Sisters and Brothers Under 1 Father

Hey everyone!

Let me just start this off saying our hearts are all very heavy today. We keep hearing bits and pieces of supposed "news" but we dont know who to believe at this point. So far, all we have heard is that Nina ended up not traveling to Kiev with Sasha which is what we thought was the plan, and Sasha hasnt returned any messages because we are pretty sure he is in the meeting with the embassy to try to get Hope's summer program's kids visas approved (so lets not disturb him...) It is hard to trust, but we do understand that this whole process is in God's hands and for some strange reason, we are supposed to be here, and this is God's timing. On a happy note, yesterday morning Mom, Christina, and me all woke up at the crack of dawn to be ready to go to church with Baptist Pastor Nikolai and his wife, Anya and their 2 precious little girls, Tonya and Vala. We were picked up in this huge white van and we met some people on the way there from the church and gave them a ride. It was so mice to be in the presence of Christian people who even though thousands of miles away, still believe exactly what we do. We got to church and they showed up around, it wasnt very big, but they had a kitchen and 2 bible study rooms. The service started at 9 oclock. Of course, all of it was in Russian, but it was still so good to be there. Anya did sit in the pew in front of us and translated some of the service. She is so sweet, we have become pretty good friends. In the middle of the sermon, Nikolai stopped and asked for prayer requests, and then he introduced us, and of course my blabbermouth mother had to say a "few" words. Which by that I mean, this few words turned into a 30 minute speech about our life and church and Christina who by the way was red in the face with embarrassment. But anyway, after the service ended, we were invited for "chai" downstairs in the kitchen. This sweet old lady had prepared not only tea, but a huge lunch for us. She made homemade borsche (which was by the way amazing), and homemade apricot bread and all these little things. It was awesome. We had Anya who helped translate and we got to talk to a lot of the little old ladies and a lot of yound girls who were at the university, it was really fascinting. Then, when everyone was finished, Nikolai asked Mom to pray. Mom prayed and Anya translated. Here is Ukraine, no one is very touchy feely and for whoever knows my mother, you know that she is very over the top in that area. So, she made everyone hold hands, which they do not do here. It was funny. She prayed about a 45 minute prayer which was awesome, but by the time she was finished, me and Christina's arms were about to fall off because we were holding hands across the table while standing up. HAHA. It kinda hurt. But, anyway on the way home from church, Anya told us about this day camp thing they are having this week (Mon-Sun) and it was English lessons in the morning, then kids camp, art camp, sports camp, and at night like a youth concert. She continued to tell us about the whole group of American youth students that had flown in from Texas to lead this camp. We were thrilled and of course wanted to help. Christina took the English class and me and mom just did what we could to help out. It was really cool to meet these people, they were all so sweet, and we also met a lot of American missionaries living in Ukraine. It was a good day. Well, pray that we can keep our heads up and trust that God will get things done, and hopefully QUICKLY so we can come home, we are all 3 ready to be home. Pray, Pray, Pray, that is all we can do. Love to all! Anna,Lynn, and Christina