more pictures from Poland and our lives

I loved this wee truck near the train station

Bella loved looking out the window of the train!

She's been doing this "peeping" thing lately... we think it's the cutest thing.

Wow... what a beautiful little face.

My girls in black and white riding the train back to Kyiv from Poland.

My girls enjoyed a polka in the background

Bella's favorite toy store... no wait, that was OUR favorite toy store. All wood toys are awesome. They were quite economical as well.

Bella enjoying one of her toys from this store. I love this picture's contrast with the white and the red and the colory

This is a MAN picture. Me standing in front of the Wawel Castle gates made of hefty iron with the king's insignia-- CHECK THIS OUT... look to the left above my head. They are the bones of the fabled dragon of Krakow. What else would they be?

Krakow's old town is "gated" by lovely green spaces. My girls make them lovelier.

Their malls are gated with CRAZY bowls of ice cream.

This is Brett on the sunset of his 36th year.

We just updated the UMW blog The explanation is in the last post.

This is a church that was used as a stronghold during the great war (WW2). It's located between Kyiv and Kalintsi (going toward the Belarussian border, also toward the infamous Chernobyl). We stopped here for a break when we were traveling with Carol Pinczuk.

While we were staying at the camp, they would run the cows down the road for milking twice a day.

This is the view out of the lodge window where we were sleeping. It was so much lovelier than the picture is.

Bella's been eating quite well, and messily.

Daughter and Mama snuggle on Mother's day.

A Krakow map on a handbag.

All girls love flowers... but sometimes for different reasons

Bella is loving her food processor (thanks to the Paetkaus for the use of it)

This is one of the jacks that they use to switch out the tracks between Poland and Ukraine. They jack the entire train (minus the wheels) a couple of meters in the air.

Visiting with our good friend Anya.

We're going to make some changes with the way we've been delivering our blog posts--


Nothing revolutionary, but we have been making some changes to the UMW website, and we will be posting ministry related blogs here, which have a link at that site. We'll keep this blog for family pictures and stuff more private for our family and friends (i.e. pictures of Isabella).

The picture above is me standing underneath Sumy's Lenin statue. Most traces of him are gone or fading from Ukraine-- this is especially true in the western side. But here in the east, the statue may no longer have a place in the city centre, but they did preserve the legacy of Lenin for a park on the outskirts of town. Keep watching, he shows up below.

Birch tree tapping for juice

Making a taste of birch juice, a spring favorite in Ukraine

We visited a Christian camp with John Paetkau and the Teuberts, both missionary families here in Sumy. This camp was formerly a "Pioneer" camp, which were state ran (through state-run industries). This property was purchased a few years ago and has been a continuous project for the Blagodat Church here.

John, Vladimir, and Me

The sleeping quarters at the camp

The front porch of one of the four housing units at the camp

Our guided tour of the camp... and our companions.
L to R- Deborah, Martin, Jenny, Serge, and Anya.
Deborah and Jenny are German girls who are visiting Sumy to work with orphanages.
Martin and Anya, are Swiss/German missionaries to Sumy
Serge is the care-taker of the camp, and birch-juice supplier

We haven't had many updates on our blog, except for Isabella
pictures-- we're just giving family and friends what you want to see!

But we are actually here in Ukraine since November, and we are
actually still engaged in the Missio Deo here. As I wrote on a
note on Facebook that I'm doing what I've always wanted to do even
though it doesn't look like what I thought it would. Cross cultural
ministry is a long term vision and we are at the front end of this.
For some of our updates in Glad Tidings News and the Ukraine Mission
Work report, we are going to change our reporting format not to what
'we' are doing but to what we see God doing here.

I don't know if the subject of this next sentence should be Americans
or Missionaries, or America Missionaries... but "we" often enter a
work like we're going to get things done and make some changes to this
thing that we're doing. We don't calculate for the changes it's going
to make in us. This is one of the primary things God has done here.
We have not converted Ukraine, but in Ukriane, God has converted us.

Every day, we must rely upon God. Every day we pray for the people
who are around us. Daily we are faced with God's plan, which is so
much bigger than the work we can do with our hands. God has taught us
that church attendance is not the measure of one's heart's allegience,
that the daily walk is where the faith must be.

One of my favorite songlines to describe my heart is "I can't see that
you're leading me unless you've brought me here, to where I'm lost
enough to let myself be led" -Rich Mullins









By the way,
here's some links to some Bella Videos
video 1
video 2