I wrapped up last time with Shavuot, and originally we were supposed to leave Israel the following night. Because I needed to sit on the plane in a seat with more leg room, we had to extend our trip by a few days until there was a seat available. That means everything afterwards was bonus time! Gabbie was also supposed to leave around the same time as us, but she was able to change her flight and stay until the next evening after we left.
On Thursday, we dropped the kids off at the mall so they could get lunch, while Dave and I went to a winery and had wine and cheese.
Later that day, we went to the beach at Ashkelon.
We had dinner and then tried to get some sunset pictures.
A random stranger took our best family photo!
It was at about this time that there were rocket alerts just south of where we were. We were able to hear the Iron Dome blocking them! We weren’t too worried, but we headed back to the car!
Later that night, we went to a little restaurant in my sister in law’s neighborhood where on Thursday nights they have foods that people usually eat on Shabbat and you can get food to go or eat it there. We had a few things and it was really good.
On Friday, we drove up north to visit a family that used to live here in Kansas. The parents taught our kids and their kids were in class with our kids. They showed us where they live, gave us lunch, and shared their photo albums from their time in Kansas.
That evening, we went to my nephew’s house for dinner. He lives about two neighborhoods over from his parents, so we could walk back, although it’s not a short walk! But I can’t complain because I had to be pushed in the wheelchair. Anyway, on the way back, we saw lots of little children running around at 12 AM, and at one house, a man was lying on the group either passed out drunk or just sleeping while kids played around him. My kids thought this was really amusing and Zachary kept telling everyone about him!
On Saturday it was Shabbat, but after it ended I felt like we should go somewhere, so we went to the mall. It is in a city where we know a lot of people, but no one wanted to meet us there, so we just went ourselves.
On Sunday, I had a follow up appointment with the hospital. I wasn’t supposed to be there still, but since we were, we decided to go to the appointment. I had asked a few people if they could come with me to help translate with the non English speakers and my sister-in-law ended up coming. We did a lot of waiting and then they took off my cast and took out my stitches. I had an xray and they said I could start wearing a boot, but I’d have to go somewhere else to get the boot and I was too scared to go somewhere without a cast on my ankle! So they gave me a new cast, which sadly was very tight and uncomfortable, but I did have another appointment scheduled for once I got home.
The kids came to Jerusalem with us but did their own thing until we met up with them at my nephew’s house. This is the nephew whose wife just had a baby, so we saw her plus their other two kids. We had lunch with them. Then we went to the Kotel for the last time of the trip.
We decided to check out a different area for dinner, so we drove there and walked around a bit. It’s called First Station and there is a trail there. There was a free library made out of an old bus stop.
The streets were labeled with these tile signs, which reminded me of a picture we have of Simon with his Hebrew name (Shimon) on a sign from when he was 5, so I took his picture there. Please excuse his crazy hair.
Then we had dinner. It was Father’s Day and Dave wanted steak!
Monday was our last day and we didn’t know what we wanted to do. We decided to go to a museum and we couldn’t decide if we wanted to go to the Israel Museum or the Museum of the Jewish People (formerly the Diaspora Museum). We ended up choosing the Museum of the Jewish People, which is in Tel Aviv. We stopped first by the port of Tel Aviv and we had lunch there.
I took a lot of pictures at the museum. It was interesting and the kids seemed interested as well! It has displays about various Jewish cultural things like people, religion, dance, music, TV, comedy, etc.
Spot Billy Joel!
One section we were all excited to see is the models of synagogues around the world, both ones that still exist and ones that have been destroyed. This display has been there at least since I was first at the museum in 1997!
Lastly, there was a new exhibit dedicated to 10/7, featuring art from people who live or lived in the attacked communities.
That night we met my sister-in-law for dinner back at the same place we had dinner on our arrival night!
On Tuesday, it was time to head home. We dropped off the rental car, and I got driven to the airport in the car by one of the workers there. Then we had a man who took us through the airport and we got to skip all the long lines. That was the best benefit of traveling with my cast. Otherwise, it wasn’t very easy. They even made me hop through the metal detector using a cane.
My seat was in the bulkhead row right near the bathroom, which was helpful for me because I could get to the bathroom easily, but not pleasant otherwise with lots of people walking by and everyone wanting to cut through my row and climb over my propped up leg. I was very nervous about it and Dave kept telling people they weren’t allowed to do that. I felt bad for the boys, because they were sitting separate from us and in with a huge group of kids traveling together who were pretty obnoxious. We landed in NY and the person who took me in the wheelchair to customs was also pretty obnoxious. She kept pushing me into the person in front of me and hurrying up and leaving the rest of my family behind. I was very frustrated with her.
We made it out and my father-in-law picked us up and brought us to my sister-in-law’s house where we would stay the night. I didn’t know how to go up the steps to her house with crutches so that was hard! My nephew came and hung out with us while we ate, and then I collapsed into bed at probably 8 pm. Which was fine because we had to get up super early to get to our next flight home.
My father-in-law picked us up again and the person who brought me to the gate this time was fine and the airplane staff was nice to me too. We made it home and our friends were nice enough to bring us dinner that night!
So that concludes our fun, meaningful, and eventful Israel trip! I hope you enjoyed reading all about it!
