Home Now

Well, we have been home for a couple of days now and I am finally starting to get rested up. We were up 36 straight hours to get home. That is a really long time. Each flight was packed. From Samara we were late. They could not get their computers to work. It is a very small airport. And I do mean small. One gate (I think). We were to have 2 hours in Frankfurt, but that went by in a hurry. That airport is huge, so getting from one place to another took a while. We did have a 6 hour lay over in Washington DC but we had to go through customs there so that seemed to take forever. We finally reached Dayton at around midnight. Everybody's family was there waiting on them. That was just great. It was so exciting seeing everyone. We all were totally exhausted. Bob had a school board meeting the next morning at 8:00 AM so we got a hotel room in Columbus. By the time we got to Columbus it was 1:30 AM. Believe it or not I slept until 3:00 PM. Never in my life have I done that!

So looking back on the trip, I would do it again in a minute. I first told Bob that I would go again tomorrow, then I said well maybe next week. I learned so much about the culture, the people, the country and I have to say about myself. I would like to bundle all of the kids up and move them to Ross County Ohio. I know that is not possible, so I feel like we did what we could do to make life a little better for them. We provided some happiness and support and told them about Christ. We gave them hope and encouragement of a better tomorrow. Through the example our kids set for them, they could see that they did not have to lead a life of drugs and alcohol and tobacco. We celebrated Christmas with them. If you could have only been there for that. (See picture at top)

I can hardly wait until the next time that God gives me an opportunity like this. I am watching and waiting. Until then.................................

This is the church where we worshiped on Sunday. The sanctuary is upstairs. You enter from the side. It is quite simple, yet pretty on the inside.
These are two of the girls from the orphanage just hanging out in my room being silly.
This is on the outside of the orphanage. We are walking back from the grocery. It was very cold and as you can tell, snowing still.
This was at around 4:00 AM when we arrived in Samara. It was a virtual blizzard. The wind was blowing and it was COLD! We had to get all of our bags into this bus and pile in! WOW!

I am sure that you are all wondering how the quilting went. We had mostly boys! I was not prepared for that. We made due. They all knew the sewing machines inside and out. I had no worries. They knew more than me. They threaded them, changed the bobbins, everything. It was great.
I hate to say I had a favorite, but well here she is. If I could have fit her in my suitcase her last name would have been Compher! What a sweetheart. She did not want us to leave. She would not go to bed on our last day. She hid and followed me to the computer. I kept telling her she was going to get into trouble, but she did not care. It was so sad. Just tore my heart out. She spoke very good English!
This little girl was the first to finish her quilt. She was very determined and it turned out beautiful.

This young man loved making the quilt. When he finished, he came back and helped other kids do theirs.

Our Last day in Russia

This has been a long day. We got up very early. We had to eat and be on the bus by 8:00 if I remember right. We were traveling to a Christian drug rehabilitation center. It was a couple of hours from here. IT WAS VERY, VERY COLD. They told us to be prepared to be outside. Can you even imagine? The orphanage packed snacks for us to take with us. We stopped by the church in Samara to pick up our interpreter Katya and the pastor and some others. They took some supplies to the center. It was a long beautiful ride through the country. I kid you not when I say it looked like we were driving through the tundra. They have had rain while we were here so there is ice on top of all of the snow. It is absolutely beautiful. Pastor Olga keeps saying "ice flowers" and I can even understand her! I don't know what time we got there, but whenever it was we had to go through the introduction thing where they could not understand us and we could not understand them but we did it anyone. You understand don't you? The polite thing, right? Anyway, they loved us being there. Each person there told his "story" through the interpreter. It was quite interesting. We toured the facility. It was a farm. They had all the animals you would expect. Some of the kids got to milk the cows. They took us took their cellar where they had all of their vegetables stored from their garden. They had huge bins of potatoes. Cabbages were hanging from the ceiling. Lots of different vegetables were canned. Fascinating. The highlight of my trip.............we got to take a horse drawn sled ride. I LOVED IT! It was the coolest thing in the world. They put us in the sleigh and covered us with these big wool blankets. What a ride. A dream come true. I felt like I was in the movie "Heidi". By the time we got back I was frozen to the core. I did not get warm until I got out of a hot shower.

We had to say goodbye to Pastor Olga, Natasha and our interpreter Katya from here. That was so hard. They are such good people. They have been so good to us. I had a really hard time with this. But the worse was yet to come.

When we got back to the orphanage the children were all waiting on us but so was our dinner. We had to eat but the kids had a hard time with this. We ate as quickly as we could and then we played. Everyone went their own separate way. I am not sure what everyone did. Our room sort of turned into a hang out. Caitlin, Diane, Myself and I am not sure who else ended up there with 5 or 6 kids at a time. They just kept coming and going. It was so hard. One little girl just saying she did not want us to go home. I told her I had to go to see my husband and she said to tell him to come here. I would tell her that I had a job at school and she would say but we have schools here. She always had an answer. That is tough! They stayed up about 1 1/2 hour after their bedtime. Then when I came down to the computer she was hiding around the computer and came to the computer room with me. She was in her pajamas. I kept saying "You are going to get into trouble" and she said "No I won't". I finally left so she would go to bed.

Well this had been a great trip. A hard one though. I have seen a lot. I have done lot. I am ready to go home.

A full day at the orphanage

I am so sorry I am late again. I won't surprise any of you that I was out shopping until late! Really I was! More about that later.

Yesterday got started with getting up at 7:30 and showers. That is an experience in itself. We practically have to

swim

to the shower. No shower curtain. I will have to decribe that one is person. The plumbing is something I just can't write about. I have pictures, but I am sure the pictures won't tell the story either. Any way,

then devotions were at 8:45 followed by breakfast at 9:00. Meals seem to go on forever. They just keep bringing food. Breakfast and lunch are the big meals. Dinner is smaller yet often times too big. At 10:00 we started quilting again. We made 14 of the 20 quilts. They only had 7 machines. The teacher of the sewing class even made one. She was so excited. I let the extas with her so she could make the rest with the students. They turned out very nice. Believe it or not most of the ones who wanted to sew were boys. Who would have thought. I remembered that I brought a video camera, so some of the boys filmed the session yesterday. I was going to try to upload it on the blog today, but it just seems to big a project to tackle this morning!

While one group was quilting another group was doing a make over with Mary Kaye. Of course, the girls loved it. We have that on film also. I am sure that you will enjoy seeing the children in action.

By this time it was time to PARTY. Can you even imagine all of those children in one room opening Christmas gifts?? Well, it was quite an ordeal! It was almost more than I could take. They received a sweater, a pair of shoes, a neck scarf, a pair of gloves, a beanie babie, a hat, lotion, some chap stick, some finger nail polish (girl), a ball (boy), ball cap (boy). Now what did you get for Christmas this year? Makes you think doesn't it? I know we can't change the world but at least all of you helped us bring a lot of love to these children on this one day. They were so excited. You can not even imagine. Some of them had everything on all at one time. It was the greatest thing to see. It was a very humbling experience. Wondering if that is what God had in mind for me on this trip???

Af the party it was time to eat again. I have taken a couple of pictures of our table at mealtime, you will enjoy seeing them.

Now it was time to play again. Joe, Luke, Derek, Ryan, Diane, Amy, Alyssa, Cydney all played Soccer and volleyball I think. Caitlin and I made friendship bracelets. More than you can even imagine. The kids came from everywhere. they loved those things. We left all the leftover supplies here so they can continue. You would have thought we had gold beads! Once again, it was not just the girls boys did this also.

We did this until dinner. By this time we are saying "Not another meal. We just ate!" We sat and talked at the tables after dinner. Some of the people from the church were here with us. Finally one said "Let's go to the market". And of course all of us jumped and said "Let's go"! This means the mall!

We walked just a short distance not by sidewalk, but over the river and through the woods, sort of, to the mall. It was cold and slippery. Shopping here is a frustrating experience. Most of the time they reject your credit card. We all called our credit card companies. That does not matter. One time they will work, the next time no! We just sort of share and pay each other cash. We all were able to get a few souvenirs. That was great.

By the time we got back and had devotions it was 11:30 and way past my bedtime! I wish you all could be here with us. These little (and big) kids are the best. They are not wanting us to go home. I told one little girl yesterday that I had to go home to see my husband and she told me to bring him over here. She said you just move here. She is a beautiful young girl and speaks beautiful English. Leaving is going to be hard.

More later.

Busy day

I have a few minutes before breakfast so I will start now and hopefully be able to finish later....................

It is 8:40 on I think Wednesday. Yesterday we did not get back until 11:00 and so I was dead tired and did not blog. Sorry. I am going to try to make up for it now.

We started the day going to a different town and I couldn't spell it if I wanted to. It must be 20 letters long. Just know that it is about 45 -60 minutes from here. We visited a place that is working with the gypsies. The gypsies in Russia are the people that do all of the drug trafficking and stealing. They are just the all around bad guys. Well, this is a program for the children of the gypsies. Actually, I think some adults come there, too. The children put on a concert for us. They danced and sang. It was beautiful. They are quite good. Afterward they had tea with us. Luke had his guitar so we shared songs with them. It was the coolest thing when one of the girls (through translation) said that she was able to forget all of her troubles just listening to our music. The holy spirit was definitely in that place. This was their Christmas Eve, so the children had to leave after a while. The director of this place took us to a place like a city park maybe where people were sledding and playing. It was a fun spot, but very cold. It was decorated very pretty. We could only stay for a little while. Russians dress better for the cold than us and they are much tougher than we are! They then took us For pizza. Can you even imagine that this was my first Diet Coke since I don't know how long? The pizza was good, too.

From here we went to the church in Samara to celebrate Christmas with the youth. We had a service first of all. More singing and praising the Lord in 2 languages. WOW. Luke and Joe were able to sing this time. It was just way to cool. The Russians just loved it. They actually know some of our songs and artists. The spirit was in that church last night. We then went the basement for refreshments and fellowship. Caitlin and our translator Katya shared their testimonies and then it was more food.

We did not get back to the orphanage until about 11:00 and do you know they were holding our dinner! I could not believe it. They would have been offended had we not eaten. I tried, but did not eat much. It is hard to turn down their bread. I think it was some kind of stroganoff but I did not try it. I have taken some pictures of the food, you will find them interesting.

This pretty much sums up our day yesterday. Today we are quilting and doing makeup again. Today is Christmas so we will be partying sometime. Other than that we are playing with kids all day.

Glad you all had a snow day. Hope you all rested! More later.

Thanks

We really want to thank all of you for posting comments. It just makes our day to read them. Keep them coming. It is great to hear from you.