Birthday, back to school, and more

Bogdan turned 11 on Saturday. Like my father said, it was a birthday that he'll tell his children and grandchildren about, but it was actually pretty normal, even though in some ways it was entirely strange. While we were at church, working and visiting with friends there, it was almost possible to forget about the war. Almost.

On Monday we started back to our usual homeschooling schedule, and that has gone okay. At times it's very hard to concentrate, but it's good to have a routine going. Bogdan's friend comes over almost every day to play after they've finished their schoolwork.

On Tuesday Yana went back to her village. We were worried about her getting there, but it went fine. If you look at the screen shot below from Live Map, you can see how it was possible for her to get home, but that we still can't go anywhere. Her family lives north of Skadovsk. (Kherson was under the fire and announcement icons.) If someone can get past the block posts at the edges of Kherson, the roads are pretty open going south. A man came into the city from her village and picked her up; it took them two hours to get back out of the city, but then their trip was fine.

Inside Kherson, lines are very long. Pretty much nothing has been delivered to stores for several weeks now. It can take an hour or more to get into a store, and then the shelves are pretty empty inside. But there's still enough that people aren't starving, and farmers from the south are getting things like potatoes and carrots in. People who rely on medicine (like insulin) are suffering. Our own family is fine, and we share back and forth with our neighbors.

I'm sorry for writing randomly and infrequently. It's hard to know what to write and to find time and energy to do it. Will posts most days on Facebook, and that's public, so you can see it even without a Facebook account, I think.