The new house project

the garden runs along the road

It's the house on the corner of the cobblestone road

Garry tells that wood at the top front of the house is about to
fall off, but it is very large inside, ideal for remodeling 

Here is the house Garry bought to remodel for a third group home for next year's students (likely a second male house, since we get more boys than girls). It will have a similar setup to the other boys home with a small apartment for the family and a large kitchen living area for the students and three bedrooms and bathroom for the guys. We have decided that the idea of having 9 boys in a home is optimistic after this year, so plan on two boys per room.

We take possession of the house on the 15th. The couple we bought it from need to finish remodeling the home they are moving into. We have two groups coming to remodel the house, 8 people from Alberta have their plane tickets bought, and will be here March 21- April 1st. Then a small group from Steinbach led by Roy Enns, plan to come April 14th. Garry has been busy with the dimensions and graph paper and has drawn up some plans already, and will stock up on supplies for building before the teams arrive.

Kiev Farm Show

Garry and Maria took the overnight train Wednesday last week with the students who qualified (by not missing work for four weeks) I was still in Hospital so they had a empty bunk. Maria tried to return my tickets but it was so difficult, that they gave up. They went to the Maidan site first and then  the farm show, where Garry bought a fertilizer spreader, and a new hoof trimming wheel. Afterwards Maria had planned a series of events to keep them busy until the train departed from Kiev at 11:30 pm. Here are some photos.

on the train

at Maidan site Karina

Kolya, Yulia, Garry front Karina Simeon behind

Julia with the girl dressed as a cow at the show

on the subway

walking downtown Kiev

KFC for dinner

A little Christmas party

Since we missed Christmas and New Years and Ukrainian Christmas (we arrived in Kiev that afternoon) we invited the students for pizza on last Tuesday evening while we were between company (I had originally thought we'd do it Friday but it was Karina's birthday and she was hosting a party at the girls house. Garry bought her flowers, which she said was the first time someone had given her flowers, a common gift here).

I made pizza and  filled the stockings I had bought at the dollar store for them, mostly with practical things I had bought here- like toothbrushes and paste, small boxes of laundry detergent, shampoo, a little candy, and for the girls bracelets with their initial I had bought at Walmart in Canada and for the boys a match box car (a bigger hit than Garry thought when I showed him) and Canada wallets which they are all using now. They were quite thrilled with their gifts, and one of the boys announced that no one had ever given him such wonderful and practical things.

everyone loves UNO!

The group home families came too (I had given them presents earlier in the week) and after lots of pizza eating ( I discovered this time that Karina who won't eat pizza likes yogurt) there was UNO playing. Then we handed out the stockings and they opened their presents, except for Sasha, who had to work that evening (he did eat lots of pizza before leaving, don't worry).  Maria told him to stop in after finishing at the barn, which he did.

Valera posing with his stocking

Ready for December

This week we had an abbreviated school week, with the girls gone shopping with Maria on Tuesday for winter coats and shoes while the boys had class with Garry without a translator. He said it was easy because they just continued working on balancing feed rations, and he is getting down the terminology for math in Russian. We had planned a final fun outing for Thursday, thinking we would switch class to Friday, but that all fell apart when Garry had to take the boys and meet Maria for a trip to the secondhand store, unfortunately it was 75% women's clothing there, so they had to go to the outdoor market to find all the boys warm shoes, coats hats and gloves for work and for good.

Thursday the boys did go to play paintball against Garry and some of the other guys who work on the farm and had a great time, although Garry has a few red spots on his arms from direct hits. The girls were going to go bowling at the same time, but Nastya was sick the day before and had to stay in bed to rest. Nastya had walked all the way to class on Wednesday morning, even though she had a fever. We put her to bed in our house during class, and drove her home to the girls' house in the afternoon. The girls and boys houses are on Centralna, the same street as our house, and class, but it is a kilometer walk.

Food week at school

Here they are separating cream in the classroom

Last week the students were very excited because Garry taught them cream and cheesemaking, Ukrainian style. Many Ukrainian households make extra money by milking a cow or two or three and making the milk into value added products. Sleevki, cream thick enough to spread like butter on bread and cottage cheese made from the skim milk, is then sold in the market or along the highway, Ukrainians love to eat them.

We bought an electric cream separator a couple years ago, the students had to learn how it works and how to take it apart and put it back together, too. Their favorite part of the lesson was sampling it on a loaf of bread and taking a 500 ml jar full back to each group home to enjoy eating.

you can see how thick it is in the jar

And on the bread too!

Tuesday they learned how to cook the skim milk to make the curds, they had to come into our house for that part of the lesson, I took a photo of them straining the curds through an old lace curtain. The whey is falling into a big pot, then it hung overnight to drain, and they got to take bags of dry cottage cheese home with them.

making cottage cheese

Friday the students had an anatomy lesson on work day when they got to see the inside of a cow. There was a young cow in the barn that was not able to get pregnant and was not giving much milk, so they had decided to butcher her. The students were not upset by the idea of watching the cow become dinner (there is no butcher to call to kill your cow and cut it up in the village like in Canada, it is a DIY project.) Garry thought the girls might not like it, but Karina was jumping up and down in excitement with the idea of eating liver. In the afternoon the boys were helping cut up a front quarter at their house (the girls did their quarter Saturday) except Valera, who helped Garry all day, the girls came in the afternoon, too, and worked in our kitchen, too, except Julia, who was scheduled to help with milking. Now everyone will have meat to eat for a while, hopefully months.

Valera in foreground, Garry and Max Rudei in back

Nastya running the electric meat grinder for Hamburger

Karina cut meat. too.

Bowling and Conference in Kiev

soup's on!

Last week on Thursday we planned a bowling excursion with the students. Suisha, Luda's daughter from the girls' house was teaching computer use that morning, and we planned a slightly shorter school day and I invited the students in for soup and bread at 11:30 so we could leave by noon for Zaporosia.

We were off to pick up Suisha, who was going with us and the students and were on the highway by 12:05 in Victor's van.

Getting instruction from the guy at the Bowling Palace

The students really enjoyed bowling and it was pretty inexpensive, so we will definitely do it again. Everybody will be used to going on escalators hopefully, for some of the students it was their first time to ride one at the mall, and bowling was on the third floor. A cleaning lady helped Nastya get on the first one with her, because she was scared.

I got a couple photos before the guy told me no photos...

Maria spent the night and at 5 am we picked up Luda and Suisha to go to a conference in Kiev for people working with orphans, mentors and group home parents. Ira, from the boys home went on the train with the group from Zaporosia, the night before.


Maria translated for Garry and I and Jessica, an American who works in Zaporosia, although her Russian is pretty good. The welcome was in Ukrainian and then they switched to Russian so everyone could understand!

Far right- Luda and Suisha after lunch with Sasha and Vera from Zaporosia

One of the ladies sitting at our table was trying to get Jessica to date her son
She had photos, and he would like an American wife, I guess.

The hotel was not hard to find, right on the Kiev Odessa highway and was attached to the mall, the meetings and lunches were upstairs at the mall. We skipped the final dinner and drove home, getting back to the village around 11 pm Saturday night.

Looking down the escalators at the mall

The Zaporosia/ Nikoliapolia New Hope group

A Thanksgiving dinner with the students

The metal is on the roof, the carpenters are doing the finishing
at the boys house

Garry had the idea last week...
we should have a Thanksgiving dinner with the students and they could all make something to eat.

We had it Friday afternoon at the boys' house, and everything was delicious too. We all sat around the ping pong table, and we even had everyone say what they were thankful for before we ate.

Here are some photos of the fun.

Garry is calling Maria to see where she is (still on the bus)
and valera is excited about the olivea salad and potatoes the girls brought

Simeon is frying potato pancakes

Kolya is getting his very chocolate dessert he made out of the freezer
I made the pumpkin pie, roast turkey and stuffing 

Yulia or Julia as she now prefers smiles a lot now

Kolya enjoying Maria's piroskie- like a bun filled with apple

Natastya and Maria sat on one side of me

Karina wasn't hungry, the girls had eaten noodles before they came
she was getting Simeon to listen to a song here, she did help with the dishes

Valera made this layered salad with cooked beets, potatoes, carrot and herring

The new guys- Kolya/Nikoli, Sasha and Simeon eating jello

Julia eating jello

Empty dishes by dessert time
(valera grabbed the camera for this photo of Garry and I)

dessert is so good!

smiles everywhere

all cleaned up