What's Up Lately

It's been far too long since I posted anything but it's been a little....boring around here!! September the kids all go back to school and the entire month, if not two months following are a complete wash! September in particular was really slow - it was the perfect time for Steve's Mom and sister to visit and for us to take a little break in Spain and Budapest.

Now that it's October things are picking up again:

 - Steve has made connections with a new school. School 71 which is fairly close to us. He went a few times with other people and then met with the director and some teachers and after the school break this next week they want him to start helping with English.

- Dezmond is back in "kindergarten", or what we would call preschool. It is VERY different from the last preschool year - he is in a classroom with desks, textbooks, new teachers and an earlier schedule (from 9-12 in the morning now instead of 10-1). This is supposed to be preparation for real school next year and it's all very serious.

- Supper club has started again. We are no longer involved as leadership, we are more like helpers now - the leadership responsibility was given to one girl who is employed by New Hope Center and is one of the girls house parents. If you can recall in late spring I wrote about being frustrated with how supper club was going because of problems we were having just among the leadership team so we are relieved and excited to just be able to show up, visit with the kids and not have to plan or run the evening. However the kids from the orphanage are no longer attending so it's a much smaller group once again, mostly just the kids who live in the group homes, so we'll see what happens.

- We continue to have Bible study at our home every Thursday evening. Garry and Teresa are the constants with a flow of other attendees from week to week. We've had up to 18 people squashed into our living room but more often it's four to six of us visiting over coffee and dessert, praising God and discussing His word.

- Our next #JustYouth event is happening next Saturday. We are doing a costume party and a penny carnival and we have some new volunteers to work with so with a bit of a larger event and more planning we're excited to have the help.

- It's the most wonderful time of the year!!! Visa renewal time!!! Ha ha obviously I'm kidding! I would say it's the worst, but it's really not that bad. This year my best friend forever Jessica isn't around to help out so I enlisted the help of our dear friend Olya. Jessica has all of these connections and was wonderful to pass them on to us, and it seems that as long as we mention her name, we get whatever we need from whoever we need it from! We ran around all week collecting paperwork and we had everything together Friday morning, ready to hand in but the lady said we were too late - she wasn't seeing any more foreigners that day. Oh dear! So now we wait all the way until Wednesday and then we hope and pray that they don't discover that we now need this document from that place, or a different date on this sheet of paper, or, or, OR. It's a run around but this year is the most calm I've ever felt dealing with this and it's probably because Olya was willing to do so much on her own! I just handed over what I had and she took care of the rest.

- Steve has been playing on a soccer team in the Christian Football League again this fall. I think they even WON a game so far!

- We booked our flights home! We will be home from December 15 until February 2nd. It feels like such a long time - spanning three months! But in reality it's merely seven weeks - one LESS week than our last time at home!

I think that about covers everything that's been up lately. Thank you for your continued support, prayerfully and financially. We feel that it is a great privilege to serve God by living here in Ukraine to share about Him and we couldn't accomplish that without each and every one of you!

Family Visit

On September 24 we traveled to Spain to meet Steve's Mom and sister there. They had planned on coming for a visit for over a year and finally the time arrived! They wanted to see a bit of Europe as well as Ukraine so we decided to show them our other home in Mijas. 

We ate our favourite chicken (it's seriously the best in the world!), we went to the beach on the Mediterranean, we went to Malaga and were taken around by really good friends of ours who were on staff while we were at G42, we climbed the mountain up to the church in Mijas, we had just a lovely time.

We spent four days with them in Spain and then we all traveled to Budapest for a few days. We chose Budapest because we discovered a great flight connection between there and Kiev! Good to know for the future too! We had never been to Budapest so it was exciting for all of us to see something new together. We did a lot of family selfies :)

We were astounded with how beautiful Budapest is! Definitely a must see city in my opinion!

The Great Market Hall:

We did a lot of walking and wandering - Steve and my favourite way to see a city! Just wander and see what you find and then do a few of the exciting touristy things along the way! We went into the labyrinth beneath Buda castle where Dracula (Vlad the Impaler) was held captive for 14 years. We went to the public baths (which we disliked) and we went on a cruise on the Danube at night and that was just amazing! Cold, but wonderful!!

This is the Parliament building lit up at night - those specks above it are all birds flying around, illuminated by the building.

We also spent a fair amount of time in McCafe.....

Over-looking the city:

Outside the parliament building:

After Budapest we brought Mom and Kara here to Zaporozhye. I think they were quite.....astonished....by the change in everything  - the transportation, the atmosphere, the language - once we arrived! We had a few hours in Kiev so we took them to see a few of the more momentous places - Maidan square where the revolution began almost two years ago, Pazatta Hatta which is THE Ukrainian restaurant to go to, ha ha. We went through a souvenir street market and saw some of the extravagant Ukrainian Orthodox churches before taking the afternoon train back to Zap. I have to say it was a little nerve wracking bringing them in the door of our home! We are so comfortable here after almost two years of living here but sometimes I look around with fresh North American eyes and I think yikes! This place is so....Ukrainian!! ha ha

We spent the week doing some of the more...."exciting".....things around Zaporozhye. We walked across the dam (which takes FOREVER because it's so big!), we walked down to the beach, we went to the BANYA (the Russian sauna!! Which is my personal favourite activity ALWAYS). We went Khortitza Island and did shashlik (Ukrainian BBQ over a fire), which happened to be a beautiful warm day so the boys went in the water:

The "forest" path from the marshrootka stop to the beach which is about a 20 minute walk.

We took them to the largest market in the city which is quite a sight to see and we also did normal, every day things like grocery shopping, and shopping at second hand stores.

We had an absolutely wonderful time with them and it was so much fun and meant so much to us to be able to show them a bit of our world. It's hard to describe every day living to people who have never experienced being here and it's wonderful (and kind of a relief in some ways!) to be able to share this place with people we love.