Almost there

 Well, Daryl and Garry met in Toronto as scheduled and found most of Jack's crew before they flew into Moldova. The person I didn't realize was coming, Craig,  had flown into Chisinau earlier in the afternoon. He had spotted their driver that was going to take them to the border with a sign the said GERRY.

After a short delay, with two of their suitcases not making the flight, they decided to go ahead and leave instead of getting a hotel and seeing if Jack and Hannah's bags would arrive at midnight. Max and Adam were getting close to the border, but they would have to wait a while before seeing them. They sent a photo around the time the plane landed.

The border was closed when the got there, apparently Hannah played violin while they were waiting. I don't know what else she had in her backpack, but I think her stuff and Jack's including his work boots were in the missing bags.  They had to walk through the border with the suitcases, to meet up with Adam and Max in their vans..

 Five hours later I found out they were two hours from Kirvoy Rog, so about four more hours to the village. That was about 9:30 pm here in Manitoba, so getting to be sunrise soon in Ukraine. I'm sure they will post photos I can show you tomorrow. 

 

One day

 In about 27 hours I'll be dropping Garry off at the airport in Winnipeg. This morning he's finding additional things for the farm in Ukraine. The parts they needed for the tractor hitch and skid steer were too heavy for one checked bag, so he has to pay for a second one, so new inflations for the milkers and breeding supplies are going in bag two now. 

I did find my old suitcase with all four wheels, so that's a start. I just decided there seems to be one more person in Jack's team than I thought. Hopefully this all works. I'll let you know as I find out here at home, as he travels.. 

One week

 This time next week, Garry will be getting close to the village, Max and Adam will meet our group at the Moldovan border crossing. They will get a ride from the airport to there via hired van, it will be late afternoon and we'll see how far the are able to drive that night. They may stay in Kirvoy Rog, where Adam lives and Daryl will stay, it's about two more hours to the village. 

For now we are trying to figure out packing his suitcases, or suitcases, as he has a 24.5 pound part to go to Ukraine. We had a nice family Thanksgiving on Monday.

AS you can see, Garry has not had a haircut since he was in Ukraine in March. It's really bothering him, but he's sticking with the only in Ukraine thing. 

Packing

 Garry has been helping the boys with harvest here, they are now finished except for combining corn. Garry leaves for Ukraine in ten days, so we're starting to pack his suitcase. I'm still waiting to see the biggest item he's bringing Max, an axle for the skidsteer, before deciding how many other things are going to make it to the village this time. 

The first part of the trip- until the 31st- he'll be joined by Jack's BC team, so keep them in your prayers. This year, Jack will be joined by Phil, for the third time as cook, Jeremy and his bride Rachel, and the other new team members, Clay, Harm and Hannah. They will travel in with Daryl Porter.  Garry will return with him next month. Daryl is going to visit pastors and do some short English outreach weeks like our Summer English Institutes we used to have in Dnipro.

Max and the guys were busy planting winter wheat when Garry talked to him last week, they had gotten a good amount of rain. They have even sold some wheat, that will be going to the port at Reni for export, the price is better than it was, but they have to pay for transport, and the price of diesel is high in Ukraine, like everywhere.

I'll try to update the blog as often as I can starting October 20th, when Garry flies out of Winnipeg at noon. 

Summer's over

It's not the best excuse, but we've had an enjoyable summer. Garry's dad came out from Ontario in July for two weeks of fishing. Of course, Garry has been out on the lake most of the summer. I flew to PEI for a week with our daughter and granddaughter, keeping up our book theme with Anne of Green Gables this year. 

 In June we flew out to BC for Jeremy's wedding to his bride Rachel. That's us in the photo at the reception after the rainstorm. We (and you through the blog) know Jeremy from his many trips to Ukraine with Jack, he does all the electrical work. 

 For you west coast people, Garry is visiting Jack right now in Salmon Arm and will be at Broadview Church on Sunday September 13th! Victor Dantsev will be there too, I believe for a little Ukraine reunion Saturday evening. Jack is putting together another building team to go to village with Garry, he's leaving here October 20th and traveling with Daryl Porter to stay a month is Ukraine. Jack's guys are staying a week I think.

They plan to build another livestock shed like last year, you might remember Garry built the trusses when he was there in the spring. They were planning to work on the new bakery building, but Max tells us that the student builders have nearly finished it. However, there are  some much needed repairs to be made in the apartments that were part of the classroom renovation in 2016. Apparently, ten years have been hard on some parts of the building. 

This year, there were good crops, because they had rain, but aren't able to sell wheat, so they have lots in storage on the farm, even if they can find a buyer to sell it to, the price is about a third of world price, because everyone has lots to sell. There are disruptions in the ability to export to foreign markets because of Russian bombing. Gas and diesel are expensive, pretty much as much as here. The corn silage was made in August, they hired the same custom operator as last year. 

 

The first day on school was September first, like every year, and little Angelika, Valentina's daughter had her first first day of school. I hear that she is really enjoying it, and here's a photo from that day. This year the village school closed and the children are going to a larger nearby village for school.

Update

 

Things are going well in the village, the rain has fallen this year, and the crops are growing well, they have not had to buy a lot of irrigation water this year. Here's a facebook video of they crops a couple weeks ago and they look great. https://www.facebook.com/share/r/1BW6zePzu6/

The first cut of hay was a little late, because the weather was so wet, but they got more bales made first cut than they got all last summer, and are getting a similiar amount of second cut. Video from first cut.    https://www.facebook.com/share/r/1AKSsvNZV7/

Alona is working with the cheese now, one of the ladies from the village quit; so here she is bottling milk in the cheese house.  They are selling gift boxes of a variety of cheeses now, and are working on a building for some bakery equipment they were given. John Wiens always talked about a bakery in the village from the project and now there will be one.

; 

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.