We're back!

Yes, we have bunches of photos of cute children, lovely old churches, beautiful scenery and such, but this is my favorite photo that I took in Poland.

Thank you for your prayers! It was a L-O-N-G trip, but everything went smoothly. Of course, I'll tell you all about it, as I have time.

Travel plans

We're leaving for Poland in a few hours!

For those who love details (hi, Mom! ), I'll tell you a little more. We'll take a marshrutka (van/bus) to Zaporozhye and get on an overnight train to Kiev there. We'll arrive in Kiev tomorrow morning. Then we have a "layover" for most of the day; our train to Krakow doesn't leave until evening. Unfortunately, we'll get into Krakow on Wednesday too late to turn in our documents, and we found out that the Ukrainian consulate there is closed on Thursdays, so we'll be applying for our visas Friday morning. If things go as fast as rumors say, we might get our visas back that afternoon, and then travel home Saturday-Monday. If not, we'll stay in Poland over the weekend and come back early next week.

Honestly, I haven't been too excited about this trip. I used to love traveling, especially in Eastern Europe, but I must have lost that somewhere. Maybe I was hoping for an easy trip to some exotic place a little too much this time? Oh, well! The saving grace of Krakow is that I get to meet Karen Glass of Ambleside Online fame. I can't wait!

Bye for now! Please be praying for us as we travel.

Fall and winter letter

Click to read.

Let us know if you would like to get these (rare) letters by email.

Another Sunday school lesson

I've been posting more pictures, less words lately, but that's better than nothing, right? Here are a few photos from yesterday's Sunday school lesson about Jesus' conversation with the rich young ruler:

Liza tries to thread the needle

Raia's turn

And Slavik's turn

The youngest student

Yasha was with us for most of the lesson. I had to take a photo, because he's so cute, and he was wearing Jaan's baby clothes.

Singing

And that's probably all you'll hear from me for a little while, as we continue with school every day and also get ready for to leave in a week for a visa trip to Poland.

Village birthday

Yesterday was our friend Yana's birthday, and she invited everyone out to her parents' village house for the day for a banya and shashlik.

Child labor?

With Lena

Sasha and Taras heating up the banya

Cooking shashlik

Yum!

This next photo was just one of the children playing with the camera, but I'm posting it so that you can see the color of the wall.

Hold that color in your mind....

After the banya

Lena said that we should have posed her, in her red shirt, with some tomatoes, in front of the red wall. She'll probably kill me for posting this photo.

Happy birthday, Yana!

Going outside

A princess can't forget to wear a crown on her daily walk!

Women's Day

Yesterday we celebrated March 8 a little early at our dacha with the youth from church. Very few came, mostly because of the weather (cold, grey, pretty constant snow/rain), but the brave few had a great time! We roasted hotdogs, played a wild game of "football,"--that wasn't quite football, because we didn't have two teams, and our children were all mixed up in it; it was hilarious!--sang, ate, and had a little Bible study.

I wasn't going to include this one, because we look so funny, but here we are:
The Women.

Warming up

Fellowship around the table

I just liked this photo.