The Voices of Ukrainians

(I’m going to write more on our experience at camp, but this is just about my relationship with kids who were in my room. ) Vlad was sitting on my left.  His head resting on my chest.  “You’re my new uncle.  You’re a good uncle.”  Man, that made me feel great. Valerie who was sitting on my right, head also on my chest, said, “You’re my new papa. You’re a good papa.”  That brought up more complicated feelings for me.  I felt great because it was only the second night of camp and Valerie already trusted me, but I felt terrible because I knew the only reason Valerie was saying that was because he wanted and needed someone to be his papa.  I squeezed both of the boys as I held back tears.  I hate what these kids have to live through. Me with Vlad and Valerie ******** This past week, Janna and I were at camp with Safe Haven.  We were told we couldn’t visit the orphanage in Komarivka so we took advantage of the opportunity to see how Safe H...

Here are some pictures from our trip to Budapest. We went last month to reset our visas and had a pretty good time. Unfortunately we were both under the weather, and so we didn't get to do as much as we wanted. More reason to go back! It's truly a beautiful city, perfect for walking around, and so we enjoyed exploring the streets, shopping, and eating at different restaurants. Hungarian food is really good, at least all the stuff we tried! Some memorable dishes were sampled included chicken in paprika sauce (Hungary is is really famous for its paprika), Hungarian beef with noodles, garlic soup, some sort of chicken with some sort of sauce,  and pork with peppers. We also found a few American style restaurants, and had burritos, sweet and sour chicken, pasta, and pizza. For me, food is definitely a highlight of traveling. That and finding interesting things like this: It's really a pink phone! I love it! This is a synagogue called The Budapest Great Synag...

When I was a kid, every summer we traveled the eight hours to Memaw and Pepaw’s house and spent a week.  We would hang out with all of our cousins.  We would stay up late, go hiking in the woods, go play putt-putt, go to the lake or the zoo and eat Memaw’s candy.  We did all the great things you do when you visit Memaw and the cousins.  Next door to Memaw and Pepaw, our second cousins, two brothers,  were usually visiting their grandma at the same time we were visiting ours.  They were younger than all of my first cousins, so naturally they wanted to hang out with us all the time.  We were older.  We were always doing something, and we could go lots of places they couldn't go … unless they went with us.  They were always knocking at the door, “Um… can Daniel, … or Shae … or Brandon come out and play.”  It started to get out of hand.  So eventually, their grandma told them that they weren't allowed to knock on Me...

Свидетельство Жанны Я родилась в христианской семье. Мои родители брали меня с собой в церковь по воскресеньям. Когда мне было 7 лет, мы проходили в церкви причастие, но я не понимала, зачем мы делали это. Моя мама обЪяснила мне, зачем и потом я помолилась и попросила Иисуса Христа войти в моё сердце. После этого  Я учила библейские истории в Воскресной школе. Но я следовала правилам просто потому, что я не хотела попасть в беду, а не потому, что я любила Бога. Когда Я была подростком, я не курила, не пила, и не встречалась с парнями. У меня были хорошие друзья (все христиане) и мы ходили в молодежную группу каждую неделю. Я продолжала расти в моей вере. Когда я училась в университете, я думала, что я хороший человек. Я знала что я грешна, но это не беспокоило меня. Другие люди были хуже, чем я. Однако мне нравилось служить, и Я служила в разных местах. Я всегда хотела помогать детям, которые живут в интернатах в России или в Восточной Европе . Но сначала Я боялась ис...

We haven’t written about Anya in a while, so I thought it was time to catch you up on what’s been happening to her.  You can read about her and the surgery she went through last year here .  Us with Anya at the beginning of school year Anya, was born with a deformed hip and one leg shorter than the other, so she’s always walked with a pronounced limp.  A year and a half ago, we learned that if she didn’t have surgery to repair some of these defects, then soon, her condition would start to degenerate and eventually she would be unable to walk.  So Doug, our team leader, started working on getting her that operation.  After months and months of hounding the doctors and trying to get the cooperation of the orphanage staff and Anya’s alcoholic mom, Doug got her into the hospital.  Then Anya sat in the hospital for a month before surgery happened. After all was said and done, the hospital didn’t do any physical therapy, so Anya’s recovery was only a fraction ...

So we haven’t been able to go into the orphanage in over a month.  It started out as a quarantine, which was planned a week in advance (I wish I could understand how that works).  Then, apparently, some group brought some food into another orphanage and kids got sick.  So every orphanage in the region was closed to visitors apparently.  I think part of it is the director, he wants to flex his muscle.  He’s also afraid of his superiors finding out so many people visit his orphanage (I’ve heard that is a very soviet thing, don’t draw attention to yourself).  And so on. But we haven’t seen most of the kids for over a month.  We’ve seen some of the kids when they come out and talk to us on the street just outside of the orphanage.  We’ve seen some in the hospitals, which is always a great time.  But I haven’t seen Sasha, Misha, and so many other kids in a long time. Me and Nadia, hanging out just outside the orphanage I miss them.  T...

Our team in Ukraine is doing something new.  We are using Doug’s Ukrainian organization, Children’s Hope and the Stoddards, the Ross's, and Meisha Dean are going to work on providing resources for Christians in Ukraine who want to provide homes for orphans.  And so we are starting to raise money through Children’s Hope Ukraine (check out our new website , but note that you can’t donate there yet). We know couples who want to or have already started transition homes. Couples like Slavic and Tanya. Our team met them last summer when we were looking for a couple to be house parents at Smile House. We unanimously agreed that they would be the ideal couple for the ministry. But someone in social services threatened to take their children away if they moved from Western Ukraine to Smile House. For a while, we were very disappointed by this turn of events. But slowly we came to realize that maybe it was for the best.  No matter what we wanted to help them in their ministry The...