling. We were headed to our 5th city, St. Andrews.

Because this trip was filled with lots of train rides and not enough good books to read... we quickly found the daily paper and competed to see who could finish the daily Sudoku puzzle first.

Also in the UK you will see a lot of these... crowns :) They're practically on everything: light posts, trash cans, land markers, etc.

Once we arrived in St. Andrews we dropped off our bags at the inn and then headed straight for the coast... a quick 2 blocks away! Even though it is the warmest time of year for Scotland, the weather was still not hot enough to go for a swim and layout. Sad. However, there are some crazies who are desperate enough for a their chance to swim in the ocean and they were swimming in the coastline man-made swimming pool. It's only accessible during low-tide (see picture for details).

Right behind where we were standing was the St. Andrews Castle. Only ruins remain, but it was beautiful to image what it used to be like. Very surreal and relaxing. Waves crashing, wind blowing, and sea gulls squawking.... ah, I love the coast.

Then made our way over to the St. Andrews Cathedral, another 2 blocks down the coastline. Sad to say that both of these beautiful historic monuments are now only remains of one of the most largest land marks to Scotland's history.

Where the pews and choir once used to stand are now thousands of graves. Some dating back to the 15th century and others just buried within the last 50 years.

Of course there was a tower to climb... so up we went! 253 steps later... we were at the top... and that was my workout for the day :) Beautiful views of the entire coastline and city!

St. Andrews is a rather small town, with a little less than 200,000 people, so you can enjoy leisurely walking to everywhere you need to go and enjoying the local eateries and shops. We stopped at, of course, a pizza place and can I tell you how fabulous it was! Goodness, if anyone tells me one more time that the food in the UK isn't that great I'm going to quickly correct them and show them my pictures. YUM! ZiZi's was the name of it and our waitress was from South Africa.

We ate right across the street where St. Mary's (the divinity school of St. Andrews University) is and where JT and I would be meeting a PhD student there later that afternoon.

JT is currently in the process of looking at a few PhD programs in the states, along with a few in the UK. So this worked out perfectly for us to be visiting St. Andrews! Prior to our trip JT set up time to meet with one of the PhD students, Steven, and also a potential professor that he might study under, Dr. Holmes.

After a quick stop back at our room, JT and I headed out to meet Steven and get a tour of the campus. Too bad it was Sunday. All the rooms were locked and no students where there (still summer and the fall students had not arrived back yet from vacation). Doesn't it remind you a little of Harry Potter?

Mom, this is the last picture of flowers I'll share. But just look at these Hydrangea bushes!!! Gorgeous! Why can't we grow these this big and beautiful in Texas?

That evening Steven invited us over to his home for dinner. His wife just had their second daughter and so his mother-in-law was visiting from McKinney, TX. It almost felt like we were already back home! We spent 4 hours visiting with them and learned all about their experience moving to the UK and what the last 3 years has been like. Oh, I almost forgot, Steven graduated from DTS 4 years ago and also studied under Dr. Bingham, who is the professor JT is interning with this year. So needless to say, it was a great time for JT to hear from someone who is essentially doing was he wants to do.

All in all, we know we could live in the UK, but we didn't leave with the feeling that we have to. Which is good! We'll just continue to pray for God's leading and that we'll have the obedience to follow.

Stirling, Scotland: Day 7

2010-08-24T22:17:00.000-05:00

We started off the morning with a FULL continental breakfast from the oh-so-great Holiday Inn Express and probably enjoyed breakfast enough for the three of us. The hotel called a taxi for us and we made a short 4 mile ride over to the monument of the Battle of Bannockburn. This is where Robert the Bruce, King of Scotland, defeated England and finished the fight for freedom that William Wallace set out to claim. The quote at the bottom was my favorite: "We fight not for glory, nor for wealth, nor honor, but only and alone we fight for freedom which no good man surrenders but with his life."

When you get closer to the larger than life monument of Robert the Bruce, you can see the Stirling castle off in the distance through the trees. It's hard to believe that all this history all happened within a few square miles.

Our taxi was gracious enough to wait for us while we wandered around a bit where the monument was. Everything is so green and beautiful!

After seeing the monument, we headed back into Stirling to visit the castle, which is perched on the top of a hill and is the focal point for the entire city. For those of you who don't know, this is the castle where all the Kings and Queens of Scotland lived. Below is a picture of the outer wall. Can you find Snugs?? Haha, we love this game.

Inside the castle, workers will give you a free guided tour to tell you about the great history of Scotland and its many kings and queens. Our tour guide was quite entertaining.

This is the garden where the royal court would come and get their exercise for the day. There is much more green space off to the left with room to run and play within the safety of the walls.

Mom, here's another picture for you. Gorgeous flowers everywhere decorating the entire grounds in the castle.

It was surprising to see so many graveyards around the outsides of the walls surrounding the castle. Stunningly beautiful though. Even though that might sound a bit odd.

They are currently renovating parts of the castle for tourists and citizens to enjoy a more vibrant picture of what exactly the castle looked like hundreds of years ago. A few of the rooms/buildings have already been completed. And wouldn't you know they would have the great hall fully restored with the king's and queen's chairs! They must have known that JT and I would be coming :)

Here's a picture of the tapestries that have been redone to their exact detailed beauty. Our guide said that it took hundreds of hours to complete each tapestry.

One of the more unique features of the castle are the archer holes. This is looking into one and out another through a round tower. Very easy to aim and hit your target but very hard for someone to shot right at you.

Outside the castle there is a statue of King Robert the Bruce and in the distance you can see the William Wallace Monument. The views of this city are amazing.

After a quick bite for lunch we went over to the Stirling bridge where supposedly William Wallace claimed his victory over England. Then we headed back to our hotel to drop our bags because we had an appointment at 3pm.... The local futball team, the Stirling Albians, were playing their first home game since their league championship last year.

This was definitely a first for all three of us and we really enjoyed it! Although I do have to say I was expecting a little more team spirit from the crowd. We were sad to have to see the Albians lose 3-1. Maybe the Americans are bad luck?? Oh well, we had a great time nonetheless!

Stirling, Scotland: Day 6

2010-08-22T21:39:00.000-05:00

Day 6 started off with sleeping in and slowly making our way across town to the train station. Next stop: Stirling. This is home to the William Wallace monument and Stirling Castle. Once we got on the train (which was only a short 50 minutes away) I told JT that I wished we would've brought Braveheart to watch on our computer. That would've put us in the perfect mood before we went to the monument. Although, after touring through it and reading all the history, the true story is rather different than what the movie portrays.

Once we arrived in Stirling, we dropped of our bags at the only hotel that had availability for two nights: The Holiday Inn Express :) Yes, we did feel like we were on top of the world because we could officially say "I stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night". A taxi dropped us off at the base of the monument and then we hiked up the hill to see what we could see.

Even Snugs made the hike with us.

When we got to the top the views of the entire city were amazing! This monument was built in the 1600's to remember William Wallace and his fight for Scotland's freedom.

Since almost every tourist attraction in the UK has a tower, the open it up to the public to climb. But please note two things: you must be think enough to get through the steep, narrow, and winding staircases and also you must be in shape. Because if you stop at any of the 234 steps to the top, everyone else in front and behind you has to stop too. Well, here's our workout for the day! Here's a view out of one of the tiny slivers of a window as I'm climbing to the top.

The first room we came to is a room telling the history of William Wallace and how he banded together with his fellow Scots to make way for defeat of English rule and freedom for the Scots. When even saw what is supposedly his actual sword.

The second room we came to was filled with marble statues commemorating Scotland's most admirable heroes.

Then once we got to the top, the views were even better. And boy was it freezing! The wind was blowing so hard and the temperature was probably 60 degrees. We enjoyed about 20 minutes of watching the clouds roll in taken in the beauty of the Scotland countryside. Jack also took those 20 minutes to map out the city and get his bearings :) a common occurrence on our trip.

Snugs is saying hello.

After heading back to our hotel we were recommended to go to the pub just next door. The food is good and the internet is free. Great! Sure enough, it's the most Americanized restaurant we've been to so far on our trip. It's family friendly, with tons of booths and flat screen TV's mounted on the wall next to every table. Holy moly. Forget friendly conversation. These people are glued to the television. Good thing the food is good and the internet is free. We almost felt like we were back in the states.

Now that our stomachs are full and our email is checked, the Holiday Inn is calling us to sleep and then will welcome us tomorrow morning with a full continental breakfast. YUM. I love food and I especially love breakfast.

Edinburgh, Scotland: Day 5

2010-08-22T21:04:00.001-05:00

The next morning we woke up bright and early to be the first ones at the Edinburgh Castle, for fear of lines forming and herds of people piling through everything there is to see... and as it turned out, there were quite a few others who had that same idea. Not tremendously crowded, but busy nonetheless. Here's a picture of JT and I out front (remember this from the night before? we're standing where the Tattoo performed in front of the castle).

There was even a bag pipe player out front to welcome us in. LOVE the music!

Edinburgh Castle is at the top of a hill and even when walking through the many walls of fortress and barriers the hill continues to go up, which only means that the view of the city get better!

The bagpipe player even made his way into the castle and we got right up and close. What talent.

JT and I definitely thought of all our dog lover friends and family when we saw this... an actual cemetery for all the royal dogs!

Imagine looking out this hole to defend your castle.

Once it started to rain on us, we headed inside one of the buildings of the castle and sat down to plan out the rest of our day.

Knowing how much we love Rick Steves, we thought we'd go on his walking tour of the Royal Mile. Like I mentioned before, the streets are busy with bus tours, tourists taking pictures (yes, I'm one of them), and all the beautiful architecture built over the last hundreds of years.

We even saw the cafe that is famed "The Birthplace of Harry Potter". It's said that JK Rowling visited this cafe when writing the Harry Potter series. The line was long so we decided to move along to Pizza Express for lunch. Yum.

Now, five days into the trip, it was time for wandering. JT and I split off from Jack for a few hours. We headed over to briefly visit New College, which has a potential PhD program for JT, and is also placed right off the Royal Mile. Stunning views and in a castle-like building. Just beautiful. The rooms were closed off for the festival, but we actually ran into a student who gave us a snapshot of his time at New College. Overall it was a beautiful and quaint campus. In the below pictures, New College is on the far left with the tall pointy towers and the Edinburgh Castle is on top of the hill to the right in the photo.

Then we headed over to St. Giles cathedral where the body of John Knox is buried. It's actually not even in the cathedral at all. It's under the 23rd parking spot.

After meeting back up with Jack, we headed down the remainder of the Royal Mile which ends at Holyrood Palace. Which is closer to stunning views of hills and full of parks where families play with their dogs in the rain and walk up and down the streets.

The rain rolled back in and we waited out the down pour and then headed up the street to find a place to eat for dinner. Wouldn't you know that JT and Jack were keeping their eyes out for Mexican restaurants and they only saw two. We tried the first one and then after being served chips and salsa that had a pickle for garnish, we decided to take the bill and head to the second one, hoping for a more positive experience. And boy were we right! The second place was delicious and satisfied all of our Mexican taste buds.

At this point in the trip our adrenaline is starting to wear off and so we called it a night around 9pm and headed back to our hotel for a long night sleep. The plan was to sleep in the next day too, so we knew we'd be well rested for heading over to Stirling the next day.

Edinburgh, Scotland: Day 4

2010-08-16T03:57:00.000-05:00

Bright and early and on the train, we make our way up north to Edinburgh, Scotland. This time of year there is an annual festival that happens in Edinburgh so it was hard finding a hotel, but thankfully we found one. This is what we get for booking our stays on the fly and not preparing ahead of time! At least it makes for a great adventure.

The train ride was about 7 hours and the landscape along the way was rolling and green. We saw plenty of fields, sheep, and horses. Beautiful countryside!

Once we walked out of the train station in Edinburgh… Hello Hilly New York! Steep streets and people everywhere. It’s a busy town!

Edinburgh’s most famous for a street called the Royal Mile. At the top of the hill and street is Edinburgh castle and at the bottom is the Palace of Holyrood House. The street is lined with shops, pubs, museums, and churches. What a great place to wander.

After dropping off our bags at the hotel, we found our way back to the Royal Mile and wandered around for a bit. There are tons of tourists around from all over, street vendors trying to sell their trinkets, actors passing out fliers for their free comedy acts, and one man acts in the middle of the street with crowds of people standing around.

Around 8pm we saw tons of people making their way up the Royal Mile to some event. After asking around, we realized that it was for the famous Military Tatoo, being held right in front of the Edinburgh Castle. You had to have tickets to get in and word has it that they’re sold out for days in advance. Good thing we found a scalper who had three tickets next to each other!

After a quick dinner at subway (hey, don’t judge, that’s the quickest bite to eat on the Royal Mile so we could head up to the show in time… plus they had Dr. Pepper) we sat like sardines in our seats waiting for the show to start.

After the trumpets sound, the show began and don’t you know I had a smile on my face for the next hour and a half. We were entertained by hundreds of bagpipes, dancers, motorbike riders, gymnasts, and marching bands from around the world. This was by far the highlight of our trip so far!

The Citadel was there!

Click here for a short video of one of the performances! (can't get the link to work right now... will update soon)

Late night again getting to sleep and early morning of site seeing tomorrow. Cheers!

Bath, England: Day 3

2010-08-16T02:56:00.001-05:00

We did not plan on taking a Bath when we got to Bath… but once we stepped off the train that’s what happened. Pouring down rain till about 6pm that night. We headed out of London and took a train straight east and about 2 hours later landed in Bath. We headed to our hotel way up the hill and then wandered around town for a bit seeing the quaint shops and eateries.

Here are the hills! I knew England had some hills, but London had yet to show me where they were. For as small as Bath is (about 100,000 people) it’s a beautiful and easy to get around.

We headed out from our hotel in our “wind jackets” (I say this because no, they were not water proof and the weather proved that to us) and quickly found indoors at the main church there the Abbey. We just love the architecture and history of all the churches in Europe.

All along the floor of the church are tombstones of those buried below. Who would've thought I would've found my relative! Mary Sinclair (Sinclair was my maiden name).

We found a local pub which had the BEST fish and chips in the UK. Then we had to make stop at the local outdoor store and buy some real rain jackets. Gotta love North Face. After seeing photos of all of us walking around town with black North Face jackets, someone might mistake us for either working for them or that we’re apart of some larger UK family reunion, all dress in the same gear.

The citizens of Bath love their town and its history so much that locals offer 2 hour walking tours for FREE. Did you catch that? Nothing in the UK is free… but thanks to our tour guide, we learned tons about the town and braved the pouring down rain for 2 ½ hours. Because of the rain and fear of ruining my camera… not many pictures were taken during the tour. However I did get some good ones once our tour ended at the Roman Baths! Here’s a picture of the main bath:

And afterwards we went into a room and actually tried the drinking water (no, it’s not green).

As you can tell from my face, this was the WORST water I’ve ever had in my life. And yes, JT, Jack, and I finished it to the last drop. They dared me.

By the time we walked outside from our delicious and refreshing drink the rain had stopped and the sun was out! We decided to visit the Smallest Pub in Bath for a drink (it was crowded) and then walked next door to a shop with really old books. JT purchased a copy of Pilgrim’s Progress from 1858. What a neat shop! Reminds me how much I love local boutiques.

After a cat nap back at our rooms, we headed out for an evening stroll and then wandered till we found a fabulous spot for dinner. Here are a few pics from around town that night.

We finally found Firehouse Rotisserie. One word: YUM. Pizza, pasta, and salad. Straight from the heart of Italy, I swear.

Now it’s off to bed because we have an early morning with a long trip north all the way to Edinburgh.

London: Day 2

2010-08-13T15:34:00.001-05:00

We started off our second day in London at one of the most delicious coffee shops in the world… Starbucks :)

After a quick fill in our stomachs, we got on the tour bus and made our way over to St. Paul’s cathedral.

We started off in the Crypt of the church where famous heroes of England are buried as well as tons of history telling the story of the wars that destroyed the church and then who rebuilt it.

Then we headed upstairs to admire the ornate walls, windows, and ceiling. I had to sneak a few pictures because there are plenty of volunteers and signs saying “no cameras”. (But I think they should allow you to take pictures with no flash).

And of course we took advantage of hiking to the top of the church to see the views of London from the top of the dome. The 360 degree view was amazing!

Like I mentioned in my last post, there are tons of flowers covering almost all the windows of homes in the heart of London. This is a common snap shot of what you can find on the streets of London: tourists and businessman filling the streets with ornate follow arrangements decorating the buildings.

Now for our next stop of the day, we weren’t sure where it was located on a map, so we needed to head to an internet café in order to find the exact location. We were happy to know that it was only about one mile away from where we were. And yes, this was on our list of things to do while in London…

Eat at Chipotle! The first one in the UK just opened up a few months ago and so of course we had to visit. After chatting it up with the general manager, who moved here from the Chicago market, we enjoyed probably the BEST Chipotle burrito ever. They actually have a few different salsas and brown rice (instead of the normal white) and it really made it great! The general manager who is going to be opening their stores in France was also visiting (native from Austin). It made for a fun lunch and just proves that we cannot go a single week without eating Chipotle :)

After lunch we walked around town down the famous Oxford street (known for it’s shopping) and then walked by Hyde park. By this point I had asked JT to carry me the rest of the way, for fear my feet would fall off, but he declined. We finally made it to the Churchill War Rooms museum and I have to say it’s probably the best and most interactive museum I’ve ever been to. I really enjoyed learning the WWII history from the British perspective.

After a quick dinner at an Italian restaurant we headed back to the hotel around 10:30pm. By this point I can’t even feel my feet. But look at how beautiful Big Ben is in the evening! Yes, I’m easily distracted. JT’s solution for me at this point is: Don’t think about it. Okay!

Tomorrow morning we’re heading out bright and early to catch a train to Bath. Goodbye London!

Sunday in London

2010-08-11T19:11:00.000-05:00

Sunday started bright and early with plans to go to the Communion service in Westminster Abbey. After grabbing a quick breakfast, we enjoyed walking across the Westminster Bridge when there were very few tourists on it. We stopped just a moment to get this picture.

Getting up early in London has its perks. Westminster Abbey is closed to visitors on Sunday, but open to those who wish to attend worship services. The service was at 8am and we were one of 35 people to attend the service. This is either a testimony to the spiritual health of London or that locals are not early risers. I’m assuming the first is true.

With the service revolving around the Sacrament of the Eucharist, we also recited Creeds and Scripture of the Christian faith. It gave us both a great understanding of where our faith has come from. We really enjoyed the service and afterwards we both said we really felt like we were worshipping the entire time, yet there wasn’t one ounce of music or lyrics sung. Makes you think twice about what worship means.

We especially liked the plea etched in stone on the outside of the church, right outside the main entrance.

“May God grant to the Living – Grace

To the Departed – Rest

To the Church and the World – Peace and Concord

And to us Sinners – Enternal Life”

Then we headed back to the hotel to meet up with Jack and then headed out for a day of bus touring and walking to see the sights of London. Our first journey was down the Thames river on a boat which took us to London Tower. I was expecting to see a Tower, not a multiple fortress landmark.

Once inside, we received a great tour from one of the Beefeaters and then made our way inside one of the towers to see the Crown Jewels. While waiting in line, we actually got to see the changing of the guards.

Did you know there’s a scepter with a 530 carat diamond in the middle?? Needless to say, I was speechless.

And for those of you who have read our previous travel blogs… can find who’s in this picture??

SNUGS!! Of course he joined us on yet another English Adventure. Please keep your eye out for any further photos that he might sneak in to.

Now it was on to the tour bus and over to Buckingham Palace. We didn’t get the chance to go in, but we did manage to take a picture outside… along with the other thousand people there.

A quick rest in a park right next to the Palace. The trees here are beautiful and unlike any I’ve ever seen. Almost a cross between large oak trees and ivy. The branches almost hang down like willow trees.

Mom, this picture is for you. There are beautiful window-boxes everywhere. Every time I see one I think of you and how much you would enjoy seeing all the colors and designs.

Driving by the famous Hyde Park shows us the famous “Speakers Corner” where there is freedom of speech and large groups will gather round to debate and challenge the speakers. Reminded both JT and I of our college campus.

The famous Trafalgar Square has beautiful fountains and monuments. The suns starting to go down at this point and feet are starting to hurt. On our way to find a spot for dinner, we pass through West End, where all the famous plays and feature films are premiered. This place is buzzing with excitement and people. We even had time to make a few phone calls… or just take a famous phone booth picture.

We found a great pizzeria to eat at… mind you this was now 9pm and we were so hungry and tired. Only about 1.5 miles walk back to the hotel and we were out by 10:30pm. Tomorrow… more sight seeing and…. Walking… boy our feet are starting to hurt.