for you to notice

another week in the holy land has come and gone. another batch of pictures has come with it.
let me explain why i am so picture happy....you see a year back my parentals got me this sweet semi-professional nikon camera. i honestly have no idea how to really use it but it sounds so great when it takes a picture and i look really good with it and so bam....hundreds of pictures. just more for my wonderful readers to enjoy right?

classes have been pretty busy so our adventures have slowed just a bit. don't worry sydney has been able to have fun and take lots of pictures.

we had our third field trip today. for the most part i had no idea where we were but i knew sweet picture opportunities were mine and so i took them.
here is bod, marie, rachel, lyds and me on top of a tel. check out the sweet grape vines in the back ground. its almost california but different and in israel....



another great stop on our field trip was the site that samson was born. remember samson, the one that had his hair cut off my delilah. yeah he was great. bod and i enjoyed reenacting this awesome event. in the words of regina spektor "you are my sweetest downfall"






last night we had our egypt party. as the chair of the activities committee we planned this event. it turned out great and we had some hilarious costumes. who doesn't love a dress up dance party. if you could only have seen what it was like to get 80 byu jeru students dressed up like white egyptians dancing in our lunch room....hilarious yes...awesome? no question




the past few days have been spent adventuring through the old city. one of my favorite things are all the spices that are sold. its like art in bowls. i've only tasted a few but my taste buds agree...oh yeah


our free day was spent exploring new parts of the city. the jewish quarter was included in this. great area, great people, good food and fun shopping....there is nothing wrong with is picture


you might not be able to tell but this is jonah and me. yeah don't worry i know we look just like egyptians despite the white skin, my blonde hair, jonahs blue eyes....like i said we look egyptian.





another favorite thing about the old city...the wall. i love the fact that there is this huge wall surrounding the city. there is something so protecting about this. this picture was taking right before we were kicked off the wall by some random palestinian. sometimes breaking the rules is worth it.

we finally made it to the dome of the rock. according to tradition we had to take a jumping picture. this one only took us two tries. we are so improving...congrats to bod, lyds, me and mas

this was our group at the beginning of the day.....6 hours later it was jane, bod, mandy and me. crazy how that happens???
so don't even worry about it. i found a utah ute flag in jeru. omar this awesome olive wood shop owner had this hanging in his shop. he was so confused of why i wanted a picture with this flag and not the byu flag. apparently he doesn't understand the definition of awesome = utah. i've never felt more at home in jeru. i love my red

so on our field trip we ventured into some bell caves. the holes from the top provided great light for sweet pictures. again i'm obsessed with jumping pictures. i blame high school musical. curse the catchy music and cheesy lines.

here we have andy and i loving the light and jumping with all our hsm abilities. after all we're all in this together.


our last stop on our field trip was the valley of ellah were david killed goliath. we were giving sling-shots and an open space to practice our skills....

i don't usually brag but this case calls for it....my slig-shot skills are kinda amazing. don't even worry about it but goliath is totally dead.

kells, me and bod are so hc (hard core for all you older folks)

fridays here are pretty lame. we can't go to the old city till 3 and most everything is closed for sabbath....so this last friday we played the american card and went to see angels and demons. best part of the movie...intermission. they totally stopped the movie half way through for ten minutes.

bod and i are soul mates and i love every second of it. recreating signs and statues is one of our favorite things to do. bod was nice and was the old man in this picture. way to take one for the team bod.
i love her face so much. look how excited she is for "up".

i have the blessed oppertunity to live about 10 minutes away from the garden of gethsemane. on sabbath we can go there in the afternoon and just ponder and read and such. there is a private part of the garden that they let the mormons go in. i love being mormon here. they may not know really what we stand for but they know who we are and they know we stand out. kellynn was playing photographer and took this sweet kandid shot.

i love saturday sabbath and the garden even more.



everyday my life gets better in jeru.

as in the words of snow patrol....
tell me that you'll open your eyes.
slowly i'm opening my eyes.

jeru is my home!