... to the mountains, err.. green hills.

To camp or stay in a bed and breakfast, hike, clear trees, maybe swim, visit with Evan and Kelly (and the rest of the Travis clan, plus Ross and Kristy), and just get away from Durham for a couple days. Should be fun!

Here are the next two ornaments fromt the Jesse Tree project; the tent and the ark.  Four down, twenty-one to go.

Our house is right in the middle of a tornado warning... wish us luck. It lasts until 4:30pm.

I love Christmas. As a kid we had an advent calendar for a while, and it seems like a couple years we had those cardboard ones that each day you opened the door and got a piece of chocolate out.

I have wanted to make a advent calendar for a long time, and now that Halleigh is going to start to remember traditions, I thought that it is time to start some.  I like the idea of placing the focus of Christmas more on Jesus and less on presents and Santa. What better way to do that than to celebrate the advent season daily. So that is what we are going to do... with a twist.

So, my friend and fellow blogger, Erin has wanted to make a Jesse Tree, and she suggested that I look into making one as well. I had never even heard of a Jesse Tree, so I did a little research, starting with Wikipedia, and here is what I found...

The Jesse Tree is named from Isaiah 11:1: "A shoot will spring forth from the stump of Jesse, and a branch out of his roots."  It is a vehicle to tell the Story of God in the Old Testament, and to connect the Advent Season with the faithfulness of God across 4,000 years of history. Basically, it ties the Old and New Testaments together. Each day there is an ornament that represents the lineage of Jesus, starting with creation, the fall (Adam), the flood (Noah), followed by Abraham's willingness to sacrifice Isaac, etc. 

I like the idea of the advent calendar, but I LOVE the idea of the Jesse tree. Not enough importance is placed on the Old Testament telling the story of Jesus.  I want my children to understand that the Old Testament speaks to us and is as relevant to us as the New Testament. It isn't just a collection of great children's stories! And what better way to teach that than to combine the Old Testament in the preparation and celebration of Christ's birth? There is none.

Anyway, so Erin and I have started our Jesse Trees. We got the first two done, creation and the fall. Here are the pictures of our finished products...

I got this as a forward on my e-mail, and I can't stop laughing about it.  We have been addicted to the Olympics, and have watched every amazing thing that Phelps has done (except his last race). And considering our "big news" I thought this cartoon was appropriate. At this point in Mama Phelps' life, she could have never known what an amazing athlete she was about to conceive.

We had so much fun the first time, we thought we'd try it again!

I don't think Halleigh gets it, but she did like all the attention paid to her shirt! Oh, and by the way Miles and I are VERY excited too!

If you want to try this out, follow the directions below, and let me know! We can compare out mosaics!

Type your answer to each of the questions below into flikr search. Using only the first page of returned images, choose your favorite and copy-&-paste each of the URL’s into the mosaic maker (3 columns, 4 rows).

The questions:
1. What is your first name?
2. What is your favorite food?
3. What high school did you attend?
4. What is your favorite color?
5. Who is your celebrity crush?
6. Favorite drink?
7. Dream vacation?
8. Favorite dessert?
9. What do you want to be when you grow up?
10.What do you love most in life?
11. One word to describe you.
12. Your Flickr name

Here are a couple pictures from our week. Halleigh and I have been making great use of our new ride. Visiting various parks has been Halleigh's favorite part and it has been really fun to ride around Durham seeing it from the biking point of view. I have yet to go to the grocery store on my bike, but I am excited to try that out soon.

We had an hour to kill the other day and so we went over to the Museum of Life and Science. We LOVE this museum. Miles' grandparents gave us a membership and we have used it A LOT! Halleigh ran for an hour straight from exhibit to exhibit. She had a very good time, and slept VERY soundly for her nap. I had to go in and wake her up after 2 1/2 hours so we could pick up Mary from the airport.

Oh by the way, I took these picture with my phone. Pretty good, I'd say!

So today is my birthday party, and since I am banned from the kitchen, I am stuck in the living room.  My birthday, as many of you already know is actually Monday, but since people work... we are celebrating today.

Which brings me to the point, I am really freaked out by being 28. People laugh when I say this, but I really do feel impending doom. Okay maybe it's not doom, but maybe trepidation. ha ha ha

I think that this hesitation is caused by Taryn (my step-mom). Sorry Taryn, but I think it's your fault. :)   When my dad and Taryn got married (16 years ago) she was 28! Totally an adult, responsible and old enough to be married to my dad!  He was OLD, or so I thought; really he was in his mid-thirties, in the best shape of his life, had a totally awesome bachelor pad and drove the "fine German touring car". Really, he was a catch! :) But that isn't the point... the point is that I am rapidly becoming my parents' age. 

Where has my life gone? It is a slippery slope to 30 from here!

If you read Miles' blog you know that we went to see the Dead Sea Scrolls a couple weekends ago. It really was one of the most interesting exhibits I have ever seen.  Though expensive, it is totally worth the money!

Along the lines of the "coolness" of the scrolls, here is a list of 25 fascinating things you may not have known about the Dead Sea Scrolls.

1. The Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered in eleven caves along the northwest shore of the Dead Sea between the years 1947 and 1956. The area is 13 miles east of Jerusalem and is 1300 feet below sea level. The mostly fragmented texts, are numbered according to the cave that they came out of. They have been called the greatest manuscript discovery of modern times.

2. Only Caves 1 and 11 have produced relatively intact manuscripts. Discovered in 1952, Cave 4 produced the largest find. About 15,000 fragments from more than 500 manuscripts were found.

3. In all, scholars have identified the remains of about 825 to 870 separate scrolls.

4. The Scrolls can be divided into two categories--biblical and non-biblical. Fragments of every book of the Old Testament have been discovered except for the book of Esther.

5. There are now identified among the scrolls, 19 copies of the Book of Isaiah, 25 copies of Deuteronomy and 30 copies of the Psalms.

6. Prophecies by Ezekiel, Jeremiah and Daniel not found in the Bible are written in the Scrolls.

7. The Isaiah Scroll, found relatively intact, is 1000 years older than any previously known copy of Isaiah. In fact, the scrolls are the oldest group of Old Testament manuscripts ever found.

8. In the Scrolls are found never before seen psalms attributed to King David and Joshua.

9.There are nonbiblical writings along the order of commentaries on the OT, paraphrases that expand on the Law, rule books of the community, war conduct, thanksgiving psalms, hymnic compositions, benedictions, liturgical texts, and wisdom writings.

10. The Scrolls are for the most part, written in Hebrew, but there are many written in Aramaic. Aramaic was the common language of the Jews of Palestine for the last two centuries B.C. and of the first two centuries A.D. The discovery of the Scrolls has greatly enhanced our knowledge of these two languages. In addition, there are a few texts written in Greek.

11. The Scrolls appear to be the library of a Jewish sect. The library was hidden away in caves around the outbreak of the First Jewish Revolt (A.D. 66-70) as the Roman army advanced against the rebel Jews.

12. Near the caves are the ancient ruins of Qumran. They were excavated in the early 1950's and appear to be connected with the scrolls.

13. The Dead Sea Scrolls were most likely written by the Essenes during the period from about 200 B.C. to 68 C.E./A.D. The Essenes are mentioned by Josephus and in a few other sources, but not in the New Testament. The Essenes were a strict Torah observant, Messianic, apocalyptic, baptist, wilderness, new covenant Jewish sect. They were led by a priest they called the "Teacher of Righteousness," who was opposed and possibly killed by the establishment priesthood in Jerusalem.

14. The enemies of the Qumran community were called the "Sons of Darkness"; they called themselves the "Sons of Light," "the poor," and members of "the Way." They thought of themselves as "the holy ones," who lived in "the house of holiness," because "the Holy Spirit" dwelt with them.

15. The last words of Joseph, Judah, Levi, Naphtali, and Amram (the father of Moses) are written down in the Scrolls.

16. One of the most curious scrolls is the Copper Scroll. Discovered in Cave 3, this scroll records a list of 64 underground hiding places throughout the land of Israel. The deposits are to contain certain amounts of gold, silver, aromatics, and manuscripts. These are believed to be treasures from the Temple at Jerusalem, that were hidden away for safekeeping.

17. The Temple Scroll, found in Cave 11, is the longest scroll. Its present total length is 26.7 feet (8.148 meters). The overall length of the scroll must have been over 28 feet (8.75m).

18. The scrolls contain previously unknown stories about biblical figures such as Enoch, Abraham, and Noah. The story of Abraham includes an explanation why God asked Abraham to sacrifice his only son Isaac.

19. The scrolls are most commonly made of animal skins, but also papyrus and one of copper. They are written with a carbon-based ink, from right to left, using no punctuation except for an occasional paragraph indentation. In fact, in some cases, there are not even spaces between the words.

20. The Scrolls have revolutionized textual criticism of the Old Testament. Interestingly, now with manuscripts predating the medieval period, we find these texts in substantial agreement with the modern text as well as widely variant forms.

21. Some of the Dead Sea Scrolls actually appeared for sale on June 1, 1954 in the Wall Street Journal. The advertisement read -- "The Four Dead Sea Scrolls: Biblical manuscripts dating back to at least 200 BC are for sale. This would be an ideal gift to an educational or religious institution by an individual or group. Box F206."  They were put in the paper after Duke University declined to buy them.

22. Although the Qumran community existed during the time of the ministry of Jesus, none of the Scrolls refer to Him, nor do they mention any of His follower's described in the New Testament.

23. The major intact texts, from Caves 1 & 11, were published by the late fifties and are now housed in the Shrine of the Book museum in Jerusalem.

24. Since the late fifties, about 40% of the Scrolls, mostly fragments from Cave 4, remained unpublished and were inaccessible. It wasn't until 1991, 44 years after the discovery of the first Scroll, after the pressure for publication mounted, that general access was made available to photographs of the Scrolls. In November of 1991 the photos were published by the Biblical Archaeological Society in a nonofficial edition; a computer reconstruction, based on a concordance, was announced; the Huntington Library pledged to open their microfilm files of all the scroll photographs.

25. The Dead Sea Scrolls enhance our knowledge of both Judaism and Christianity. They represent a non-rabbinic form of Judaism and provide a wealth of comparative material for New Testament scholars, including many important parallels to the Jesus movement. They show Christianity to be rooted in Judaism and have been called the evolutionary link between the two.

(This list came from http://www.centuryone.com/25dssfacts.html)