The long trip home... to be continued....now updated

Today our friends are away, but Victor brought Doreen out with him for the day anyway (she has been in Dnepropetroesk for the last week since leaving Kramatorsk - what a way to end your career in missions -to evacuate a week before you planned to retire.) She says she finds it relaxing out here on the farm with us. This morning she enjoyed talking with Maria, who has been here this week, working and enjoying our Easter egg hunt on Tuesday (the grass was finally dry enough.)

Today it was finally dry enough to try to plant some more corn - the 10 acres they planted on Friday has two roots already- if you wonder how I know that, Garry digs some up to look until it comes up so he can count leaves to see how it is growing - Garry went out with the guys before 8 am to change the depth that the seed would be placed, shallower since the ground was still pretty wet. He came back before 10 am, but then Max phoned and he drove back to the field to see what was going on. He stayed out until there was a sudden downpour at 1 pm, just as I was dishing up dinner to go out to the field- hamburgers, potatoes, gravy, pepper slices, and deviled eggs (the last of the dyed eggs) and bread. Maria and Doreen had walked to the store for the bread just before the rain hit (there was even thunder) but they said they didn't get wet because they were in the store when the rain came down. It turned out everyone but the guys working in the new barn were in the house for lunch, after I had filled the disposable bowls.  Andrey drove their lunch over on the scooter, but I forget to include forks, so they found a spoon in the barn and shared it!

Doreen gets a photo of the calf in the van

After a quick lunch, Garry went to the barn to load up a month old bull calf - one of the 75% Holstein calves. It was a little later than planned yesterday, but he and Maria headed off with it to an orphanage about two hours away. They had visited the orphanage with a man from Zaporosia a couple of months ago, and Garry had been asked how they could improve their cows. That's right, this orphanage has a herd of 25-30 cows and they feed the milk produced by their herd to the children. Garry had said that if they could get some Holstein blood in their cows the offspring would give more milk, so they decided to trade calves - one of theirs for one of our 75% percent Holstein bulls. However, Garry decided it would be easier to just take a calf one way, so it turned into a donation.

 I talked to him a couple hours ago and they had just unloaded the calf and were going to the office to sign some paperwork to say it was a donation. He was still hoping to make it home in time for us to go to the Bible study in Zaporosia.

Just before six, he called to say we would not make it there, because the car had broken down in Melitopol. He said the battery light had come on, so he had turned off the lights (you have to have them on when driving or the police will stop you and threaten to ticket you Garry is constantly forgetting to turn then on) but it eventually stopped. He and Maria were walking to the bus station in  Melitopol   Vasillivka  to get a marshutka back this way when he phoned.

Hopefully he will get home tonight....
it is a really nice looking bull calf, though!

They made it back at 8:20 as it was getting dark, they walked fast from the highway where the bus stopped to the house, no cars came past on the road into the village until they were almost there, so they did not get a ride....  but they are safely home. He will return to get the car tomorrow, hopefully.