Home again

 Garry made it back to Winnipeg on time with his suitcase and backpack- although he lost his tablet somewhere along the way. I picked him up at the airport with a bag of Popeye's spicy chicken and we were at the cabin two hours later. 

After 30 hours of plane travel, he was pretty tired, but he watched the Blue Jays and stayed up until bedtime. He woke up before 4 am, so 12 hours later, he is now napping. However he was putting the docks down at 6 am and has been out fishing (but not catching) already. The lake did melt before he returned! Hopefully he's over jetlag and staying in this time zone soon. 

Leaving Ukraine

 Wedding I found a couple more videos from our friends and staff in the village, just click on the orange words to see them (a new window will open). This first one is from yesterday's wedding ceremony, and if you use translate, you may get a little choked up like I did. Here's the translation- Yesterday, 28.04.2026 a new family was formed in our charity project. Andrew and Valentina do not know their own parents, family and shelter for them became the home of Harry and Teresa Verhug (our founders), who became father and mother to all participants of our project in the village of Nikolai-Pole. The wedding took place the day before Gary left back to Canada, now he's on his way. Andrew and Valentina are glad Gary was able to attend this celebration!

 I sent a crocheted wedding gift for them. Garry said it did make Valentina laugh, two peas in a pod in wedding outfits. She has a great laugh.

If you click on this one, it's another farmer Garry facebook post, you can see Garry during Saturday's tour. If you're on Facebook you can follow them, their posts are about the cheese, and celebrations. Tour

Saturday morning, Garry sent these photos, you may have seen that six people died in an apartment building in Dnipro, the fuel depot was hit also, and he could see smoke driving down the highway. I've gotten better at not worrying when he goes, I know the village is safer than the cities, and he's mostly in the village. 

Garry is safely back in Moldova (no van problems, hurrah!) for his and Daryl's flights early tomorrow (Thursday) morning. That's tonight here, since they are eight hours ahead of us in Manitoba. He's scheduled to land in Winnipeg at 5:30, just in time for supper.  Here's a photo of the pile of trusses, he plans to go back in the fall to help build the shed.

Busy Tuesday

 

Yesterday Garry was not feeling well. He said that he did preg check some cows with the ultrasound machine. He has been teaching Max to do it so he can check cows when Garry is gone. However, Garry went to bed in the afternoon and was feeling pretty sick when I called Monday night. I was glad to hear he was a lot better in the morning. 

Tuesday  dawned sunny but was mostly cloudy with a high of 12 Celsius.

They were hoping to plant corn Monday, but Sunday's rain delayed it again. They did get the pre-plant spraying and cultivating done today (Tuesday) but decided it was still too wet to plant when they tried one pass around the field. So they will plant tomorrow while Garry is enroute to Moldova for his flight Thursday morning. 

 

Today was the big day, Andrey is home from the army and he and Valentina got married! They have two kids, so I guess you could say it was a long time coming. They went into Zaporosia for their appointment at the official government wedding palace. 

They had a wedding party back in the village. Garry said Alona cooked a big dinner with roast pork and potatoes and salad.

Here's a few more wedding photos

Andrey will try to get a compassionate release from the army because his son Nazar is disabled and needs extra care. Angelika will start school in September, she is very normal. 

Garry finished packing his suitcase and will get a ride at 6 am to meet Adam and Daryl in Kirviy Rig for the drive to Moldova. I'm thanking God that he's feeling better for the trip home, he is supposed to land in Winnipeg at 5:30 Thursday evening. 

Weekend

 

selfie time on the farm

One of the things they do is give farm tours, with information about farming, and cheesemaking with photo ops and snacks (for a small fee) to schools and other groups. 

That's Margo stirring the pot of cheese in the cheese house.

Bagging up cottage cheese

Oleg with some samples after a tour, served under the porch at his house.

There were a couple tours this week, including one on Saturday from the Reimer Center (where Garry did the English talk) and Garry sent photos.

Garry said they ate hot dogs after the tour.

He also said they finished all the trusses now. 

Sunday he went to church in the village, and in the afternoon, took our young ladies and kids to Dnepro for an excursion but you'll have to wait for those photos, because I don't have them yet.

Garry had the same problem with the van not starting as before- when he was trying to go home with the girls, Max drove to the city to help and they finally figured out the solution- there are two keys on the ring that fit in the ignition, but only the chipped one starts the van.  Garry also went to pick up some fresh parsley and dill for tomorrow's cheesemaking. 

It was the alternator that was the problem when Adam was driving it last week, both vans are now fixed and they traded vehicles back on Saturday. Daryl and Adam were back in the city for Sunday again. On Wednesday they will be heading back to Moldova for Garry and Daryl to fly home on Thursday. 

Finished Building?

 Turns out they didn't wait for more nails, just went through the rolls of bad nails to find the best ones and used those on Thursday. Garry said they had two trusses left to build when he left to go to Zaporosia to have dinner with our American friend Jessica.

 Apparently they have one and half trusses left to build, because they ran out of decent nails, but the new ones come on Saturday.

I talked to Garry when he was driving back to the village (it was eight pm there, when we usually talk). He had just dropped Jessica off at Max (O. from New Hope center) and Anya's dotsha, where she is staying. She doesn't have a car right now, she is supposed to get her repaired vehicle back, but she has to take the train to where it broke down. Seems like everyone's car is breaking down!

He said it was sleeting when they gave him a tour of their garden, but it was raining when he was driving out of the city. He sent me this photo this morning.

Hopefully that doesn't hurt this summer's fruit harvest, they have been worried about a frost since he arrived in the village. Up to this point, they weren't affected.

Garry told me that Adam's van is fixed now and his is supposed to be back tomorrow, ready to go also.

Garry said Alona made cinnamon buns again this morning and they came out better than last time. They look a little snow covered, too. 

She wanted him to make pizza tonight, but he went to a birthday party for Max Rudei's daughter Vika, who's 11 now. Maybe tomorrow. 

Wednesday

 Garry had a good workday and everything went well. The nails are the right ones- the compressor worked great. He said it's been sitting around for years unused, and it works so much better than the new ones they buy that it's going to become a permanent part of the shop.  They finished eleven trusses today, he had lots of help for building and turning them over to finish the other side.

Only problem is they might have finished the rest tomorrow but they only have enough nails to do one or two more trusses, so they will have to order more and hope they are in for the weekend. He thinks there's enough lumber cut and he needs more glue for when the nails come, but he can pick that up at Nova Lena. He was enjoying these cookies and some other things Alona baked today when he called me.  I know where my cow cookie cutter is- still in Ukraine!

On Monday Garry said they were having the usual post-Easter slump in milk sales, so the ladies are making hard cheese to age as fast as they can.

When they put in the new milk cooler at the barn, the old one was moved into an addition built on the cheese room, and both tanks were pretty full on Monday. that's 6000 litres.

We always had people buying milk like crazy the week before Easter for making paska bread, and then no one has money to buy milk after the holiday.

If you are wondering, by this time next week Garry will be flying out of Moldova (

Thursday morning). 

Monday\Tuesday musings (moo-oosings)

 In case you've never noticed, yes, I made a cute title for this blog all those years ago. Garry had a good day to take photos, because he sent me more than any day since his first whole day in the village. His new nails won't arrive until Tuesday, so he cut the rest of the boards he didn't finish on Friday. 

Daryl and Adam ended up driving Garry's van back to Kirvoy because Adam's van needed more work done after the first repair was finished on Monday. Or almost back to Kirvoy because they broke down just before getting to the city. They thought it might be the alternator, but I haven't heard how it's going, other than they are repairing each other's van.

Garry got the flat tire on the brown (old mission car) repaired on Monday at the Shinomontage - one the first places we learned the name of when we moved to Ukraine. He said there was a hole in the sidewall and in Canada we'd buy a new tire, but they patched it in 15 minutes. Cost -about 20 dollars.

On Monday they were making sure the planter was ready to start planting corn on Tuesday, but they didn't plant Tuesday and won't on Wednesday because they got an inch of rain! Rain is always good in Ukraine and this is the first "real rain" like Garry's been hoping for. He said all the drizzle rain days you could kick the dirt and there was dust underneath but now there's mud. 

So Tuesday they got the new nails and they are the right ones this time, but they were trying to get a better (higher) amount of air pressure to run the nailer so that the nails go all the way into the wood. Here's some photos of the three phase compressor they are working on to get the job done. With the wet weather, Garry's hoping to have lots of help building trusses tomorrow.