Birthday Party, Summer Heat, and Our Last Desert Adventure

Asher celebrated his fifth birthday in preschool-camp last week. Here he is in the special birthday chair next to his mother who prepared a special chocolate birthday cake.

Teacher Maggie did a special dance for the birthday boy to the delight of all.

Then everyone danced together.

All of the children hoisted Asher up on his chair and danced around him.

Another classroom tradition is putting the birthday child in the middle of a parachute with balloons and shaking them up while the birthday child pops all of the balloons.

It was a great party!

It's Hot Out There!

Summer heat is here. It is regularly 100+ degrees in the sun. Asher and Margalit went next door to our neighbors for a swim last week. (They even had a diving platform.)

A cool time was had by all.

Our Last Desert Adventure (For Now)...

Our friend David Biton took us out to Ein Ekev, a desert spring near the base of the mountain in the center of this photo. We drove in a four-wheel-drive jeep to get there.

After a bumpy ride, we parked the jeep,

and David led us on foot to the spring.

The spring flows down a 30-foot cliff into a deep basin full of water

which is ideal for swimming.

After a swim, we all enjoyed a watermelon snack.

Here's a photo of Tami Biton, David's wife.

After our swim and snack, we walked back to to  the jeep.

We drove to a nearby picnic area at dusk, where Tami and Rachel prepared salads and David grilled a feast, including spicy Moroccan sausages, marinated chicken hearts, chicken tenders, and steaks.