This is a picture of our room or at least one side of it.  It is actually a pretty large room and the hotel is located across the street from the Sea of Galilee.  The view when we walk out the door each morning is very nice.  Hopefully we'll get a good picture of that to send soon.
Our schedule is very full---breakfast at 7:00, board the bus at 8:00, tour all day and get back in time for dinner at 7:00.  All the food has been delicious.  However, it is not food that I would have appreciated even 5 years ago!

 This is one of the first sites we went to.  It is a Roman theater and it is right beside the place where the chariot races took place with public executions for the half-time show.  This is right on the Mediterranean Sea.

New House Progress Report #9

Well I'm back from Germany, so let's try and get a house update in before Mom and Dad remember their password and post an update from Israel. All the exterior stone work is done, cabinets are installed, bathrooms are tiled, and trim is going up! The trim is really making the inside of the house look good.

Close-up of the stone. It's stacked a little tighter than I was hoping, but I'm guessing there isn't much I can do about that!

Cabinets installed! Lots of good natural light in the kitchen.

A view of the buffet going from the kitchen to the dining room, or as I like to call it, "the place where Grandma would put all the Christmas goodies"

Here is a shot of the guest bathroom. Both of the upstairs baths look the same, as in not much to blog about...

We had some vandals Saturday night. :( They kicked in the drywall in a few rooms... how rude! Time to put that deer stand to use.

Here are the bookcases, they are still a work in progress, but they are looking great. All of the custom finish work inside is looking really good.

All the exterior is missing now is the shutters. And a yard. And a team of Southern Living photog's.

The neighbors behind us had a few trees cut down!

 Then the neighbors next door to them decided to get in on the action.

 Incredibly, it doesn't really change the view from our backyard unless you walk out behind the shed!

New House Progress Report #8

Hello all, I'll be in Germany next week, so I thought I'd provide an update before I left. Good news, our current house sold in 8 days. We are under contract, so I guess it's not officially sold, but everything seems promising. We had ~25 showings during that time, which helped our confidence that it would sell. So currently we will be closing on the sale of our current house June 17, and our new house will be ready June 27, so we will be homeless for a few days. Maybe they will let us move some stuff in early? We'll see...

Not much has happened since last time. It rained a lot over the last 2 weeks, which slowed down the dry time for the drywall mud. They had to wait a good week before they could get in and sand the walls. Just a few days ago they installed the hardwood floors and just yesterday I noticed they delivered the stone. Next week, they should install cabinets, and probably install the stone siding, so I'm bummed I'll be missing that. I won't be taking the camera to Germany this time, so hopefully Lindsay will make it out there once or twice and take some pictures for us.

May 10, 2013 - Here is a lovely symmetrical view of our family room.

May 10, 2013 - Living Room, Foyer, and Dining Room.

May 10, 2013 - We had our trim walkthough where we walked through all the rooms and discussed details about any of the built-ins and finish details. Here is some proof that we are building a custom home. There are drawings all over the walls with custom details about the closets, stairs, beams, and bookshelves. These are our "lockers" coming in from the garage for dropping off shoes, coats, book bags...

May 10, 2013 - Stone has arrived. Hopefully it looks good on the house. We are doing the visible mortar joints, so hopefully it looks like the house in the picture above mom and dad's fireplace!

May 10, 2013 - Nothing new on the outside, but it was a nicer day than last time. 

New House Progress Report #7

Sorry for the delay, been busy with work and getting our current house ready for selling. Today our house was listed on the market, so maybe by the next blog entry it will be under contract... That might be a little hopeful, but we shall see. A lot has happened with the new house as you will soon see. They installed siding, built the porch, painted the exterior, and drywalled the inside since last update. The stone and shutters won't go up for a few weeks, but once that happens the exterior will be complete! 

April 13, 2013 - Siding went up pretty quick. I was in Jacksonville during the week they did siding, so I didn't miss much. I'll be in Germany in a few weeks, so hopefully they will be working on some boring stuff then as well. 

April 13, 2013 - Linz on the partially completed porch. We weren't sure how we felt about the diagonal layout on the porch, but we like it now that it's all done. 

April 21, 2013 - Visitors! and insulation¡

April 21, 2013 - Another visitor, and they finally built the front steps.

April 22, 2013 - Just some exterior painting.

April 25, 2013 - Drywall in the kitchen/breakfast/family room.

April 25, 2013 - A shot of our double front doors. You'd think with the glass to mahogany ratio on the doors, they would have been a little cheaper...

April 25, 2013 - A picture of the stained bead board ceiling on the porch and window trim details.

April 25, 2103 - Not the standard angle, but I think I might change it up from here on out to get a better look at the porch and chimney. (I'll keep taking one from the original angle as well so I can do a nice time lapse when it's all done.)

Spring Break 2013 (Part 2): Savannah, GA

For the second half of spring break, Mom, Dad, Joe and I traveled to Savannah. Mom and Dad had stopped here on their way to Florida earlier this year, but it was a first time experience for Joe and me. We arrived in the late afternoon on Friday, and to our luck it was raining. We stopped at our hotel, settled in, and planned out the rest of our day. The rain eventually stopped, and we headed out to Mom's favorite place in Savannah--or any city really--Starbucks! After our coffee/hot chocolate fix, we started on our self-guided tour of downtown (aka the sites Mom and Dad could remember from the carriage tour). 

I'm not sure that his particular picture was anything more than a beautiful house we passed while walking. Luckily for our iphones, we were able to quickly find a couple of destinations such as Chippewa Square (where the bench scene from Forrest Gump was filmed), the Mercer House, and The Juliette Gordon Low House. Below, is the fountain in one of the parks. That night we decided to go to Uncle Bubba's Oyster House. I was glad to see they had some chicken on the menu!

That evening we wandered down to the river front. There was some type of art fair taking place. We visited many of the various tents before finding the funnel cake tent. We partook in some lovely funnel cake before calling it a night.

On Saturday, we started by driving to the Wormsloe Historic Site. I had wanted to visit this site because of the beautiful scenery. I remembered that Nicholas Sparks' The Last Song had been filmed in Savannah, and my favorite scene was filmed here. The following picture was the entrance gate.

You had to pay the ticket price to even take pictures of the long oak tree drive. This had been what I wanted to see. We definitely took enough pictures to cover our ticket price! Unfortunately, most of them are on Dad's camera. These are just the ones I had on my phone. We went to the museum on the plantation, did the walking nature tour, and got back in the car for our next destination. 

Joe's Savannah attraction of choice was the lighthouse on Tybee Island. It was a beautiful day to be out near the water! We decided to start by climbing to the top of the lighthouse--and let me tell you--I paid for that decision for days. Those 178 steps to the top were no joke! The following Monday I about cried as I started the climb up the three flights of stairs to my classroom. 

However, the view from the top of the lighthouse was definitely worth it. You can't see it really well in this picture, but if you look closely, you can see one of the cargo ships that we frequently saw while we were there. 

Once we were back downtown, we decided to take the Juliette Gordon Low House tour. It was the house that she lived in once she was married. The tour was very informative, but had several rules! They cautioned against large bags, touching anything, or even getting too close to some items. Dad, who struggles with listening sometimes, wandered back into a previous room while the rest of the tour group was moving on. Our guide stopped midway up the stairs and gave Dad an icy stare until he turned around and joined the group! 

We then walked over to our highly anticipated lunch at Mrs. Wilkes Boarding House, only to discover that they were closed on the weekends! We had missed our chance. We settled for an English Pub--hoping I would be able to get some experience at ordering before my trip this summer :) Later that evening, we walked down to the shops on the river. It was a lovely way to end a great trip!

Spring Break 2013- Richmond, VA

Over Spring Break, Joe and I decided to travel to Richmond, VA for a little historical field trip. We started by visiting St. John's Church. This was the church where Patrick Henry delivered his "Speech to the Second Virginia Convention" (which I happen to teach to my Juniors!)

Next on our itinerary was the Edgar Allan Poe Museum. I had high hopes for this museum; however, we were severely disappointed! It consisted of a small honorary garden, a scale of Richmond pointing out where Poe's houses would have been (if they still existed), and a room of Poe inspired art work. The gift shop was fully of "scary" keychains, coffee mugs, magnets, etc. So...we moved on to the Holocaust Museum.

I had been to the DC and Detroit Holocaust museums, but I heard the Richmond one was unique because each room was created to be similar to a Holocaust experience. When you enter the museum, you walk down a German railroad track. It allows you to travel into about 20 different rooms. Each room is different--one is a concentration camp living quarter, a crematorium, a gas chamber, a cattle cart, etc. It definitely provided a different perspective! 

For the last part of our trip, we experienced some Civil War history. We visited the American Civil War Center located on the James River. We didn't do much here except enjoy the scenery and the beautiful weather! 

We ended our trip at the Hollywood Cemetery. We were able to drive to the graves of former presidents James Monroe and John Tyler- and President of the Confederate States Jefferson Davis.

Overall, we had quite a lovely experience in Richmond!