A Picture is Worth A Thousand Words!!

I wanted to share with you some photos of the residents that live at the Retirement Home to which the church donated some much needed items. This is Galina. She received a new bed and told us, "I sleep like a queen."

Youth Conference

Youth Conference was held for all the young people ages 12 -30 from all the branches in Belarus. The did service by pulling weeds at the Botanical Gardens.

Olya, Lena, Yula


Yula and Robert and their new friend snail.


The Young Volunteers taught them how to balloon toss. It created quite a bit of interest with people walking in the gardens. They stopped to watch and some took pictures.

Trasdale from Arizona and Brandenburg from Washington.

"Back to School" Russian Style

We attended a "Back to School" promotion held on the plaza near our apartment. This was a style show that sponsored by one of the stores. The children all wear dark clothes to school which have to be dressy. No levis and t-shirts are allowed.




The boys wear jackets or vests. The shirts have to be white.
This is school in Russian.

Notice the big bows!!

The style is the same for the older girls--their legs are just longer.

(Our computer is working again--at the present time--but I'm not sure if once the firewall is put in place we'll have access to blogs. That will be a sad day if that happens. We just have to wait and see.)

Gardens--revisited

The first of the summer we visited the Botanical Garden which was beautiful, but we never found the lake. We decided to see how it had changed during the summer and was determined to find the lake--we did.



The flowers had blossomed and were even more beautiful.

I took some more pictures I want to use for the calendar I'm going to produce (someday).

Pizza Party

We took the office Staff of Sofia out for pizza Friday. They provided a menu full of interesting and wide variety of pizza choices. This one came with a cooked egg in the middle.


I played it safe and had my usual--cheese. It was really very good.


Eugene's favorite if Mexican!! He tries to teach me a little Russian about three days a week for a 1/2 an hour. In turn I help him improve his English. He is a much better student than I am!!

Natasha, Eugene, Deanna, Lena, and Sergei.
We took them out to this same pizza restuarant a few weeks after we arrived in Minsk. We commented that we sure know and appreciate them even more after living here eight months. They are such wonderful people and so willing to help us with whatever we need.

Let's Celebrate!!

Happy Birthday to Tonya and Zoya!!



This little guys is the newest member of our branch. He was given a name and a blessing Sunday. Isn't he cute. There was also a baby blessed in the other branch. The church is growing from "within". I think there were 6 babies born last year in the two branches.

Flash WAY-back Friday

Has he changed a little--still as cute as ever!!

Mission President Visit

We found a Honey Festival where they would let you take these small sticks and taste a sample. I tasted one I really didn't like. Elder Millet told me it had tongue in it.

There were several couples getting married on 7-8-9. This couple had pigeons all over them--not my idea of a neat wedding picture!!

Sister Wooley, Elders Ellingson and Millett

President and Sister Wooley, Elders Brandenburg and Craven, Max, and Sergie just outside the Drinking Man's Pub where we all ate lunch.

Polatsk

This week we closed a project in Polatsk and then had time to do some sight seeing.

This marks the center of Europe. Each one of us are standing on a direction marker.

First school built in Polatsk.

Dash, Valya, and Sergei

Sofia Cathedral in the background.

City Sights

They come in all sizes....small

Big....


Small....

Big!!!

The flowers in this city really are beautiful and they are everywhere.

Fun Foster Family

We closed a project in Vitesbyk at the Shyelovanovy Foster Family. They were so fun to re-visit. They showed us all the items the church had donated to them which consisted of several desk-wardrobe combinations, a freezer, food processor, hot water heater, and linens for their beds. Everything was neat and organized. The "young volunteers" showed them the puppet showed which they thoroughly enjoyed. They shared with us some candy one of the foster children had received from someone she knew in Germany. This family has 9 children--two of them were at a day camp. They sleep in three bedrooms in bunk-beds made by the father and the children. The mother had a beautiful flower and vegetable garden that was literally a work of art. Most children are put in boarding homes so it was nice to see these children in a loving home with a caring mama and papa.

Puppet Shows

This last week our road trip was to Vitesbyk where the "young volunteers" did three puppet shows. Two where in libriaries.
Elder Ellingson and Brother Wade setting up the stage.

Elder Craven was the narrator at the first show. He had each of the children raise their hands and say out loud, "I will never smoke."


Elders and Millet and Ellingson behind the scenes.

A captive audience and....


some very cute puppets with a very important message--the harmful effects of smoking.