Pomegranates galore

Oh, it's nearly the end of the pomegranate season - so sad. I love this fruit with all its inherent beauty and twinkle. (But I do admit to hating cleaning up pomegranate juice when it splashes all over when you knock the seeds out.) Here in Jerusalem you can, when they are in season, easily get a glass of freshly squeezed pomegranate juice while doing your shopping from one of the street carts or many juice stands in this city. It is tart, sweet and so, so good!

My favourite use of pomegranates though, is pomegranate seeds served over vanilla ice cream. So delicious! Pomegranates - I will definitely be missing you until next season!

The Church of the Holy Sepulchre

A little image from the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, one of the many churches in the Old City in Jerusalem. This time of year there are many people who come to light candles, get a blessing and generally take in the atmosphere of the space. I love the candle lighting which takes place in churches, which we don't really have in synagogues. I am always intrigued to know what the person who lit the candle(s) was thinking, praying. For whom or what were these candles lit? Only the person lighting knows, but leaves this tangible light to show to the world their care. Beautiful.

Coffee express

In parts of the Old City you can have get your coffee delivered to where you are, ready made, instead of going to the coffee maker. You'll see men running with trays like this one, ready to serve his customers. Oh, how nice it would be if they could come to my house with coffee, ready. It is a little bitter, but with lots of sugar and often with some cardamom. Delicious. Oh, if only they could come to my house, right now - I am ready for a nice cup of coffee just about now. Oh, and maybe with a couple of biscuits on the side as well. Maybe I'll just go and make myself a cup - there isn't exactly a coffee delivering service where I live...

Jaffa gate

I love coming to the Old City here in Jerusalem. Every time I see something new. When the weather is as wonderful as this - somehow it really is the city of gold with possibilities everywhere.

We are having freak weather here for a few days, with high temperatures and glorious sunshine! It is great (especially when I don't mention the fact that it must have caused some tree/palm to pollinate in an extreme way, which my body is not very happy about!)

Channuka

I love this time of year with all its indulgences and family time. Here in Jerusalem people everywhere are lighting their channukiot (channuka candelabras) in their windows. Yesterday we passed a house where they had seven channukiot lit in the window. Totally awesome and so beautiful. T and I light one each, so from the outside of our window you will be able to see two of them shining brightly.

I love the progressiveness of the eight days of the holiday - the first day we light one candle, then second two etc - today is the third day, so we lit three candles. (The lone candle in the middle, which is a bit higher up than the others, is the candle we light the three candles with, and is not counted towards the three.) It makes you feel how the days are going and really being able to enjoy and take part in each and every one of the days of the holiday.

During Channuka we try to do extra nice things all week - so we see a lot of friends, eat especially nice food, play games and indulge a little extra. I always make candy and cookies for Channuka - usually I make quite a few different kinds, at least seven, but this year I made five; peanut brittle, pecan brittle, sugared pecans, peanut clusters and oatmeal, chocolate chip and cranberry cookies. Maybe I will make some more during the next few days? I've been toying with the idea of making sirupsnipper, but I'm not sure yet. I guess the next days will tell.

Happy Channuka!

Winter has come

Outside it is really, really windy, it is supposed to rain and the buildings here in Jerusalem are not well insulated. In fact - I have never been so cold indoors anywhere as I have been in Jerusalem. So I am so happy we have access to a great heating system (we have one which runs on gas) which we can turn on and off as we want (depending on the ratio between the level of the cold temperature and our willingness to pay the excessive gas bill for using it)!

But when we're both out of the house most of the day we don't keep it on, so over the summer I knit myself a shawl to keep me warm. It is so soft and warm, and not at all itchy - made from merino, alpaca and silk. Yum! I knitted it with the two strands of yarn - one was Drops Alpaca and one was KnitPicks Gloss Lace. This is my largest knitting project to date, and I am very pleased with the way it turned out. I used the pattern for the Levina shawl, but made some of my own changes, to make it just the way I wanted. The only thing I will be more careful about in the future is how to combine two different colours. Don't get me wrong - I like the way it turned out, but I do think the two different colours of the two yarns would have been nicer separately than when knitted together like this... Oh well, you live (knit) and learn.

Colourful everyday

So much for being vocal... My life has been full of wonderfully full of people coming to visit us since my last post - both planned and surprise visits. Truly amazing. But now comes a more calm season, I think. So for today - a little image from this wonderful city. I love walking through the city at this time of year during the day on a sunshine day. The sun really brings out the inherent beauty of this city. Even mundane things like laundry can become real jewels to the eye.

I really am here

But I have been feeling sort of blank. That is - I always think about things I would tell you. Lots of little anecdotes that would make this a living blog throughout my day and my week, but then at the end of it, when I sit down to tell them to you, my mind goes blank. Empty. White.

It is not unpleasant. For years I hated silence, because everytime there was nothing to fill my brain with, inevitably my brain would start coming with all these worrying thoughts about my future, my finances, my studies, my job going on and on and on until I could hear nothing else but worries and I would cry inside myself, feeling myself sinking deeper and deeper. These days if there is silence, I find myself in a good space inside my head - it is kind of like a nice summer day, not too hot, not too cold, just right, with the sun shining at you, not too strong, not too directly, but just right. It doesn't mean that I don't think about stuff, it just means that there is space to be quiet, and I've been enjoying it.

But, there are many things that I would like to share. And that does not happen if I just keep this page blank, like my page. And it is not as if the thoughts I have in my head, before it goes blank and white, couldn't be translated into words on this page. So here goes - I am really here. I am back.