Day 12 - Mothers Day - Mother Sites

Mary and Elisabeth - Honoring Two Great Mothers on Mother's Day

An adorable statue of Mary and Elisabeth meeting when they were both pregnant. It's Amy's favorite statue in the Holy Land.  I think it's mine too.  I love it.

"And it came to pass, that, when Elisabeth heard the salutation of Mary, hte babe leaped within her womb; and Elisabeth was filled with the Holy Ghost:  And she spake out with a loud voice, and said, Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb" (Luke 1:41-42).

That statue is outside the Church of the Visitation.

 There are beautiful paintings depicting Mary and Elisabeth inside the church.

Doesn't this painting make your heart ache? 

This is believed to be the cave where Elisabeth

This is believed to be the stone Elisabeth and John the Baptist hid behind to escape Herod killing the baby boys.

Shepherd's Field Where Angels Announced Mary's Birth to Jesus

I'm sitting in the spot where Amy's Jerusalem ward (branch) came on Christmas Eve to celebrate the angels coming to the shephers and announcing Christ's birth.  They sang Christmas songs together.  I bet it was wonderful for the whole branch.  Look how rocky it is. 

There are many hills overlooking Bethlehem, and we are standing on one of them.  This is Bethlehem in the distance.

I assume there were olive trees on these hills back then too.

A very hot and tired Joni and Jackson sharing a hug.

Joni and I were very tough, we thought.  We were the only ones in our group who didn't have long pants and shoes for the hike to shepherd's field.  We got a few pokes and scratches. I had to take a photo of this spiny weed.  Ouch.

This was by far the hottest Mother's Day I've ever had.  It felt like over 100 degrees, but it was in the 90's.  We had borrowed Amy's nice friend's van, but it had no air conditioning, and the back windows didn't open, so it was like an oven in there.  We enjoyed a big, cold drink and some really orange, cheesy Cheeto things (a real treat!) for the drive home.  It's a good thing, because we got pretty lost for quite a while.  But Amy stayed calm, cool, and collected.  She's awesome. 

 

After the burning hot, long drive being lost, Amy needed one item at a store.  We all wanted to go in to get cooled off.  Thank heaven for air conditioning!  We stayed a nice long time, meandering the isles.  This is the store that has the most American foods but it's across town so this may be Amy's last chance to shop here before she leaves in six weeks, so she stocked up on a few things.  We were all cooled off by the time we headed out again. How fitting to go grocery shopping on Mother's Day.  That's what mothers do all the time.

 

Sweet little Joni fell asleep in the back bench of the van on the way home.  Ouch. Where's the chiropractor when you need one? Her rosy cheeks are a mixture of heat and Cheetos.

Update from five years later: Tom treated us to a wonderful Mother's Day when we got home. He made a platter of nachos for us and bought us Dove ice cream bars if I remember right. It was so sweet!