Van Gogh in the making...

Last Thursday, the children in the Rose Garden class did some painting activity. This is Enna-Marie's second painting experience. I captured the four busy with their artwork...

that's Enna-Marie and Zane, then Melody and Salim

EM: "Hmmm, let me do some Van Gogh style..."!

and here she is posing for me...good job sweetie!

Visit of Siila, Jabez and Fetaui

Siila Knight with husband Jabez and daughter Fetaui recently visited us at home. They were here for their nine day pilgrimage. Just a flashback, when I came to the World Centre more than nine years ago, Siila from Samoa and Jabez from Barbados were serving here as well. That same year, I had a privilege to be part of the "Pacific Night", a presentation of different dances and songs from the Pacific, thanks to Siila for teaching me this traditional hawaiian dance, very simple but a beautiful dance. I kept with me the practice tape, traditional costume and video that she gave me as souvenirs. I remember before they finished their services, they had a beautiful baby girl named Fetaui. Now she's 8 1/2 years old, people she meets get attracted to her sweet, happy and gentle personality. Enna-Marie and I for instance didn't want her to go when it's time to leave our place after we had lunch together (Maarten by the way couldn't join us as he was busy meeting with some consultants who were in town). You can see from the photos below that they really played/liked each other. Thank you for that short visit Siila, Jabez and Fetaui and for the parenting experiences and advices you shared with me.











Siila and I at the Pacific Night more than nine years ago...

Trips to Beit Alpha and Gangaroo

Our family together with Vanysha joined a group of friends boarded on two sheruts to Beit Alpha and Gangaroo trips last 20 October. Because of our very busy schedules in the past week, we are only able to post these photos now. Anyway, we did enjoy looking at the koalas and feeding the kangaroos, our first time ever to see them so closely. They are jumping and eating everywhere in the kangaroo area. Enna-Marie and Menchie have also been to the zoo in Haifa (photos were also posted here), it's nice as they have a variety of animals there, but here in Gangaroo you can touch and feed the kangaroos, you can buy the food and it costs one shekel. We also have seen and taken photos of sheep, cockatoos and few other animals, but have deleted them by mistake, oh well unexpected things can happen sometimes. We recommend this trip to families with young children. Enjoy the following photos:

Beit Alpha Synagogue National Park is an ancient fifth century synagogue with a splendid mosaic floor. (photos didn't turn out so well as the room was so dark due to the film showing)...














Gangaroo is a beautiful park with all things Australian––kangaroos, cockatoos, flying foxes, koalas, laughing kookaburras, cassowaries, wallabies, and emus. There are 38 types of eucalyptus trees and other plants grace the grounds. They have a gift shop with all things Australian as well.

Recent gatherings...

We had a welcome lunch gathering last weekend at Diane and Lonnie's place for the new family, the Rychetniks: David, Grace and Kira.
















Also recently, we had a privilege of meeting Dr. Parvaneh Farid from Hungary who shared her knowledge about homeophathy with the mothers. Our special thank you goes to Barbara, Sahar and Desiree who babysat for us.

Menchie's birthday

Last Wednesday was Menchie's birthday. At lunchtime we went out to our favourite Arab pizza place on Allenby and we treated ourselves to some simple yet delicious food. For the evening, Arnold, Canan, Kurt and Vanysha had organized a dinner for her at Kurt's place, and it was my job to make sure she got there on time and that she would to some extent be surprised (as most birthday parties here are surprises and Menchie has attended her fair share of them, I was sure she would see right through me if I tried to lure her to Kurt's place...).

An attempt after lunch to let Menchie's ID card mysteriously disappear so that Kurt could later "find" it and call her to come and get it from his home failed miserably, and so I had almost resigned to the fact that this year there would be no real surprise. We went to the Shrine after work to say some prayers, and on the way to "dinner in a restaurant of Menchie's choosing" I suddenly turned the car on to Hillel street and stopped in front of Kurt's place. As I was thinking of just telling her we weren't going to go to a restaurant but instead have dinner with some close friends, Martijn walked by and saved the day! He said that dinner for four was ready at his place, and Menchie bought into it! On the way to May and Martijn's apartment I swung open the door to Kurt's house (Kurt lives in the same building as May and Martijn) and the look on Menchie's face was just great! We had a wonderful evening with our friends, with delicious food and a yummy cake! Thanks everyone for coming and sharing this special evening with us!

Here are some pictures of the day...

our pizza girl enjoying her food at lunch time...

and Menchie too...

Franco, Rhea, Elfida, Canan and Kurt...

Peyman, Selvi and Arnold...

us with Riyad...

with the Laroya's...

Enna-Marie in the spotlight...

Happy parents...

birthday celebrant with friends...

A budding love Story...

Menchie as mother goose

I had the bounty of being the goose in our singing class today with our babies. I have introduced few songs from the ones that we already know. It's funny that yesterday, I was singing all these songs just to be familiar with the order, even at shower and sleeping time (yep I can sing to myself without opening my mouth, you guys do that too isn't?). It's quite a lot of songs actually, but most of them are short. To help and guide me with my presentation, I wrote the title of each song on a piece of paper in case I forget. It indeed helped me. Enna-Marie was cooperative in the beginning and somehow in the middle part, but towards the end she decided to get up and tried on some of her aunties shoes at the hallway.

Here are our group photos:

these are the lovely moms and their babies in our community

this time with me