Happy Holidays

I am at my sister's now enjoying some holiday rest with my nephew and nieces and friends here. It is really beautiful to be here and just be away from my responsibilities. The change of scenery is really beautiful here. There is a little snow every day and it just feels so wintery. It has reminded me of how much heat I have in my apartment as the Gollan's are not able to heat their house quite as much as my apartment is heated. It is cool here, but still quite pleasant. The Gollan's have a beautiful tree. It is the hugest tree I've ever seen. Not the typical American cone tree shape, more like a round ball, but really lovely. The kids have decorated the house with snowflakes and other Christmas deocrations and it is beautiful.
I'll certainly enjoy the next couple of weeks of rest and relaxation as we celebrate New Year's and then Ukrainian Christmas here (or as the children call it "Big Christmas", the Gollan's celebrated "little Christmas" on the 25th).

Christmas Party

L to R: back row--Lena, Larissa, Julia (who works in my office), Tonia, Ira (who also works in my office); front row--Me, Daryna, Lena (who works in my office and is Daryna's mum) and Tanya

I meant to post these pictures earlier this week, but lost my camera cord so couldn't do that. I had a little Christmas party last Saturday at my apartment. I made some American style treats (like pretzel bark and peanut brittle) and we watched "Christmas with the Kranks" in English. The idea had originally started because one of the girls asked to borrow a movie in English only to discover that she couldn't play it on her computer here do to the different format. So, this way they all got to come and watch it.

This picture is the same as the one above, except that Alla (Julia's sister) is sitting in the spot I occupied.

It was a great evening and the girls really enjoyed the treats and time together. Unfortunately I didn't manage to get a picture of Lika or Luba (the ladies who are living with me), but I will try to do so in the future.
Tonight I am off to my sister's for two weeks of much needed rest. I'm looking forward to spending time with the family and not having the stresses of work around. I probably won't post much during that time, esp. since we'll be celebrating New Year's and then Ukrainian Christmas (or just Christmas for me).

Happy CHRISTmas and I hope that the true Joy of the season will remain in your hearts throughout the next year.

Keep Praying

Please do continue to pray for me and Lika over the next few weeks/months. I am running ragged and it is not that I actually have that much more on my plate. The main thing is that I am just not able to relax as much at home which means I wear out very easily, but since I have to keep going, I am drinking caffeine which in the end will only make things worse. :)
Lika is definitely doing some thinking and we have been able to have some conversations where God helped me to point out how much He is doing and is willing to do for her. She has a lot of trust barriers to overcome.
This week promises to be a little stressful for me as I try to wrap up things here at the office so that I can leave on Friday to go to my sister's for two weeks.
Pray that help comes together for the apartment while I am away. I don't expect much work to be done in the next two weeks, because of the holidays, but it would be great if someone would step up and be willing to organize things.

Saga Continues

The electricity has been turned off in Lika's apartment, but the people at the electric company are refusing to turn it back on. They say there are repairs that have to be done, but they won't tell her what the repairs are... She's been there at least three or four times already. It really looks like they are holding out for a bribe. Please pray that they will, like the unjust judge, give her fair treatment because of her persistence.

On a happier note, a couple of men from one of the churches have offered to help out at Lika's place. They are willing to work for a low price and apparently have good experience. Please pray that she will accept their help and that they will do good work and quickly so she can move back in and that it will be a witness to her.

Christmas Season

It looks like Lika, Luba and Carmen will be staying at my place for the next month or two. It is immediately stressful, and not. Actually, Lika is very good and she cooks and they do the dishes and they even washed the kitchen floor! So, they are not difficult guests to have. Lika had hoped to be only staying with me for a couple of weeks at the most, but I think she'll need a minimum of a month and quite possibly two or more before she is able to move back into her own place. She is a very aggressive woman, and she is anxious to get back into her apartment, so we'll see, but I think some of these things just take time. They have to completely replaster the whole apartment and she can't live there while they are doing that, but I think that as soon as that is done she'll want to move back home.
In the meantime I have a perfect opportunity to share the Christmas spirit with the three of them. Yes, it has upset my life and my plans. It does require adjustment and I am a little high strung so I find it more stressful than some would, but Lord willing, through this I will be able to share the real meaning of Christmas with Lika. It is a sacrifie for me, but it is one that is willingly made. I think I actually find the spiritual burden for Lika to be the most difficult thing. Living arrangments can be sorted out, and my Christmas plans can easily be put on hold or changed. No, it doesn't feel very Christmassy to me right now, but if only I can give Lika the Christ of Christmas it will be all sooooo very worthwhile. Please really pray for that. Pray that God would just break through.
She is not closed spiritually, but I can't say she is open either. She believes in God and to a certain degree considers herself a Christian, but she has no personal relationship with Jesus.

Pictures of LIka's place after the fire

Here are some pictures of Lika's place right after the fire. This was her daughter's room. She had just managed to do some remodling in this room this summer and had just bought new furniture for her daughter.
This is where the fire started. Thankfully no one was home at the time. But basically they lost everything that they had, so that they only had the clothes they were wearing that day.





Right now, Lika and her mum are staying with me because they have no other place to go. Lika has sent her daughter to a sanitroium for two weeks so that she doesn't have to deal with all of this.
Please pray for me as I am trying to get some of the churches here to help them. And I have them living with me, which is a little stressful for me as I need to fix food for them and take care of them. But mostly pray for Lika. Her mum is sick and so she is the sole provider for her family and basically all of this rests on her shoulders. And she is struggling.

Helping Lika

Tomorrow I am taking some of my office staff to help Lika clean out her apartment. Hopefully we'll actually be able to help her. Please pray that we are able to actually be of good benefit to her and get some work done on the apartment as well as that we are able to find some people from the local churches who would be willing to do some of the repairs at cost or for free.
For some reason I am feeling stressed about going to Lika's tomorrow. I'm not sure why. I think I just so badly want to help her and I am afraid that we won't actually be of much assistance. Additionally, Vasia, the one of us who might actually know what he is doing, probably won't be able to help much because his wife is scheduled for delivery (c-section or induced I don't know) tomorrow. Pray that we are able to really be of assistance to her even though none of us really know what we are doing. And esp. that this would be a witness to her and her mother and daughter. And that it would relieve some of her stress. I think that is why I am feeling stressed, just because I want to help lift her burden so much and while I certainly do pray I know that there must be more that I can do. Tonight I went through my closet and picked out as many items as I could that I don't wear or rarely wear or that I feel I can spare for her as she is a similar size to me. Unfortunately there isn't a lot of winter clothing there.
Pray that I would be able to relax and sleep well tonight (could only sleep three hours last night because I was so tense and it is late again already). And pray that this would be a good experience for the office as well. I feel it is an opportunity to get them involved in "community service" as well as a good team building "activity", but since I don't really know what we are going to end up doing I also realize that it could just be a total flop and they may end up feeling like it was a waste of time (although I'm paying them anyway, so I suppose they'd just be able to count it as a "day off" if we aren't able to do much).

Lika

Please pray for my friend Lika and her daughter Carmen. They had a fire in their apartment last week and lost almost everything. I don't know what happened, except that they were not at fault for the fire and neither of them were home when it happened.
If I understand correctly, Lika's mother also lives with them. They had just done a lot of remodling this summer in the one room that they live in and that is the room where the fire was. Lika is feeling very discouraged right now. Inflation has totally changed the price for remodling and repairs and really the whole apartment needs to be done now, so that will be a huge expense. She had saved up to do the remodling this summer and I can't imagine that she has much money saved right now.
Lika said that the fridge still works and she has one cupboard that she is able to keep (apartments here don't have built in closets, you have to buy them all yourself). Everything is covered with soot and she and Carmen have lost their clothes and other personal belongings.
Lika is not a Christian. Please pray that God will use this to break down the final barriers that she may have so that she would surrender her life to God.

All on My Own

Mum has left to join dad in the States. She actually left Rivne on Monday evening, but she flies out of Kyiv tomorrow. Please pray for her flight and luggage. She has some heavy bags so please pray that she doesn't have any trouble with them, esp. since she has to cart them around Orly (Paris) and apparently it is a quite inconvenient airport. She'll be in the States for three months.
So I am here alone now. Please pray for me as I manage the office and try to make wise decisions about financial things and decisions in relation to hiring people and delegating work and keeping up quality and morale as well as my own editing decisions and work that I need to get done every day. I've been feeling a little overwhelmed lately. I am working on the doctrine course which my father edited, but there are still a lot of kinks to work out and it is a heavy course and I am crunched for time. Besides that work I also need to prepare work for our Russian translator and I am working on hiring Ukrainian translators. And in my spare time I field financial questions and issues from our bookkeeper and other questions and issues relating to our office and course work.
Right now I really need to make Doctrine a priority, but I also need a clear mind to do that, which is more difficult to come by.

On a personal level I am making some new friends and struggling to balance that with my work life and my limited energy. I'm also trying to reconnect with some old friends as one of them recently pointed out that whether I realize it or not, I am lonely. Particularly now with my mum going away. But in any case, I have missed having companionship from someone my age as well.
Thankfully, I do have a little more energy right now, so I am able to use that to reach out a little and also begin to enjoy the Christmas season, for which I am grateful.

Coat Shopping

I finally managed to get out and buy a winter coat last week.
Mum was kind enough to go with me, so she took a couple of shots of us shopping. This is actually an outdoor market, it's just that this one alley near the main gate they have covered over. Most of the stalls are not much more than 10-12 feet square, although there are a few bigger places like the place I ended up buying my coat.
And this is the coat I ended up with! I think it will suit me well. Perhaps not as modern as some of the coats, but much more in my style and it was by $50 the cheapest coat I found! Plus it matches my red accessories (hat, purse and scarf)--what can I say, it's the big things in life...

Thanksgiving

We celebrated Thanksgiving on Friday instead of Thursday. Mum and I had the office in, as well as a couple of other people. It was a really lovely time. Not everyone that we had invited from the office was able to come, a couple of people being sick or having sick kids at home. That actually worked out well as it meant there was only a total of 16 of us instead of 22, plus our group was pretty much all in their 20's. It was a very relaxed evening. We didn't do much for entertainment, but just let everyone sit around and chat, which was kind of nice.
As you can see, even with the "smaller" group we managed to fill the place up pretty well! We set the tables up in a "T" shape to help accommodate everyone but even so it was cozy. :)
We had a great meal, with all of the necessities: turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, dressing, cranberry sauce, pumpkin soup and a few other family traditional favorites. Mum had arranged to have a couple of the girls (not from the office) come over early to help her out with preparations which made the day a little easier for her and a lot easier for me. Afterwards, Laura and her husband (who had both come earlier and helped), stayed and helped clean up as well. It was such a blessing to have them and just to have those extra hands.
Thanksgiving wasn't a time for family this year, but it was a really nice celebration with friends and coworkers.