Hope

     When people start shoveling snow off of roofs, there is HOPE that it will reach above freezing at some point in the next few weeks.  A lady at the swimming pool reprimanded me the other day for not wearing 3 layers of pants.  I told her that I was tired of wearing all of the clothes and that I had hope that it would be spring soon.  Basically, her reply was, "Oh, no, no, honey.  It's going to be winter for a LONG time yet".  But I saw the snow/roof shoveling.  So I can remove a layer.  I have hope.

Four Years Old!

     Our Ike is 4!  For his birthday we went to an indoor play place at a mall in Ulan Ude.  He invited his family and his buddy, Bogdan (and Bogdan's sister and mom).  The kids had a great time running around and playing.

Ike LOVES his friend Bogdan!

     After the play place, each person could choose 4 things that they did at the arcade.  Here they were hitting groundhogs.

... and we all had a wild and wonderful ride on the bumper cars!

     After all of the fun playing we headed over the food court for lunch.

Ike's lunch of choice was chicken nuggets, fries, and berry juice.

     The day before the party, Ike told me he wanted a Spiderman cake.  I found food coloring here in Ulan Ude (the first time ever!) and Leif and I made the cake together after the kids went to bed.  

     ... And as an extra special surprise, there was this transformer guy who greeted Ike on our way out of the building.  He must have known it was Ike's birthday!  ;)  

     Ike, we love you so much!  You are so sweet and funny.  We love how much you talk and the wonderful way you describe things with your words.  We also love how busy you are.  It is so fun to watch you creating and playing and putting things together.  You are so affectionate with your hugs and kisses and "I love you"'s . What a gift you are to us!  We thank God for giving us you!

Meat For Sale, Day of Prayer, and Other Snippets...

      I love how people pull up to the side of the road with their trunks full of meat for sale.  Ike and I were out the other day and bought a beef roast.  It didn't look that big when I bought it because it was small in comparison to the other slabs of meat, but when I brought it home to put it in the freezer, I realized it was HUGE!  It's nice to buy meat in the winter because we can be pretty sure it's safe/fresh.  It's also so nice to buy from local people, and to know that there aren't hormones or chemicals added.

 

     This weekend we had our annual team day of prayer.  We had times of worship and praying both inside and outside for each other, Buryatia, and also other fields of ministry around the world.  Daniela prepared songs that the kids were familiar with from the Thailand Conference.  They were so excited to sing and to do the motions to these special praise songs!

      This picture is a little washed out from the light coming in the window, but we enjoyed meals together during this day.  We have a really great team and praise God for one another!

      The girls have recently begun piano lessons, complete with Music Theory classes.  Their teacher is excellent and comes right to our home!  We are having a trial run for a month, but I think we'll continue because the girls are really liking it.  This week, we had to feed the girls at the beginning of their lesson because Anneka had been traveling (walking far in the cold) to a local school to put on a skit.  She got home just in time to start her lesson.  Here, Sveta was teaching them to write music notes on a staff.

     Leif has had a lot of late night Skype meetings this week.  To combine our time zone with people in western Russia and in Canada/America, it often means meetings until after midnight.  He's had a good attitude about it.  I don't think I could sit that long in front of the screen!  I took this picture through the glass door, so as not to disturb him.  =)

     Two weeks ago, we had a women's retreat with some materials that Martina was recently given on "soul care" for women.  We had a lot of time to pray, reflect, read, and go through questions.  We also had good times of fellowship.  It was nice because we were able to to do it before Nettie headed back to the States and right when Renata came back (there was only about a 6 day window there).  Leif was leading the Buryat Partnership that day and took all three kids with him.  It was also really cold that day!  (It's always quite the process to bundle everyone to go outside). He's pretty amazing!

     There are certain people who bring out the sillies in our kids.  Pastor Sasha is one of them.


     ...and Art is another.  Art is very creative and artistic.  He often makes fun animals out of paper and gives them to the kids.  They are their treasures!

     We've had a new boy and his mom come to our English Club a couple of weeks.  I got to teach him an English lesson one week.  He's blind, and he is so smart!  It was very fascinating to me to watch him learn and memorize new words and exceptions to rules in the English language. It was also a good challenge for me to think of ways to teach with only using sounds and the sense of touch.   I told him that I think God has given him a gift of language.  I'm not sure if he comes from a believing family or not.  But he is special, and I can see the Lord using him in amazing ways!

     My new favorite thing I'm a part of is an English discussion group with Christian ladies from different churches.  This picture was taken from the first week, but more ladies are coming.  I really love these ladies and feel very connected with them.  Sveta has three young kids, so Ike comes with me and likes to play with them.  It's good for my Russian, too, because they'll ask me how to say things and I'll discover more conversational ways of saying things in Russian that I had previously said more awkwardly.  These ladies like to talk about things that I like to talk about and have very interesting lives.  They also all want to grow, and we shared what's on our hearts and prayed together.  We each said that we felt joy in our hearts after meeting together!  =)  It will be interesting to see what becomes of this group.  For now it's just a really encouraging time that fills me up to have energy for other things.

A Good Start to 2016!

      It may seem kind of late to be writing another holiday blog, but the holidays last much longer here than in the States.  Our friend, Renata, just returned from her first Christmas in America in something like 9 years.  She said that it really struck her how right after Christmas, everything was just OVER.  Here, the celebrations seem to last for weeks.  Decorations are still up in most stores, and there is New Years on the 1st and Old New Years (on the 14th).  And Russian Christmas in between.  We just got a Christmas card in the mail today.  =) 

      Inka invited us out to the village to celebrate the coming of 2016 with a family that she's become friends with.  It was a special time for us all, and it was really nice to get to know this family better, talk with one another, and have fun!  Of course, it was a bonus to the kids that they got to pet Inka's dog and cat for 2 days straight!

      We ate a ton of food.  I didn't get any good pictures of our feast, but I think we had three dinners (of course, we had to have the traditional feast right after midnight, too) and a huge breakfast.  I was full for the next 3 days!!  We shared our new favorite game with everyone (it's called Mister X).

      Our friend, Lena, worked at a fireworks stand this year, so we picked up some sparklers, a couple of Roman candles and some confetti/bee things.  The kids loved it!  We did this earlier in the evening in case the kids went to bed.  But we they all ended up staying awake until almost 1:00 anyways.

      Because we did our little "fireworks" earlier, we were able to watch everyone elses' after the turn of the New Year.  I was amazed at how many there were!

      We came back in and played (and ate) some more.  We pray that this dear family will know the love of God in deep ways this year!


 
     A few days after the New Year we had a holiday dinner for our home group.


It was the night before Russian Christmas, so nobody had to leave early to get to bed for work the next day.  We enjoyed hanging out and playing games together.

           We had a play at our church on January 7th (Russian Christmas).

      Friends from our neighborhood came with us.  I thought it was cute that little Angelina (6 years) from our church came up and sat on our friend's lap for most of the play!

 And, of course, we ate together after the service.  Here's the kids' table.

In English Club we had a special week to talk about New Years, the ways we celebrate this holiday in our different cultures, and to have deeper discussions, too.  At the beginning we played a game where each team had to decorate a New Years' tree (yes, in Russia it's a New Years tree instead of a Christmas tree).  These kids turned out pretty cute!


     I got the privilege of listening in on the different discussion groups without being in one myself.  I loved overhearing this group when Olya shared that something she's looking forward to this year is getting baptized.  I took this picture right as she was sharing (she's in the middle in the back).  She was just glowing with joy, and I loved thinking about all that God has done in her heart and life in the few years we've known her.  May we all continue to grow more and more in love with Him this year!!

Christmas

     I'm just now getting to our Christmas blog.  It was so busy surrounding Christmas, and then we enjoyed our time when the kids were out of school to connect with other families and make the most of the time.  Just this week we're getting back into a "normal" schedule again (that is, if you can ever use the words "normal" or "schedule" with missionary life!!).  On Christmas Eve, we hosted our team for a party.  Nettie set up a little photo booth for whoever wanted to take silly pictures (I think it was just kids!)

      We enjoyed our tradition of acting out the Christmas story.

.....and eating lots of great food!  We also sang Christmas carols together by candlelight in a few languages.  This is a special time that we all treasure.

     This year the adults drew names for giving presents and got food items for each other.  But the kids each got unique gifts.  These girls looked so cute in their matching hats.  I just love their pet zebra, too!  =)

     Ike and Bogdan got power tools with safety goggles.  They zipped those things all around the house and had so much fun!



          Then on the 26th (after our busy performance day and a night of sleeping under the Christmas tree as a family), we awoke to a special morning together.  Each of the kids had made a special gift for the family.  Anneka wrote a book about a pony that we had laminated and bound.  Ella made us a calendar (all on her own during her rest time- not one of us knew what was on the pages), and Ike made a framed painting.  They were each so excited to share their special gifts with the family.

 
     Something else really special was that our friends, the Lacys, sent amazing presents for our whole family.  Our kids loved everything they sent, as their (same-aged) kids hand-picked gifts they knew they would love.  Our friend Erin sent wonderful presents, too.   She found a game set that she played as a little girl that's PERFECT for our family.  Inside are games that even Ike can play without being on a team with someone else.  It makes it really fun for all of us on our family nights!  Our parents sent special gifts, too, and we felt so loved by the love and care that went into shipping them all of the way here!

     Nettie came and joined us in the afternoon.  She helped the kids put together legos and we played a very fun game that she gave our family.  (can you tell that we love games?)  We ordered Chinese food for dinner and watched a ridiculous Christmas dog movie and just relaxed.

     The next day, ,the older kids at church put on a play.  Anneka was a horse and did a great job with her lines!  She only had one day in between her other performance and this one. 

 

     We enjoyed a meal together as a church family after the service.

     I had to snap this picture with Baba Ira, all dressed up to go outside in her fur hat and coat. 

     We feel so thankful that even amidst a busy season, God also gave us special times as a family and with loved ones to celebrate Him. 

More Performances

Not only did Anneka have performances the week of Christmas, but Ike, Ella, and Leif did, too!  Ike's was at his preschool on December 24th and he was so cute!

 
         The kids danced and sang around the tree and were a part of a little play with Grandfather Frost and his granddaughter, Snow Girl.



     It's traditional for kids to dress in costumes for New Years programs, and Ike recently inherited this knight costume from some boys on our team who have outgrown it.  He was quite dashing.  By the end, though, he was so hot that he began taking off piece by piece.  The program was 1.5 hours and he kept asking me when it would be over!  =)

 
     Then to get a piece of candy, the kids had to say a poem to Grandfather Frost.  I'd forgotten about this tradition, and Ike doesn't know any poems in Russian!  He was very shy, but he also really wanted the candy.  I told him to just say the words of "Silent Night" in English.  He did, and it worked!  All of the kids got hand-picked toys from their teachers.  Ike's gift was a keyboard to play on!  He loves it and plays it often.


     Christmas morning we awoke to temperatures of -40 (it's the same in Farenheit and Celcius).  He hadn't anticipated this.  Normally we keep our van in a garage because we share it with other teammates.  But we chose to keep it close by beacause the 25th was a very busy day for us with Ella's morning kindergarten, a needed trip to the immigration office, Leif and Ella's performance, and Anneka's three performances.  We had already decided to celebrate Christmas as a family on the 26th, and I'd asked people to pray for our hearts to be filled with peace and joy in this busy time.  Well,  needless to say with the frigid temperatures, our engine was frozen solid!!  I called a taxi for taking Anneka to the theatre building, and all of the taxis were busy because everyone's car was frozen!  Thus began an extra-busy day for us with not only all of our things but the added stress of trying to get the car heated.

      The very cool thing, though, is that we knew people were praying for us and we really did have peace and joy!!  I called a guy to come and warm up our van.  It took him 2 hours to come (because of all of the other frozen cars) and then he tried for 4 hours and still didn't get it started.  He returned later and finally got it started at 11:30 at night!  Here's Ike, my little buddy, waiting with me in the van for the guy to come back after getting a better heater.  He insisted on wearing his new safety goggles that he got at our team Christmas party the night before. =)



     Here's Ella after preschool, checking out the ice decorations they put out for the holidays.  It's way too cold to make snowmen, but they made these out of blocks of ice.  I brought her home for lunch and to get her all ready for her performance! 


     I wasn't sitting where I could get a picture of all of the girls from Ella's class, but they did a "Malvina" dance and were the beautiful puppet girl from Pinnocio.  They were all so cute in their blue hair and dresses.

     Ella loved being a Malvina and it was so fun to watch her!

     One special surprise was that Leif was Grandfather Frost!  He had a lot of lines and most of them were in poetic form so he couldn't just "wing it".  He did a great job.  Besides his lines, he danced and played games with the kids.  I got a video of Ella the moment she realized it was Leif.  Her eyes lit up and she got a huge smile.  Then she told the boy next to her, with delight, "That's my Papa!" 


     While the kids in Ella's class were getting their gifts of big boxes of candy, Ike and I got our picture taken with the star. I had a lot of fun watching parents faces as Leif played out his role.  They all had big smiles as they watched him.

     I noticed that Ella's class was getting their picture but Ella didn't have her wig!  I raced into the other room, grabbed it, set it on her head and snapped this picture.  But by then the kids were done posing, I think.  =)

     Here's Ella telling Leif that she knew he was Grandfather Frost.  So cute.

     So even though our actual Christmas day wasn't exactly traditional, and it was kind of crazy with the cold, no van, and everything going on, it was rich in blessings!