Friday, November 16, 2007 – My 55th Birthday and 6th in UkraineI just went back and read what my journal said over the last 2 years. 2 years ago I went to the village as I did this afternoon. This time I made 6 dozen chocolate chip cookies and took about 20 about with me. We had our 4 regular 11th grade girls and 2 of our younger kids came and we shared juice and cookies first and then had a study with the older girls – our last part of our study on the Plan of Salvation. It is so hard to have this kind of study with groups because it is so important to be able to ask the person that you are studying with if they are understanding, what they are thinking, etc. at times like this. However, both Oksana and I felt that the study went well. I came home and had about an hour before my birthday party was to start. We had 30 people come and the brought 4 cakes and many other candies and sweets besides my cookies and donuts that I made yesterday. We played games, ate, opened many wonderful presents and had a wonderful time over all!
Saturday, November 17We had 2 for our Univ. Bible Club and 5 for our Teen Bible Club. There were 17 (I actually counted today!) at the Church Discussion at 4. Our questions today centered around the church and the Kingdom of God being one and the same.
Sunday, November 18I woke up ill this morning about 3:30am with a stomach flu and all the yuck that goes with it. I didn’t go to services, but our young people came and got money from me, bought all the needed stuff and made the sandwiches and took care of me through the day. I also didn’t go to evening services tonight.
Monday, November 19I am better today, but am still very weak and achy. I stayed in and in bed as much as possible all day and we didn’t go to the orphan’s home family for our study tonight. They and us were very disappointed!
Tuesday, November 20
I am getting back on my feet again and had planned to go to the village for our studies out there today, but Oksana had conflicts at her Univ. and couldn’t go, so we didn’t go. I stayed in and studied most of the day. I was supposed to have a 6th grade class at School 11 this morning, but no one came. At our Devo at 6pm, we had 11 come for our singing and Bible study. Afterwards, Kelli and I were invited to go to a private English teacher’s classes (I have gone there several times) to talk to her class conversation style. These were 6th through 8th grade kids – 5 of them. We left there about 9:30pm.
Wednesday, November 21
Today was shopping day for the Thanksgiving Dinner I will prepare for between 25 – 30 people on Friday. I bought 2 turkeys at the market and other things as well. Then I went to our big shopping store and bought the rest, spending about $100 in all for this meal. I also pealed, cleaned, chopped and cooked my pumpkin in preparation for making my pies on Friday morning. At 1:30, we had 10 5th graders at School 11 for a good and fun class! At 6pm, we moved our English Club from the Palace of Culture to my house and we had 9 for our English Club and several of our regulars weren’t able to come – so we had some new people present. The Club was from 6-8pm.
Thursday, November 22 – Happy Thanksgiving!
A Holiday – vacation! I talked to 3 of my kids and my brother and 2 of my sisters this morning and their families and that was fun!!! I did try to make sure that I got most things done before and no cooking today – that’s all tomorrow as we celebrate on Friday night. Kelli had discovered a new restaurant that she said was excellent, so met there about 1pm and ate Thanksgiving Dinner together. This very elegant restaurant and we were the only ones in it! I have no idea how restaurants can continue to exist as so few people go out to eat on a regular basis here in Kremenchuk. That was about the most eventful things that took place today! In the evening I followed the Green Bay Packers beat the Detroit Lions on the Internet! I didn’t watch it, but followed the play by play. Better than nothing! Wow! The Pack and the Cowboys (my 2 favorite teams) are both 10-1 and play each other next Thursday! Who am I going to cheer for? Hmmmmmm as a good friend of mine says! That’s a tough one!
Friday, November 23The cooking started in earnest at about 7am when I started cooking 4 pumpkin pies from scratch, including the crusts! I do say, I cook a pretty tasty and flaky crust! These were big pies – each 1 ½ times the regular recipe size because my pie pans are so big. While the first of these were cooking, about 9:30am, I went and picked up Zhenya who came and helped me tremendously throughout the day. She said I don’t want to get in the way of your cooking, so I will keep all your dishes washed up and she did a great job! She also helped with several other cooking things, too! Then I made crescent rolls – about 60+ of them. Then we made dressing/stuffing for the first turkey. I cleaned it and prepared it and chopped onions while Zhenya prepared the bread. The first Turkey went into the oven about 1:30 and the 2nd about 3:30. Oksana was also over for awhile this afternoon and help to clean and cut up potatoes for mashed potatoes. I got real tired around 4 and took a short nap (I did get up at 4:30 this morning). My back was really hurting too. This was a lot of cooking energy and stress that I wasn’t used to doing! By 5:30, everything was pretty much done, except cooking the potatoes. Others had come and helped to set the tables, cook the potatoes – Yulya helped to get these finished up. About 6:30 we were ready to set down to eat and only 15 people were here. Everybody brought something like sweets, cookies, salads. We also had black olives to eat – my favorite treat for the holidays. But by 7 we had 29 here! So a lot of late comers and we had enough food plus extra for everyone! About 8pm, we served the pumpkin pie with whipped topping – the spray on variety. Then we cleared the tables away, played some games, and cleaned up. The last person left at 10:10pm. Great evening!
Saturday, November 24Ups and downs of life. We had 1 person come for the Adult/Univ. Bible Club and 1 person came for the Teen Club. In between, we had 9 of us for the Church discussion time. Also at about 3pm, Artem and Ksusha came over and we had tea and a nice visit. They are both working so many very long hours, we hardly ever see them anymore. Life is hard for Ksusha and her mother. Her mother has a 2nd hand store, but it probably makes very little. Ksusha is working as a server in a pizza place, working 14 hour days and making less that 2 Grievnas (40 cents) an hour. She is having to use this money to help her mother pay for things and for her Univ. studies as well. Very hard!
Sunday, November 25After worship Kelli needed help with several errands she needed doing and so I helped her out, with Yura’s help too. I spent part of the afternoon working on my evening lesson. We had 11 for evening worship service.
Monday, November 26It is just a week until I leave for the States and Jenise’s graduation on Dec. 15th. I have tons of stuff to get done, including working on my Newsletter to send to the US as well as my local newsletter, with a special edition honoring Kelli. On Dec. 16th, I will have the opportunity to have a Christmas celebration with all of my children together for the first time in a very long time!!! It will be great! I return to Ukraine on the 28th in time for the New Year Celebration and for our Christmas party on Ukrainian Christmas day of January 7th. In the evening 4 of us went and spent the evening with the Orphan family and had a good Bible Study with them. We found out that the Dad – Victor – his Dad is also dieing of cancer in another city and so he is still under a lot of stress.
Tuesday, November 27 – Kelli H.’s Birthday
I continued working on both newsletters, besides going to the village for our class with 5th – 7th grades. We had 14 today. Then we had 10 for singing and devotional study at 6pm.
Wednesday, November 28
I worked all morning on those newsletters, finishing both of them up. We are also working on a picture calendar and other things for celebration with Olya on Saturday and then her going away “party” on Sunday night. It is so hard to see her go! Today at 1:30 we had 7 5th graders for a class that was lots of fun! What a nice group of kids! We also found out some tragic news! The Director of this school, for as long as I have been coming and living in Ukraine, is going to be leaving this position December 3rd! She has been such a strong, strong supporter of us and our work, I just don’t know what we are going to do!!!! I tried to see her, but she was not in, supposedly “sick”. I would be sick too, I guess! There is no telling what this is going to mean to our work at the schools! At 2:30, I spent the next 1 ½ hours helping Kelli with trying to get things shipped back to the US and finally it was decided that the cheapest way is for her to take it by plane – still it is $100 for each container of 30 Kilograms! Wow! Then at 4 I hurried home to do some straightening up of my place and preparing for our English Club at 6. We had 6 people come and it was good. I invited them all to the upcoming holiday parties that we will have and they sounded like they would like to come! By the time everyone left, I was pretty wiped out!
Thursday, November 29 – Olya’s 18th BirthdayToday was a crazy day of errands, study and preparations for this weekend and for leaving to go to the US. We (I am traveling back to New York with Kelli and then on to TX by myself for Jenise graduation) will leave on Monday to Kiev and then on Tuesday to Fly out, arriving in San Angelo, TX on Wed., the 5th. I will arrive back in Ukraine on the 28th of Dec. There probably won’t be much of a Journal for Dec. because of my travels, even though I will try to give a brief account. Some may not believe that I can do a brief account!
Friday, November 30There is always so much to do to get ready for a trip! Things to buy, things to prepare for and not leave behind undone. I was already to go to the village for our study with our 4 11th grade girls, when they called and said that they couldn’t meet with us today just before I left. So that was a bit discouraging. Then at 5:30 Kelli called and said that Marina, the young mother of 9 month old Anya, wanted to be baptized! I studied with her before her pregnancy and now Kelli has been studying with her for the last 3 months or so. So we began to make preparations to take her to the Church building and baptize her into Christ! And about 9pm, we welcomed her into the family of God through her faith, obedience and baptism into Christ!!! Marina is our 4th new Christian this year and our 39th addition to the family! Please pray for her and her family! Her brother-in-law, Sasha, was the first to bring her to Bible Studies and Church. Many people have been involved in teaching her about Jesus. About 2 weeks ago, she told us how thankful she was that Sasha had brought her to us! We feel the same way!
Saturday, December 1 – Sasha R. Birthday (preacher in Komsomolsk)I am going to go ahead and include this in here, too! I woke up at 3:15 this morning! Saturday morning saw a lot more errands and getting ready for a long day. At noon we celebrated Sasha’s birthday with the Bible Club and 5 of us. Then in the afternoon from 2 to 4, I worked on packing, and preparing for Kelli and Olya’s Birthday party at 7 after evening Bible Club. At 4 I went to the Church Discussion and there were 9 of us there, but no translator so I stayed only about ½ an hour for the singing and Tea, but was unable to understand enough to stay for the discussion and left at 4:30. I came home and tried to take a nap – useless! 2 phone calls and 2 people coming to the door – nap didn’t work! Bible Club at 6 saw 9 people present for the class and that was good. Then at 7, people continued to gather for the Birthday party and that was just a lot of fun with 28 people here to celebrate that. The last people left after 10pm. I am very thankful we had this fun and light time as we prepared for Kelli’s good bye tomorrow, which is going to be hard and trying for everyone! She has become such a strength and anchor here, it will be so hard to have her go! To say the least, I was pretty tired at the end of this day.
