Nastya

Here is a photo of Nastya, the only girl signed up for the trade school for the fall. She is a very exuberant orphan girl who has been living at the girls house this past year. Max O, John Wiens Ukrainian coworker, helped find some orphans for Luda to foster parent while the trade school was in limbo. The other two girls will attend other trade schools, but Nastya (short for Anastasia) decided she would like to stay here in the village. She has been helping Maxim Boradin feed the cows often and is always smiling. While the guys have been busy with the straw for the last month, no one has been working fixing up the barn, so a day guard was hired to keep an eye on things. Recently, Nastya has been doing this, and she enjoys playing with the puppies. If you ever met Nastya, she is sure to greet you with a hug.

We also pay someone to sleep there at night, two guys take turns sleeping in the barn, so no one is tempted to walk away with anything. As soon as Garry is done teaching English he plans to jump back into barn reno, as his boxes of pieces for the milking system he shipped while we were home have arrived in Ukraine, so the building of the milk parlor will start to happen in a week or so, watch for photos he sends me with his tablet.

The crops are really needing some rain over there. July is a critical month for a thunderstorm to come over the village and give us a downpour, as wet weather is unusual this time of year. With so much land in corn this year, it is hoped that some of the crop will be grain to sell,  rather than all of it becoming silage for the cows to eat. If it continues to dry out, they may have to chop it soon, as the plants will start dying, and it will be the only option. The later planted corn is starting to tassel now, and the earlier crop is making cobs. The sunflower crop is a little more drought tolerant.Without some decent rain this week the farm will not be able to generate as much income as hoped for day-to-day operation of the school for the coming year (last week would have been better). Next year, they plan to get as much land as possible into winter wheat, which is a much more reliable crop in this area, as it can use the normally wet fall weather to get started. We have only seen one disaster year in the last seven for wheat.

baby Polo (it seems Polo may be a dad)