and they're off!

That's right it's time for everyone's favorite blog post photos, today was the first day that the village herd went out to pasture. Garry sent out ten heifers and dry cows again this year, in fact yesterday Yana made a list of cows who were not giving much milk, and Garry made some of them into dry cows, so they could go out to the field also.

Unlike last year, when we had lots of help with Seth and Jonah here to help, not to mention Maxim who gets back from his trip tonight, Garry had to get Andrei out of bed to help him and the milker ladies chase the ten out this morning before 7 am. I got out to stand in the front yard with a camera and attempt to deflect any moves by our group through the front yard on the way out the gate to join the rest of the herd on the road. I didn't get to make any moves as Andrei raced up from the back and frantically raced toward the two who thought about going that way!

Garry went along for the first hour, until the cows settled down, it's a very exciting day for them, some of them have not been outside their sheds since the last day the herd went out in October. He was happy to report all the animals made it out to the field this year, last year, one heifer went back home four straight days before they could get her out far enough to figure she wanted to be there! There are always a few stranglers, mostly small heifers with their owner chasing- or pulling them along the first week.

Just wait until they come back late this afternoon, it will be just as exciting until the cows (and the young heifers) start to remember where they make the turn into the yard, finding all of our ten as the whole herd heads toward us is a real rodeo for at least the first week!

Special Sunday

The Sunday after Easter is a special holiday in Ukraine, people travel to put flowers on the graves of their grandparents, the cemeteries are cleaned up before this day, many people spend time there to honor their ancestors, some even will eat there at the cemetery, to share the time with those who family members who are buried there. There were more visitors in the village this weekend than last week. There were people walking, driving and biking to the village graveyard as we drove out to the highway just before nine am.



 There were more cars than normal on the road on this Sunday, it looks more like traffic on a summer vacation highway, than any day on this highway, and you see many older cars, some of which don't look like they travel the highway often, full of people going out to their home village heading from Dnepropetroesk (our side of the highway had more normal traffic volume.)

There is a big cemetery off the highway just as we drive into Dnepropetroesk , on this Sunday morning it is very busy, people parking and walking everywhere, police directing traffic as pedestrians cross the road with their live flowers or plastic flower wreaths, and food. It was just as busy at noontime when we left the city.










We had a little milk spill in the back of the car on the way to church, one of the spigots on the jugs must have leaked. it's good that we got the plastic try in the back, it caught most of the milk. You can see the Easter banner with Chris-tos vas Chris-t behind the praise group singing at Morningstar Church.

opps!

We went to Zaporosia in the afternoon, where there is a big cemetery on the right side of the highway as you drive into the city. There are steps in several places along the railroad tracks to walk over to the graveyard. There were cars parked on both sides, and in the center of the divided highway.

plastic flower wreaths for sale in the city

You can see the people walking over to the cemetery-
 the large brown pipe is one of the central heating pipes for the city.

 As we drove home....

The village graveyard late afternoon

People are putting their cows out to graze,
 Tuesday will be the first day for the village herd to go out
...photos to follow

A little rain...

Now that the crops are in the ground Garry is watching the sky for rain to get them growing. Late Saturday afternoon as a thunderstorm rolled in, I took some photos. Then I went inside the house, and found a candle and matches, just in case the power went out. It seems that often when we have a storm, the power goes out, so I thought I'd be prepared.

you can see the ground is dry!

The peas are up in the garden

The babushka chased her chickens inside

......and it rained a little, it rained a little more, there were even a few puddles outside when Victor came, as the sun was getting low around seven pm. He brought the empty milk jugs from when Garry brought milk in to sell on Thursday, so we could use them for the milk for the churches on Sunday. One of the cows had gotten loose in the barn, good thing that they are so quiet and easy to lead to the stalls and tie up! After Victor came inside for tea and talk with Garry, it rained a little more...no power outage, and no real amount of rain, wasn't even wet under the trees.

puddles next to Victor's van

check out the new cement pad

she's on the loose!

Sunday morning we had a few sprinkles on the windshield as we drove into Dnepro for Church, and Sunday evening, same show, thunderstorm rolled in around six pm, and this time, there was a little more rain, Garry says it soaked into the ground about an inch. Monday around noon it got a little dark out, thunder in the distance, but no more rain... so Garry will be checking the sky still...

Water, water...anywhere?

This is a story about water. Yesterday morning I woke up and the CNN news weather was telling me that heavy rain was moving across western Russia, across Ukraine and then into western Poland. I remembered I had clothes still on the line- I had hung out a load Garry had washed the afternoon before. Garry had come in a few minutes before and said he was planting seeds in the garden because it was sprinkling, so I ran outside in my robe to grab the clothes before they got too wet. Luckily, ladies outside in robes is perfectly normal in the village- or housedresses anyway- so if anyone saw me, they didn't think anything of it. It was still pretty much dry out, in fact I washed two more loads, hung them out, and got each batch down as drops began to fall yesterday!

 In spite of the forecast, we didn't get more than enough to wet the top of the car last night either, so Garry is still hoping for a good rainy day. He has been out digging up corn seed everyday lately, some of it has roots and sprouts, but some did not get deep enough into the ground with that old corn planter, and is too dry to grow, so he's hoping for rain. Plus it would get the alfalfa growing, so the cows will have some to eat soon. A load of brewers grain was delivered this morning, we are feeding (and selling) a lot of it with the hay gone, the village cows are not going out to graze as a herd yet, but you see a few people have their cows tied out in the yard to eat grass during the day now.





 Yesterday morning I did get wet, though, while I was running the water into the sink to wash the dishes. It took me a few seconds to react, when the faucet suddenly fell off into the sink and water shot straight up under the cabinet, and over me, as I washed a glass. I turned off the taps and Garry helped me screw it back on, as he happened to be walking through the house when It happened. It must have gotten very loose for the water pressure to push it off like that!



Today I did a little furniture rearrangement, the table is back in the kitchen/living room area. I am going to set up the arch room as an office for Garry now.

The irrigation project

the line from our fence to the road still needs to be buried

Garry took some photos of the water line irrigation project on Tuesday when the guys were working on getting it under the road - they had been having trouble with the procedure, but Garry suggested a smaller line for this section, and that is what they decided to do. They built this machine, it's a hydraulic pump geared down turning a cut-down flight from an old combine auger to bore under the road. It worked beautifully, they would go two meters, pull it back and then add another section of pipe. It rolled on the pieces of angle iron you see lying the bottom of the trench.

 This section was a success, but there are a few remaining parts to do, like digging places for the garden hookups by hand, and putting the big black pipe running over the ground on the edge of our yard in the ground. They couldn't do this with the tractor, it needs to be trenched by digging with shovels. As people get their gardens growing getting everything done may become more important to finish so the water starts flowing.

That's Maxim in the orange coveralls, with some of the village guys working on the  water line

The tulips are in bloom

Water is coming.....

Just after lunch today, I heard a strange, yet familiar gurgling noise from the bathroom, once again the cistern was empty and we were out of the water. If I had know we were running low, I wouldn't have done another load of laundry this morning! Since Maxim left yesterday for a few days to visit relatives in Moldova, Garry got Andrei to talk to the neighbor Seroshia to see if he could go get a load, and a couple hours later, they backed in and unloaded it, so showering and dish washing is on again!

Andrei and little Seroshka give a helping  hand

Strange things happen....

I don't know if I mentioned that I brought back from New Jersey a suitcase filled with mostly stuff for Garry, and not just the Easter candy- I bought him a chocalate cow- and the jar of peanut butter he wanted. I also had a number of things for the barn, milk filters, a few items to treat sick cows with like a IV kit (the vet here uses a cut-off pop bottle and a rubber tube with a needle stuck on) and a large grain shovel, which I disassembled to fit in the suitcase. Garry said his first aluminum one was in bad shape, although they are still using it upstairs in the barn in the grain bin. I bought a poly one, and it came through the airplane trip fine, so we'll see how it wears. Why did I bring a shovel? Because here is a photo of the biggest bladed shovel you can buy in Ukraine and Garry's new rake he bought in the village!



Yesterday Garry drove the corn planter back to the farm he borrowed (rented?) it from in Molozaharina and had an interesting encounter. A couple guys waved him down, and since he could not figure out what they wanted, he asked Victor, who he happened to be talking to on the phone, to speak to them. When he got the phone back, he discovered that they were customs agents trying to sell seized goods.




Yesterday afternoon, Maxim came back dissappointed from his meeting with the window people. Last fall he bought all new windows for his house, and had the company guys install them. Eight of the twelve windows had the glass crack from top to bottom (some were one piece windows, some opened, it didn't make any difference which kind) by spring. Some guys came out to look a couple weeks ago, and yesterday they told Max that it must have been too cold, or something, it wasn't their fault. Proving once again, a warranty in Ukraine is worthless. Maxim and Garry thought it might help that they had been installed by their guys, because they knew it would have been the installation at fault if they had done it themselves!





While Maxim was gone, Andrei came in the house to get Garry, somehow the fire inspector was outside. He said he was driving by and saw the big canvas barn and must inspect it. Garry suspected someone filed a complaint, but Victor says it is spring, so maybe he was driving around looking for income, since the inspector said we had dangerous fire hazard - wood- in the barn and it must be coated with something to retard fire. We knew there must be a reason why everything here is built with brick, steel and concrete, now we know, fire inspections! Everyone here is shocked with the idea of framing a house with wood in North America, asking why we are not worried about fires.






A couple days ago, Garry was at the closest gas station, filling up the tractor with diesel (must have been Friday or Saturday, when they were planting corn) when he saw a couple of guys come in on bicycles with big packs. As he was waiting inside the store, the guys put some stuff on the counter and the clerk asked them Va-meis-tiah? They looked blank, so Garry said She wants to know if you are paying for it together. The guys grinned and said "You're not Ukrainian!"

Turned out they were two brothers from Holland biking from there to Mongolia. They had been on the road for 50 days already, and had stopped for some snacks, and like most younger Dutch people are pretty good English speakers (good thing, because Garry only knows a couple words in Dutch.) They plan to take the Trans-Siberian railroad to Moscow and then fly home at the end of their bike trip. They told him they weren't worried about traveling here, although the highways are rough and the drivers a little aggressive, when Garry asked if Ukrainian traffic scared them.








The kittens are doing well outside, Garry gave away the black one and the striped male, but the striped one only went to the people next door and returned the next day! They hang out with the big kittens from last year, sometimes sneak in the door for some catfood and wrestling with their mom Box, and I think that Needles, who is enjoying outdoors more than indoors since spring has sprung is trying to show them the joying of bird chasing...or tree climbing.






Monday morning, sad news, one of the cows had a dead bull calf overnight, Yana stayed up until one am, because she thought it might calve. Too bad I didn't know, I could have sent Garry out to check on the cows when the Flyers game was over.
There is another cow due soon, a good Holstein-looking milker, so Garry is hoping for a heifer calf from her. If it is a bull calf it goes to the most recent guy who promised Max a tractor-driving licence, a relative of Yulia, Max's fiance. He came to buy brewers grain on the weekend, with the licence in hand, it has been almost two years of trying to get Max this licence - yes, in Ukraine it is an important thing if you want to drive a tractor off the yard, Garry shows his Canadian drivers licence and tells them it is good for cars and tractors- which is true!




Maxim has been locking the tractor and walking home if he sees the police in the village checking documents. They keep telling him they would arrest him for this, and the day before the licence came, he got pulled over in the neighbor's big old payloader (the multi-colored one in the photo) on the street. Maxim managed to talk his way out of it, asking why they pulled him over, when they had no cause, he was obeying all traffic rules. They said the tractor could be Mafia-owned , and he said what would the mafia want with a rusty old tractor? then it could be stolen, and Max said that they see it here in the village every week, so they gave up and let him go. NEXT TIME HE CAN SHOW THEM his official LICENCE!





Finally- here is the giant bee trapped in the back of the Lada on Saturday, Garry was bringing more corn seed out to the field with the car, when we spotted this three-inch-long bee that that flew inside while he had the back open... we let it fly out the door after taking the photo!

Easter

Христос воскрес!! Christ is risen! It was Easter today in Ukraine, and here are some pictures from today...


my hot cross buns and the candy for Maxim and Andrei (Garry had a bigger dish with a chocolate cow, jelly beans and robin eggs I brought back from NJ)



















as we we driving out of the village to go to church on a cloudy morning... there was an Orthodox priest blessing stuff in front of the community center, our village does not have an Orthodox church, Garry saw a priest putting up a notice about it at the village store two weeks ago.















In Dneproprotroesk, here are a few of the people carrying baskets of food to be blessed at one of the many Orthodox churches in the city,(sorry that the wind-shield was dirty for the first one, but I loved her hurrying all the way across the boulevard as the light was almost ready to change!) the trees are greening up, we even saw some dandelions and here is one of the many Easter billboards.

































Unfortunately the camera battery died before I got to church or I would have taken a photo of the older Sunday school children doing a skit in Biblical costumes, all of them singing and some of the little ones saying Easter recitations after the sermon today. We also had special music for the offering, Anna was back from Kiev and sang for us (she used to lead the worship singing) and Edward sang powerfully in English (with translation into Russian on the screen). We received some gifts of paska bread from friends, before we headed home to the village in the rain.




When I came back from New Jersey, Garry showed me this gift he got while I was gone. One of the ladies in the village did the needlepoint and her husband built the frame, we finally hung in the living room last week. What an amazing gift!