Exciting Times - Rolling with the Punches

So much has been happening in the last few weeks! I set here looking at a blank page not knowing what to write about first. I decided I would just quickly make a list of everything that is going on and slowly work through that list creating an individual blog post for each thing.

1. We applied for a program called Bayit Rishon B'Moledet (First Home in the Homeland). This would allow our family to spend the first 6 months (and up to 1 year) focusing on Ulpan (Hebrew language learning). We were accepted into the program and are waiting to hear back about potential community placement.
2. We have decided that we really want to live in the Negev. We are now working directly with the GoSouth NBN team. They are helping us work through most of the logistics of such a large move including shipping, housing, employment, networking, etc.
3. We have narrowed our community search down to . . . wait for it . . . ONE community (check out this blog post to learn more)! We now have a top choice in where we would like to initially settle. This point is a little hazy since we have also applied with the Bayit Rishon program; however, both the community and the program director are working together and (G-d willing) we might be able to be placed into the community through the program itself. This would be AWESOME! Basically at this point we are just W-A-I-T-I-N-G to find out (1). 
4. I got a job! Employment unknowns - at least for me - may be not so unknown after all. I applied for a job with an Israeli company. They also have offices located in Canada, as well as the US. The awesome part is I work from home and can set my own hours. There is a minimum amount of time I have to fulfill, but after that they will give me as much work as I want. Since they are based in Israel, once we make the move I only have to transfer the position from the US to Israel and I can continue working as quickly as I would like. How awesome is this!!??
5. Just because - Here are some more pictures we took for another part of our application:

They had to be passport size and we needed to submit multiple copies. Eventually we will have to do this for everyone - as well as redue our own - for our official Israeli documents. But this is what we got the first time around. Not too bad.

(1) As a side note let me just say that it feels like there is a lot of WAITING! We rush to get forms filled our, submitted, and emails answered only to have to wait, and wait, and wait to hear back. I think this is pretty typical - and the wait is probably not as long as it feels - but it still is frustrating and difficult for me!