Oh what a night...

We handed out shoes to the guys today at four pm, and at five I pushed them out the door, with shoes, hats and candy in hand. They asked for bags to put them in to carry home and thought it hilarious when I gave them small garbage bags off the roll to use. "New shoes in Mooser (garbage)!" they exclaimed. I needed to get the chicken in the oven for dinner quickly so we'd be on time.

by afternoon coffeetime we had ceiling and lights 

By six some rooms had plastic on the walls

 I lost track of how many we had for dinner tonight, there were 19 or 20, we didn't wait for Jeremy and Max to come to start, but had given out some of the extra chicken legs (there were 27 to start) and then as I was handing out seconds on dessert, in came two of the guy students. So they had mashed potatoes and buckwheat and bread with butter and leftover lunch dessert. Sasha didn't like buckwheat, even with the sauce from the chicken on, so Bear got a dish full too.

During dinner six more chicks pushed their way out of the shells, so I am sitting writing this between two boxes of peeping, one with ten hopping around it and one with more working their way out, all cheeping away. Not sure if Jack is sleeping tonight, he's just a door and a few feet behind me.

The young guys and a couple of students took off right after dinner to go with Max to Zaporosia for some more plywood and syrofoam. They had an adventure shopping and riding back in the Mercedes with 7 people and  14 (no, 25 they told me) sheets of plywood and  20  (40) of Styrofoam. I think they have photos on their phones.

It turned out that Doug. Marcie and I had the bigger adventure when we went to Masha's birthday party at Luda's. Student Masha had invited all of us for six pm, but we thought it would be too many people, and the guys were still building then, so the three of us left after she helped with most of the dinner cleanup done. ( i seem to do no cleaning this week). Doug drove because I hate  trying to back down the driveway. Marcie had a hat she'd crocheted  and wanted to give it to Masha for a birthday present. Since they weren't sure which house it was I said I'd come along.

We also were going to bring the batteries and chargers to the shop to plug in. First Doug backed all the way down the driveway and then remembered he'd forgotten the batteries, so he drove back up, got them and backed down again. Marcie commented that the noise we'd heard when I drove to Dnepro when turning and shifting- but only sometimes- was louder.
We stopped at the shop and Doug unlocked the door with the key attached to the car keys. We carried in the chargers and batteries and then he realized they couldn't charge them until morning so we left them and re-locked the shop door. We commented on how cool it was out, but we weren't walking so it would be fine.

Of course when we got there, parked and moved past the dog at the house (the new one doesn't know me) our plan to not stay long didn't happen. Masha and Luda insisted we come into the kitchen for something to eat, so we said for ten minutes.  Everyone else at the party (most of the senior students and the girls from the other house) who had been playing games,  came in for the cake and beautiful apple roses Luda  makes; while we had to try the potatoes, broderbrot (open faced sandwiches) and salads, even though we'd just finished dinner. Then Doug took a pile of photos of different student groups.

Luda and her girls, old and new.. and photobombing Kolya

 As we were trying to leave, maybe twenty minutes later, one of the kids came in and said in English that the car was on fire. It was.

We didn't quite know what to do. I phoned Garry, but I had to try a couple times, I had no bars on the phone. It was obvious to us that the car would be a write off, but we were worried about an explosion or it spreading.  Then Vova, from the guys house ran in the gate and yelled to get buckets of water, so some of the guys and Masha the birthday girl and Doug flung water on the front of the car. They did get it out, somehow, smoke was billowing and the neighbors came out to look and talk.

They even got the documents, the jack (which Doug carried) and little air-pump (I carried) out of the back of the car. It was a long ( 2 kms?) and rather cold ( around freezing) walk home in our sweatshirts, but we had company-the students who asked for and ride home before.

Eventually the car was towed home and into the driveway, see? I have no idea if the car insurance covers fire. (It seems the answer is no)

Well its almost one am, I'm going to bed. Everyone else was there two hours ago. Except the chicks.