Skip to main content

Easter 1 and Easter 2

Living in Ukraine is rad because we get to celebrate most holidays twice. For example, we celebrated American Easter on April 8th with a party at the Stoddards. We had a feast of ham, mashers, green beans, salad, rolls, and 4 desserts. It was a great way to celebrate the good news--Our Saviour lives!
On the left side of the table are the Manna's (Mike, Katya, and Sammy), and on the right side are the Stoddard's (Megan, Benjamin, Suzie, Petro, and Doug).
This is the cool table (mainly because its where I sat). On the left you see Lexi, then Judy Manna, then the Hughes (Sam, Jarrett, and Melissa), then the newlyweds (Brian and Victoria), then Anya's nurse Marina, and finally Daniel Raa. In his arms you will see the star of the party!
This is Evie, Sam and Melissa Hugh's newest addition!
She is the cutest thing on two wheels, and we all fought over her like crazy. Limbs were lost, hair was pulled out, but in the end, everyone got to hold her and so it turned out okay.
 Everyone had a good time visiting Anya and playing games....Uno! What a fun Easter 1!

Easter 2
Then we celebrated Ukrainian Easter at Safe Haven on April 15 . We got to practice the new phrase we learned in class last week!
Христос воскрес (Christ has risen)!
Воистину Воскрес (Truly risen)!
Roma and Daniel had fun taking pictures with new cameras!
Ira and Janna chill together!
Just one of the little munchkins running around!
The girls sat around and discussed life while the boys went outside and grilled kabobs! Mmm; they were really good kabobs! We had a great Easter at Safe Haven and are looking forward to many more in the future!

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Christmas in Ukraine Part VI: Nat and Tiffy come to Ukraine

A few weeks ago we had the pleasure of hosting two sisters here in Kiev, Tiffany and Natalie. When they came to Ukraine from America, they brought 280 blankets to give out to children in need! The blankets were awesome! Natalie and Tiffany go to Liberty College, and they had decided to do something for kids in Ukraine. They chose to make blankets. With the help of many prayer groups at Liberty, they came up with 280 beautiful, colorful, warm and fuzzy blankets, and each one had cards inside with Bible verses and notes from the people who made them. What a wonderful idea! We spent three days going around to different places to hand out the blankets, and it was precious! First we went to our orphanage, Komarivka. The majority of the kids had gone home for the holidays, but about 30 kids remained. You should have seen their faces! Such big smiles all around! One of my favorite pictures ever of two giggling girls, Luda and Vita! Some of the older girls, Larissa, Natasha, Janna (the Russ

The power of a hug

Three weeks ago at church, Masha sat next to me.   Masha is ten, has Downs Syndrome and is a fantastic hugger.  She just loves hugging.  So I try to always stop and hug her back.  During the service, she came in and sat between me and her dad, for a while she loved on her dad and then she leaned her head on my shoulder, so I leaned my head over onto hers, and she looked up at me with this big smile.  She reached around and gave me a shoulder hug, and then patted my head, and then rubbed my back for a few minutes.  I didn’t move the entire time because it just felt so good.  It was just simple, innocent affection, and it sent tingles up my spine.  If you don’t know what I’m talking about you need more hugs and back scratches. Human contact is so important.  That’s why I try and hug the kids when we go up to the orphanage.  These are just a few stories of some of the hugs I’ve given and gotten this past month, and why hugs are so important in our ministry. My friend Viktor and some o

The rain in Spain falls mainly on the plain: Why shopping is a pain in Ukraine.

I used to like shopping. I thought it was fun. I love closure, and so nothing was more satisfying than crossing items off a list. I enjoyed the experience of checking out new stuff, looking for bargains, and of course everyone knows that buying stuff feels good.   That was then. This is now. Shopping here is a pain. Let me explain (hey, I’m a poet and I don’t even realize it)! First, we don’t have a car. That means we are at the mercy of public transportation, and so we have to keep that in mind when choosing what store to go to. Is it close to a bus or metro stop? Do we have to transfer metro lines? When we lived in the city center, we were really close to two metro lines. We like this store called MegaMarket, and it was only a few stops away on the metro. So, we would grab our backpacks, walk a block to the metro, go down a ridiculously long escalator, then hop on a metro and ride a couple stops down.   Then we would walk a few blocks and there it was..…Megamarket! Second reason why