#JustYouth: September Park Party

We usually do an end of summer beach party for #JY but last year it rained and this year we decided to mix it up a bit and just play games in a park. 

We bought an enormous thick piece of plastic to play slippery hockey again - the last one was six meters by 4 meters and now this time we went 6 meters by 10 meters! 

We brought our cornhole and Caleb (left) showed all the newbies how to play:

Garry came with their crew from the village and brought their cornhole so that we could have two running at once:

Andre and Andy:

Floorball sticks have holes in the blade so it was discovered that with all the soap they made beautiful massive bubbles!

Unfortunately there were injuries this time. Andre and Phillipe both had huge gashes in their feet but we're still not sure how they happened because there were no rips in the tarp. They must have stepped on twigs when they went off the tarp to get the ball. Thankfully we have a first aid kit in our car and an Igor to play doctor:

As usual we sat down, handed out cookies and drinks and Steve shared a message with Alyona as translator:

We definitely drew a crowd - lots of people interested in the hockey and a few lurkers listening in to Steve's message which was cool. It also served as one last big party for Andy and Caleb to invite the people they met over the summer and say goodbye which is INSANE that the summer is over!

Our next #JY is our costume party/carnival so I'm already planning costumes and games for that! A lot of people have been asking about it, it's definitely a yearly favourite!

Day Trip

After playing baseball in Molochansk we took Andre (one of Steve's guys) and headed down to Kirillovka on the Azov Sea. The road from Molochansk to the main highway is HORRIBLE, as you can see this tree was blocking part of it at one point: 

Alas, we had our FIRST actual tire issue because of a bad highway! We hit one pothole really hard and I had my window open and it sounded pretty serious, ha ha. We stopped, filled it up with our electric pump, drove a little more to a gas station and decided that yep, it needed to be changed.

The boys and I wandered over to this sign (featuring the town name of Novo Bogdanivka) while the guys were getting the job done.

Andy (with the tire) was pretty ecstatic to be out in the sunshine doing some manual labour!

We stopped at another gas station to double check the spare and fill up gas a little further down the road and we're always looking for iced coffee but it's rarely available. This orange cold brewed coffee was the WORST thing I've ever tried, ha ha.

Our family and Andre spent a few hours at the water park while Caleb and Andy sat on the beach. 

We spent about an hour in the center touristy area of Kirillovka and found some slushy drinks!! We were really excited - it was the first time we had seen it in Ukraine and it was fabulous!

The busy busy beach:

The ride home was ridiculous because everyone was traveling to and from the sea and Ukrainian drivers are terrifying. We saw one near-miss that was SO near that Steve was already slamming on the brakes and veering off the road to avoid the aftermath and we were all practically screaming at the car in question because we were 100% certain that it was going to actually hit another car imminently. We're certain that it was only the Lord that prevented that crash and we're quite certain that we won't be taking any road trips again for a while!!

Baseball in Molochansk

Twice this summer we've played baseball with teenagers in Molochansk - the first time just Steve, Andy and Caleb went out there for a night and then the second time we all went. The baseball field always has some goats in it but none were harmed during the game, ha ha. 

We always have way more people interested in baseball in Molochansk than we do here in Zap - enough for a real game.

The first inning the sun was going down directly behind the pitcher's (Steve) head so no one could see to hit the ball!

We got a beautiful sunset and then it was much easier to play!

Andy pitching to Steve to wrap up the evening:

We usually stay with our friend Pasha's family but because there were so many of us this summer we just stayed in the church. They have a meeting room type area and air mattresses and a full kitchen that we can use.