As I write this blog, we are receiving a beautiful rain here in the village. It was a little spotty on our way home from Dnipro after church and a few things to pick up. This is a blessing as the fall crops are looking good and some of this year's crops have already been planted.
On Friday, we loaded up three vehicles and celebrated International Women's Day by going on a picnic to Zaparosia where there is a park called Khortytsia. It is at the base of the Dam and Cossack Fort is located there. It was a beautiful day and many others thought the same thing as parking was at a premium. This is a huge holiday in Ukraine.
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| Photo before lunch (Scott and Teresa were taking photos) |
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| Garry and Daniel |
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| Kolya & Oksana |
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| My beautiful Bride |
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Julia and Shannon
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We took along sandwiches, muffins, apples, cookies, coffee and tea. We had fun walking along the rocks along the shore. We took some pictures as we had a great view of the dam. After lunch we continued to hike around and toss the Frisbee.
After we were done at the park, Teresa took a few guys home who didn't want to go shopping. Along with Garry, we took the rest of the students shopping at a store in Zaporosia. The store was also a popular destination that day as I don't think we have ever seen a store so crowded, not even at Christmas time.
The next day, Shannon and I went back at cleaning the yard out back by the fruit trees. We had a huge pile to burn and thought it would be a good day as it was fairly calm and they were calling for light showers. We ended up doing our burning, but we also ended up spending about 6 hours weeding and pruning trees. We found that we have a nice patch of raspberries and grapes. Unfortunately, the grapes were a mess as they were all along the ground and up into trees and whatever else they could climb into.
When Garry bought this property, the son of the lady who owned the property took down the metal trellis because he could make a quick dollar selling the metal. There are probably about a dozen grape plants, so we need to set up a trellis for them to grow on. We are looking forward to the fruit that is on this property. There are pears, apricots, plums, cherries, apples, grapes, raspberries and walnuts. Sounds like a tasty year coming up. :)
Later in the day, we had another Russian lesson with Ulzana. Before we started we took some time to show her pictures of our family (the gift our kids sent to us) and to see some pictures of her family when Timor was born. We don't want to be all about "just doing class," but we also want to get to know one another and build a friendship. Ulzana always is well prepared to teach us how to speak Russian. We are making progress, but there is a long ways to go.
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| Cleaning the yard |
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| What was left of the pile |
In our village and I'm sure most place in Ukraine, everybody burns to clean up their yards. By the end of yesterday, there was a smoky haze throughout the community. It would not be the place to be if you had allergies, because smoke is a way of life here.
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| Cleaning the fruit trees (go back a couple of blogs to see how they have changed) |
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| raspberry patch |
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| Grape vines |
Last week, we started having some of the students come for supper as a way of getting to know them better. Neely, our translator, also comes so that we can have a conversation. We have another couple coming tonight and we are looking forward to getting to know each other better.
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