Monday

 

Garry actually sent me photos! See there's one of the Yulias painting the fence he fixed Saturday.

 The rain stopped and they were able to get some work done today. Garry said he had some guys working on the cement on the left side of the barn while two of the guys hired to put up block wall worked on the right.

 He said there's a thousand blocks and they got about 24 done today, but they have to cut each one for the bottom layer, so hopefully it goes faster as they work. They poured 5 sections of cement and have four more ready to do Tuesday. They are mixing concrete in the cement mixer, since its a small job. 

I said hello to a couple of the students and my little buddy Danil while Garry was walking around outside during a video call, I'm a little envious of the green grass and the fact that he was wearing shorts. 

The guys from Salmon Arm arrive this week, Max is driving eight hours or so to get them sometime on Thursday at the Moldovan border. 

Sunday morning

 With daylight savings time arriving overnight, Garry was still trying to reset the clock in his van at 6:30 Sunday evening when I talked to him at noontime here. He is (so far, fingers crossed) avoiding the stomach flu going around the students and staff since he arrived on Wednesday. He says in the house Leila is starting to feel better and Valentina is still sick. 

He said that it was raining, if it's cleared up in the morning, the guys building the gas block (insul-block made from cement and sytrofoam) sides would be able to start building. They think it will take the three guys- one expert with the block and a couple of refugee guys to assist him - about three weeks to build the two long sides of the barn. It was only drizzling earlier in the day, the guys finished fertilizing the winter wheat before the rain started.

The roof material is scheduled to arrive Tuesday and the scaffolding tomorrow, they will be able to do the end walls and roof in a week or so, so Garry probably won't see the finished sides, but the front and back and roof should be finished before he leaves.

This morning church attendance was down due to the flu, but Max sent me a couple photos from church (Garry is having problems with the camera on his phone). Garry said Oleg's wife and kids stayed home, but some of the other kids sang a song and were very cute.

Update

 So he is in the village, and all is well. He's been busy getting ready for the barn repair. The steel for the roof actually won't arrive until next week, probably just before Jack and the guys. Max is driving over to Moldova to pick them up.

Meanwhile, Garry has been to Dnepro to the Canadian- Ukrainian Dairy Commission office to buy semen, and to the place to get liquid nitrogen, he still remembered where it was. He actually bred a couple cows for someone the first day he was in the village, but they needed to buy more to resupply the tank. 

I forgot to say that Garry saw lots of farmers in the fields as he went across Ukraine, tractors working land, planting and fertilizing. Our guys have been busy this week, pulling up the last of the water lines and plowing up the last cornfield that was combined this winter, planting alfalfa, and some barley as as cover crop with it. They also planted eight gardens in the village in alfalfa, and some barley for a neighbor. 

Yesterday Garry, with the help of the two new Yulias repaired the wooden picket fence in front of the house, three of the posts were broken, today he had one repainting the fence. You may guess it's warm there, the crocuses are blooming and Garry was looking for his shorts to wear!

Today he was off buying rebar and cement, they were getting ready to repair the foundation on one side of the barn, the gas block to build the two long sides of the barn was delivered. They have hired three guys who will start that on Monday. Garry also helped load and unload a couple loads of straw they purchased from a farm in the next village. 

Time springs ahead in Ukraine this weekend, so he gets to miss an hours sleep a second time this spring. 

Please keep Rolling Fork Mississippi in your prayers, where the tornado was last night, it's actually the town where Garry's parents would go every winter to help with a mission there, where Garry helped build a house in his mother Mary's memory a couple years ago. Garry's dad had been there for a couple months, and just returned to Ontario at the beginning of March. 

He's there

 

It took a few days, but Garry is safely in the village, getting ready to help replace the barn roof and build walls. He arrived late Tuesday after a couple days in Uzgorod (northern Ukraine). Sunday evening he got stopped by the police while walking in the city. They were concerned because he wasn't wearing a coat. He explained that he was from Canada and thought it was very warm, which was why he only had a T-shirt on.  On Monday he helped load supplies from a warehouse into vans, one of which he traveled in down to the farm. He said it reminded him of his time in Poland.

Here's a couple of before photos, it's the original barn, it hasn't had cows in for a couple years, the canvas had a ten year guarantee about 14 years ago, and they are going to replace it with metal. You can see it's had some patches in the last couple years. They are going to build block side walls. Since last summer they have been raising chickens for meat and eggs in it and it needed some modifications to work better for that. 

Garry said first steps were cleaning up around the barn and removing the canvas, the steel was supposed to be delivered today. 

Getting ready

 Garry has booked his ticket for Ukraine, well for Budapest, he leaves on the 17th, and will be traveling to Uzgorad with our friends Steve and Jo. Our friend Jessica will pick them up at the airport. He hopes to go toward the farm with a humanitarian aid group after getting there. He'll be gone until after Easter. A couple guys from Salmon Arm plan to go from Moldova to the farm near the end of March to help with that barn roof replacement. The students and staff are counting down to his arrival.

I'm counting down to when he needs to be packed and ready while he's been busy with fishing and refereeing basketball since we returned from New Jersey. He had quite the cold when he came for the funeral, but is better this week, I didn't get as sick. 

The staff in Ukraine continue to work on finding new products that they can sell in the city. They made a popular kind of smoked string cheese recently and even tried kolbasa making this weekend.