Nikolaev Ukraine Day Ten

Mary is posting today.

We woke up this morning and packed up all of stuff and moved to a new apartment. It is near our old apartment building and we only have to climb five flights of stairs now! It is really nice. It kind of feels like I am staying at my Catholic Grandmother's house, if I had one. It has two separate bedrooms (with doors!), a living room, a kitchen, and a bathroom, and most importantly a washing machine! We moved to this new apartment so our facilitator can move in with us. We were having to pay for her hotel room so hopefully this option will help us save money. With all of the delays, etc. every penny or kopyeka counts! The reason why it feels like I am living in a Catholic Grandmother's house is in our living room there is a giant tapestry of the Last Supper. All of the rooms have Cherub pictures and crosses and we have all sorts of religious and non religious knick knacks everywhere. All of the furniture is nice, but kind of "Grandma style", for the US anyways. Here are a few pictures for you!

 

Our Hallway to the Front Door

Our Lovely Kitchen!

 



Our Fabulous Living Room!

 

 

Another Angle of our Living Room that includes some of the many knick knacks!

 

The Last Supper Tapestry in the Living Room.

Our New Bedroom.

 

Natasha's Bedroom, yes that is a pull out couch bed.

 

 

We are very thankful for our new home and we will be comfortable here.

 

 

After the move, we drove out to the Summer Camp to visit the kids. B was waiting for us at the gate again. When we got out of the car he took us over to where he had been waiting and showed us this:

 



 

Yes! Those are snails! B collected them while he was waiting for us. Yes, he is all boy! He was very proud to show them to us. After that he walked us into camp and he sat us down to wait for K. While we were waiting for K, B found one of his friends, which is an older, pretty teenage girl. He asked us for our camera and took a picture of her. He then went inside and grabbed the teddy bear we gave him on the first day we met him and put it in his bag. He then said he would be back in a minute and he took her off a little ways and gave her the bear. It was kind of adorable! When K showed up she looked really sad and tired. I asked James to ask her if she was okay and she said that she was sick. She has a sore throat and a cough. She said she had been to the doctor at the camp and they had given her some medicine. We all went over to the benches we often sit at and started our visit. We talked to K a little bit more about how she was feeling and we decided to have James take her back to the doctor at the camp so that he could talk to him. I hung back and stayed with B while James and K left. James was able to purchase better medicine for K and on the way back they were able to chat and K felt comfortable enough to ask about getting some farewell gifts for her friends. B found his friend again and James was able to get a good picture of B and his friend. I think it is starting to hit the kids that they will be leaving. After that we were able to get in some football (soccer) and some more card games. As always our visit felt very short. After we got back into Nikolaev, we received a call that the medicine was helping K and she was starting to stabilize, which is good! It is hard to know what to do in a foreign country when your kiddo is sick. I don't recognize any of the products here.

Later this evening, James and I hunted down some the items the kids requested: lip gloss, chapstick, shampoo, soap, etc. It was an interesting process. It isn't like you can just go to Target or Walmart to find these things. Everything is in separate shops and in foreign packaging etc. so it is really hard to tell what the product is or does. For instance it took James and I over a week to find nail clippers! After that James and I had a nice dinner where we were able to chat about the crazy process we are going through then we walked home and Skyped with the kids. I was also able to Skype with my sister! It was awesome.