A Day In The Life

Every once in awhile I write about one of our days here. Yesterday we have four pictures from different parts, so I thought it would be a good day to blog about. Although now that it was already half a day ago, I'm not sure if I remember what all we did yesterday! I'll try my best. =) Nathan and Matty went to preschool for the first time yesterday with Anneka. I love this picture that Martina took of them walking to the van. Matty and Anneka on their own decided to hold hands.

While the kids were in school, Leif and I went on a nice walk up the hill and in a pretty wooded area. Ella was with us and she slept happily in her stroller. (It's so cute how she loves to sleep in the stroller. She gets the biggest smile on her face when we carry her and the stroller down the stairs and she literally falls asleep within 30 seconds of being seated). We walked and talked and prayed for teammates, people in our church, and for Ulan Ude. I love looking down at the city and thinking of how much God loves the people here. We sat on a rock and sipped some tea that I'd packed in a thermos. We saw a man with his goats roaming the hillside. The weather was sunny and pleasant.

Martina braved driving in Russia for the first time on our way to pick up the kids. During that time, Leif make phone calls and checked emails. I got Anneka a little roll from the bread stand (a tradition on school days). We had lunch together as a family (leftover enchiladas). Then Leif went next door to listen to something Dave had prepared in Russian and I read to Anneka and tucked her into bed for her rest time. Leif came back and worked on some official paperwork that he needs to turn in soon. I made baby food (pureed split peas), but Ella was kind of fussy(teeth?) and needed me to hold her the whole time.



Then Ella went down for her nap and Leif headed outside to teach neighborhood kids how to play basketball. Martina called to ask if Anneka wanted to go out and play with her boys. She did, and I was so grateful for Martina's offer, as we were having guests later and I still had to get things ready. I took the picture above from our balcony. In the top left corner you can seen Leif with the kids and down at the bottom you can see Anneka and the boys playing in the sandbox. While they were outside, I got a call that we would be having some guests in about 20 minutes. I threw some cookies in the oven. Then I madly did dishes and took laundry off the clothes racks.



After Leif showed Heidi some basketball moves and let Anneka slam dunk a few baskets(and talking outside for a bit- Ella was awake by then), Dwayne (the guy who opened up SEND in Russia) and another man, Tom, came in for tea. It was neat to hear what they're doing in the States, training missionary pilots. Right now they're training Russians to do this in their home country. We shared our ministry with them as well. Heidi played with the girls. I went into the kitchen to make dinner (pizza) and more cookies. John joined us.

Oh, and I must add that when Anneka met Dwayne, she was SO THRILLED because she could try out her knock-knock joke on him. In a fit of giggles, she smoothly executed this joke:
Knock-knock
Who's there?
Dwayne
Dwayne who?
Dwayne the bathtub, I'm dwowning

He loved it. Silly girl!



Guests overlapped each other (but no pictures to show). Sasha and Lena came over and so did Dave and Martina. And later Sasha and Katia came, too. It was so nice to talk with them and have time together. Somewhere in there Lena read Anneka a book and I put the girls to bed.

Now I remember why I don't write these that often... it sounds kind of boring all written out. Also in the middle was time that we read our Bibles and more phone calls and emails. Sasha's borrowing our camera for a fishing trip, so I'll just post a few pics from this past week in the next few days.