If I Had a Hammer...

Started working on the house last week. Right now we’re in tree cutting mode. When we left Jerusalem, we didn’t know we’d be doing this, so we didn’t bring the best tools for such an endeavor. It makes for a lot of work just to cut down a single tree. Then once you cut it down, it’s still a ton of work to shape the wood so it's usable for a house.

Luckily, I saw Nephi with some iron ore yesterday. I guess he got it out of the mountains where’s he’s been hanging out lately. I haven’t asked him what it’s for yet, but I’m guessing he’s going to be making some tools that will really save a lot of time here. Good thing we brought him.

Oh, and I LOVE it here. After 8 years in the desert, there’s so much great food here. Sam goes out early every morning and comes back with a bunch of fish by breakfast. The kids go out and find fruit. There are some new fruits here I’ve never seen before. Whenever we get something new, one of us eats it the first day, then if they don’t get sick (or worse) from the fruit, then we know it’s safe for us to all eat.

Each time Dad has insisted that he eat the fruit. He says he’s already old, and the family would probably do better without him anyway. That’s so not true, I’m just hoping we can count on his prophetic abilities to warn him before he eats something he shouldn’t. He’s not as physically strong as he once was, but he still is helpful to have around, and probably more so for leadership than for labor.

To everyone stuck back in Jerusalem (assuming you haven’t all been hauled off by the Babylonians yet), you guys need to come check out the place sometime. Don’t take 8 years to get here. That’s not fun. But if you ever get a chance to come down this way, go basically east from Nahom until you hit Irreantum.

Huntin', Gatherin', Ballin'

Sorry it’s been so long between posts again. I really just don’t feel like I have much to post. Ever since God put me in my place, I’ve just been trying to go along with things. Sometimes Nephi will say things that push my buttons, but I just calm down and remind myself that’s just how he is. Avoiding drama leaves me with no real juicy conversations to post.

Finding enough food and water every day is a lot of work, but it doesn’t make for particularly interesting writing either. So I don’t feel like I have much to write about. Then I thought, well, maybe I’ll at least share a picture. The picture below is looking back over a canyon we just traveled through. The family is to the bottom right, just outside the frame. I climbed up to the top so I could look beyond our current location and check out where we’re headed.

So not exactly what I’d call fertile, but not completely barren either. It’s tough living, but we’re living, and I think we have God to thank for that.

Arabian Arrow Massacre

Alright, I’m still ticked at Nephi, and still working on being able to forgive him, but I gotta give him some credit. He figured out how to make his own bow, string it, and and then he made an appropriate arrow. Dad used the director to figure out where he should go hunt, and Nephi made a killing up on the mountain this morning. He killed so many animals with a single arrow, Laman, Sam, and I had to go help him bring the carcasses down. Like I said before, he’s got a lot of good technical skills, just no social skills at all. I guess I need to focus more on his good qualities.

A slight exaggeration of Nephi's haul from this morning

Camp’s been busy this whole morning as we’ve been skinning and prepping the food. Dad has insisted that we don’t cook the food (my guess is the smoke would alert the gangs on the trading routes to our presence), so we’ve been eating it raw (ugh), but luckily no one has gotten sick. Or at least they haven’t got sick from eating raw meat anyway. Jael’s dad is real sick. I spent some time with him this morning, and I don’t know if he’s going to return to health even with all the meat we have. Jael tried to feed him a bit, but he couldn’t keep anything down. I think the exhaustion combined with starvation might’ve been too much for him at his age.

Jael's not talking about it much; she still thinks he's going to pull through, and I’m not sure what to say. It’s a rough way for her to start a new family—live in a tent, nearly starve while pregnant, probably lose your dad. She’s so great, and I love her so much. She really deserves a lot better than this. I have no idea how to help her through this time. I’m kind of new at this whole being an adult thing, and I want to do what I can for her, but I feel so limited.