Thinking

 Trying to get clothes and things ready to pack for Garry's trip to Poland next week. He's been busy on tractors helping the boys to get the corn planted before it rains again. I've been doing some babysitting of grandkids and trying to get the house back together post reno. There's still a lot of pictures to rehang. Our couches will arrive before Garry flies out. It's supposed to rain this weekend so he should be able to finish the flooring in the guest room. Hopefully the chicken coop gets built too. 

There's a little more to do repairing the drywall and getting the decorative beams finished.

On May 25th four cruise missiles went toward Zaporozhye, one was shot down, and one building hit was pictured all over my Facebook page. Over the last three months, I've looked at many photos of destruction and wondered if I'd been near that place. This time the mall (yes, mall) looked very familiar. It's right on the main street of the city. Garry and I had often eaten at the food court on the fifth floor, riding up the elevator you see in the center of the photo. Sometimes the escalator, but they were set up so you had to walk around each floor to get to the next one up or down. For several years there was a kiosk up there that had spicy chicken sandwiches, long before KFC came to Ukraine. There was a movie theatre and a wonderful shop that sold fancy chocolate candies, too. 

The city, like Dnipro, has been relatively safe, although the Russian army isn't that far away. 

 

Now a photo from Ukraine to make you smile, Leila posted this photo to Facebook that made us smile. She loves her stuffed dog Muktar (he's named after her favourite television show about a German shepherd police dog). This is Muktar the second, the first one was often over the years washed in our washing machine and hung by his ears to dry on the clothesline. Muktar is a great help when Leila is stressed, she can hurt herself at times when she's upset. She really likes to make sure he's clean. 

Garry is going

 To Poland. Next Wednesday. For a month. 

We don't have a lot of details, but a church in Poland, closer to Germany and the Baltic sea than Ukraine is looking for help dealing with aiding refugees from Ukraine. Speaking russian is an asset and EFCCM thought of us. So three weeks after we heard about it, maybe less, and he's got a plane ticket. 

He's going to be there a month, and then go to Pennsylvania for his family reunion. Afterwards we could go for the rest of summer if Garry feels like this is the mission calling him. We know they've found us an apartment and they have some kind of three days a week thing for refugees. 

This next month I'm going to get some loose ends tied up and chick sit as Garry put eggs in an incubator last week. Hopefully he gets his last reno projects finished up before he leaves.

It's time to make hay (in Ukraine)

 This week the guys are baling hay! The sunflowers are up, the corn is about four inches high, the wheat looks good, it's been fertilized and sprayed- I've seen video footage from Nikolaipolia. No one is sure what will happen when the wheat is harvested with no good way to get it out of the country, selling it may not be an option, It's a good thing we built another shed that it could be stored in last year, so it won't spoil, even if it can't be sold this year. It also good they have milk to sell so there is some farm income. Right now they are buying and bagging up brewers grains to feed the cows, since companies are making beer and Kavas again.

Our village remains a safe place, although gas and diesel fuel are in short supply in Ukraine right now, they are a little worried that the milk buyers may start to have trouble getting to the farm to pick up milk, we have two guys who come in vans from Dnepro. So they are looking into getting some more things to make cheese, like a bigger milk separator, in case they can't sell milk some days, the cheese room house will get used yet!

The milk truck comes a couple times a week, but wants to get 4,000 litres at a time and our refrigerated tank only holds three thousand! When it was cold, they were putting some in plastic vats so they had more to sell, but now that it's getting hot, they are trying to buy a larger milk tank, which has some logistical problems with the country at war, as you might imagine.

Garry gets reports from the village all the time. He had another video call with the staff from the village last week Thursday (about the time he was finally feeling better, he had a bad cold for more than a week). The most exciting news was that Yana's sister and her two girls have joined her in Nikolaipolia. They were in Yana's home village near Molachansk, which was taken over by the Russians early in the war. Her mother was too afraid to try leaving, having heard the stories about people being shot at in cars, but Natasha hired a taxi and they drove out on the roads through the fields and made it safely. Yana says it's a little crowded in her house, but it's wonderful that they are safe with her. 

Bear

 This past week we got news that Bear wasn't doing well, and how old was he? I said at least fourteen. Unfortunately he passed away on Monday. His former owners think he must have been fifteen, and he had an adventurous life. This was his second Russian invasion, he was probably seven when he evacuated with his family from Crimea, even having guns pointed at him at the border checkpoint. 

Then he came to live at our place, where he enjoyed hanging out with the students, who kept trying to improve their commands in English to get him to sit, shake and lie down. I always had trouble convincing them not to feed him candies and chicken bones as treats. Sasha Borchuk loved to pet him, and bring him treats; over the years he asked me to take his photo with Bear many times and he didn't like photos otherwise!

 He enjoyed walking to the farm with the Crawfords when they were in the village, too. He had a job guarding things occasionally at building sites, even last September when the new Quonset was being built. Bear tended to look rather fierce barking-  at Russian speaking men especially. We always knew when someone was in the yard. 

Last summer, he started to go with me on my walks to lose weight, so I have Bear to thank for helping me lose twenty-five pounds. He always was eager to head to the barn and get a treat of milk Yana would save for him. I'd let him choose the route home, whether we'd take the long way around the village to home, he enjoyed seeing the sights. One day when I went around without him, the man we'd see everyday putting his cow out to pasture asked where my dog was. 

One thing I was looking forward to in February (before the invasion happened) was going for a walk over to the barn or around the village with Bear. Elena and the kids took him for a few walks while we were gone, and Valentina fed him. Oleg and the kids gave Bear an impressive burial, complete with marker made by the boys. 

A birthday party

 We have had a quiet week here in Canada, Garry has been sick with a cold, so Friday his biggest effort was our zoom call at noon with Lena's English students. We've been doing it monthly since the war started, although some of the students are in other parts of Europe, most are still in Ukraine. Dnepro has been pretty safe.

However, back in the village, our house was the setting for Angelina's second birthday party. It looked like the house was full of kids, with the new refugee kids there too. I hear they are a pleasant family. If you're wondering, that is a Paw Patrol cake with Skye on.

It's a little strange looking at our house. I found out that Leila goes next door to Oleg's for evening prayer time every night. 

Today I drove to Morden for our granddaughter's ballet recital, while Garry stayed home, but he says he is feeling better, so hopefully he will be back to normal next week. There's a possibility we could go to Poland for a short term mission working with Ukrainian refugees as soon as June, but nothing definite yet. I thought our summer was going to be spending time with family and talking about Ukraine, but we'll see what God has in His plans for us.

Not much to write about

 We think about our guys, girls, kids and the village every day, but not much to report. I've seen some videos of Elena and Oleg's boys in a new hammock in the front yard, and Elena trimming little Angelina's hair as she sits on her Papa's (Andrey's) lap on a chair in the driveway.

Today I was washing a very dusty set of blinds in what will be our spare room in Canada. Except for the dust they are in great shape in spite of the fact that they are probably twenty-five years old. Our ones in the house in Ukraine are all bent and broken because no one seems to figure out how to pull them up to look out, instead bending the strips on them to peek out.

Garry has been able to help the boys a bit with some field work, they let him drive tractor here (in Ukraine Max almost always finds one of the guys to drive instead) he picked rocks with the stone picker and made some ditches in the field today. It's been wet here, and a late spring, but most of the snow banks have melted away. He caught a cold and was sick and napping most of yesterday, and he's still drinking lots of tea with honey.

It's slowed him down on tearing out the carpet in the above mentioned spare room that I've cleaned out (as requested) now that he's finished the vinyl plank flooring in the kitchen and living room. That reno is pretty much done, except for deciding on an island and lights.

I think we might be getting another thunderstorm, since Rolo, the old farm dog has come to our house. She hides in the basement or tries to climb in your lap if there's a storm coming. Otherwise, she lives down the road at Josh's house.

Rain's coming down again, and the thunder is rolling. The weather is sure to delay planting corn here. It's already a later spring than last year.  Garry's waiting for Max to send him photos of the corn up in the field in Ukraine. 

Looks like a picnic

 

We got some photos from the village, looks like Oleg, Elena and family had a backyard picnic with the students. You might notice Leila wearing eyeglasses, she was having headaches, and the hospital said she needed glasses. They cooked plouf over the fire.

You can see the red tulips are blooming, we got a video with lots of the students saying hello to us. All three Sasha's, you can see Sasha Borchuk with Oleg and with Elena's father trying the plouf (it's a rice, meat, carrots, garlic and spices dish.

In the video we also saw the mom and kids from the one refugee family, and a very familiar cat, Needles.

We have heard about many people and churches helping refugees, at Morningstar they have been giving the gospel message with bags of grocery staples. Some are taking free Bibles the church offers, too.

While Victor and his wife are in BC with their sons and their families, his old blue van is being used by a church in Kharkov to give out food aid too. You probably know that city has been under attack since the beginning of the war. 

Six months

 It was November fourth when Max dropped us off at the airport in Zaporosia. The first (and possibly only) time we flew from there. As we approached the airport, we talked about how nice it was to not take the train to Kyiv and how in three months, Max could pick us up at two am.

Of course, that didn't happen, first the plane to Zap was cancelled and we were going to be flying into Kyiv instead on February fourth and would have to take the train or get Victor to come get us, then we postponed because Canada raised the caution level for Ukraine. Garry really wishes he'd gone, since Russia attacked February 24th, four days before our flight was rescheduled to go, and then we couldn't fly into Ukraine. He could have gotten things set and then driven out (I hope). Our mission's official policy is if Canada says do not go, we can't. 

If that changes, Garry would go, he misses our farm and our people there. He feels guilty for being safe here, while so many Ukrainian Christians we know are still there, many endangering their own lives to try to help others by driving to dangerous places to evacuate people to safer areas. He feels bad for feeling sad when we just can't go there, since we have so much here.

Garry talked with Max for a few minutes yesterday, he was out with the van looking to buy diesel for the tractors. He could only buy fifty liters at each station, so he's been going to several stations daily recently. He said the price went up three grivna a liter between morning and afternoon. He stopped and got out to show Garry the wheat field, it looks good, a foot tall, it was fertilized a while ago, they were planning to spray herbicide and insecticide yesterday. I think I wrote that the corn is all planted and they were starting to plant sunflowers this week.

You might remember I wrote that Julia and Dima are now in Turin and I thought Karina, who'd been in Kyiv was out of Ukraine. Garry actually talked to her today and Karina is still in Ukraine with her husband and baby is due in a month. She told Garry it has been two years and three months since she quit drinking and turned her life around. 

Three months was going to be the longest time for Garry in Canada away from Ukraine, now that it's been six, with no idea when he can return, he is looking for something meaningful to do. This week he's putting flooring down in the house reno, and soon he'll be able to help the boys here with fieldwork, but his heart is missing his other family in the village (and no our biological kids are here in Canada, it's the family we found in Ukraine he worries over.) There are more babies due, Alona is due in two months and Kolya and Oksana let know they are having another baby in the fall.

I keep seeing people here that make me think of people we know in Ukraine, at church or at the mall and I stop and think about them and say a prayer in my mind for them. This Sunday at church a smile reminded me of an older lady in Dnepro at the church there, she was one of the generous ladies who made and brought us meals when we were in the hospital with covid last year. 

Talking with Ukraine

 

my daffodil is blooming in Ukraine now,
 thanks Elena for the photo

Well, with Max Rudei, anyway. 

While I was painting the living room walls Saturday afternoon, Garry had a good video chat with Max in Ukraine. The corn was planted last week and it has rained since they finished, always a good thing in Ukraine! 

They are still able to sell the milk, the truck is paying a good price for it, they even have some money in the bank now. Grain is not at world price, right now wheat price in Ukraine according to Max is about fifty dollars a ton, while here it's five hundred. All because they can't export it. Of course, in areas where Russia has taken over, they are taking the grain, and farm equipment or destroying it and killing the cows. 

Max said there is active fighting along the line south of Zaporozhye, with the Russians gaining one day and the Ukrainians moving back the next so far, but it is a little more concerning than before.

Lena in Dnepro is excited about Morningstar church's outreach program, they are handing out food staple packages and presenting the gospel. She said more people are taking Bibles now, some are local people, and many are displaced from Eastern Ukraine.

Vlad (Valera's brother, although young Vlad from the village is working on the farm again, too) sent more photos of the pair of cranes at the farm.

I was typing with Julia this week, and they are no longer in Poland, she and Dima flew to Italy where they are staying at a hotel for free with other Ukrainians. She said taking the two hour ride was scary for her. All our other students and workers are still in the village. Former student Karina, who was in Kyiv, seems to be out of the country also.

Talking about Ukraine and driving home

 So the presentation for the 4- 8th grade at the Huron Christian School (some of our great nieces and nephews are in younger grades) went well, I had put together a different PowerPoint than we used before, asking the question what would you think if your parents became missionaries ? from Seth and Jonah's perspective. Some of the students were interested in the farming pictures, because we answered a lot of follow-up questions about farming, along with ones like "do you miss your family? "

Tuesday we had lunch at Garry's dad's, and checked out his baby finches, they are so cute hopping around the cage. We got packed and made sure everything was ready for our epic silage truck trip. The insurance and temporary plate arrived in the mail from our son. 

That evening we spoke at our old church in Zurich Ontario. We were surprised that so many people came out, neither of us counted, but Garry says he thinks there were 70-80 people there. We even got interviewed by the local paper. I did an overview of how we got into missions, while Garry talked about farming, people and some projects in Ukraine to help if people wanted to make donations to the efccm humanitarian fund-Ukraine, ones for churches giving food and gospel outreach to refugees and neighbors, or clothing and food for injured soldiers and fuel for an ambulance moving sick and injured people from bad areas to safer ones.

Afterwards we talked to many people we knew- friends, neighbors and relatives, even some from other churches, I had my photo taken with Linda, whom I used to do VBS with there. I also answered a number of moms who wanted to know what our daughter was doing now, and Garry talked to most of the guys from his old men's small group. Sorry to say, I didn't get any photos to share. 

However, I have lots of photos of driving up the shores of Lake Huron and Superior in the new to the boys silage truck.  We got a ride to Orangeville with Tom and Susan at five am, to get the truck at seven am and start off, around 7:40, anyway.

 It all went pretty well, except when the air pot broke the first day and we had a four hour lunch break while a mobile guy came to fix it from Sudbury (it controls a number of functions Garry needed to drive like brakes and suspension of the box) so we didn't get quite as far as he hoped. Day two we left around six thirty from the Bavarian Inn, I'd stay there again, but we got an hour past Thunder Bay and stopped at a very dated motel late that Thursday afternoon. That bed convinced us to make the early (3:30 am) start in the dark on Friday, the third and last day, when it started raining and the wipers slowly quit in the upright position, was a real problem seeing the road when we met another vehicle. By daylight, the rain stopped, we fueled up one last time, got breakfast at Tim Hortons, and made it to Steinbach by eleven am.

We did not see a moose, or as they are apparently called in Ontario, Night Danger. There was, as predicted, trees, rocks, lakes and many places with ice and snow on or under those things.