Back From Outter Space.

Well ... really I am just back from my visa trip! Everything went smoothly and procuring a visa was pretty painless and simple. Except for walking to and from the Ukrainian consulate about a million times before it was all said and done but maybe that counteracted some of the eating I did whilst I was there! Haha.

Attempt Number Two.

As of five seconds ago, there were no volcanic disturbances to speak of and my flight was listed on the boards at the airport for a Monday morning 10:30 departure. So far, so good. Woohoo! As long as there are no overnight disturbances; tomorrow morning I shall be off "to see the wizard, the wonderful wizard of Oz" ... or at least the wonderful wizard of the Ukrainian Consulate in Krakow. Hopefully, he is just as helpful to me as he was to Dorthy!

Парк Київська Русь.

Today I went with some friends out to a place called Kiev Rus' Park (Парк Київська Русь). This park is built out in the middle of a field and is becoming a replica of a town that might have existed in the Kievan Rus'. The Kievan Rus' is a medieval state which existed approximately between 880 to the middle of the 13th century and fell to the Mongolian invasion of 1240. Originally founded by Scandinavian traders called "Rus'," the state eventually included territories stretching south to the Black Sea, east to Volga and west to the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. In the 9th century, Kiev, a Slavic settlement was captured by the Rus' and became the capital of Kievan Rus'.

This weekend the Kiev Rus' Park was holding a medieval festival and we went to check it out.Yumm! Lunch!The park is still a work in progress but this is an area that had been set up to host the re-enactors. They really seemed to be enjoying themselves!The whole place was full of people dressed up in various costumes; from what I could tell some of it was representative of where the groups came from and some had to do with the status or job their character had. It was all quite amazing and even a little scary! There were plenty of big guys wandering around with swords, clubs, axes and just about any other sharp object you could think of.For the festival kick off they told the story of how Kiev was settled. It started out with dancers who represented the people who lived in the land already ...and culminated with the coming of the conquerors.After a while we left - but many festivities were planned for the weekend. It was quite fun to get out and see a piece of Ukraine history, to understand a little bit more about the people here and where they came from.

Oh So Good.

Everyone has a favourite recipe. Most of the time you ate that special food somewhere and asked, ever so nicely, for the recipe You sat with your fingers crossed in hopes that it would actually be given to you! Haha. Living abroad has greatly increased my chances of getting that special recipe ... its a nice perk! The problem is that often times when I make these recipes; they never seem to measure up to the original. Perhaps it is an ingredient issue (there are variants in texture, taste and processing even with normal products) but most of the time I think it comes down to two things: first, I had to make it myself (not fun) and second, I ate it alone - without the company of those that make fantastic meals so fantastic.

That is until today ...My Mum makes the most fabulous buttercream icing and when I left town she gave me the recipe. I have not made it whilst being abroad and did not figure I would. But I was making cupcakes to take to a party tonight and figured I might as well frost them. So I pulled out her recipe and went over the special directions, making sure I was familiar with what I was about to do. Then I just whipped it up! After I was done whipping and whilst I was waiting to regain feeling in my arms (the only mixer I have comes in a set ... of arms attached to my body!) I stuck my finger in the bowl to get a taste. As I was bringing the globby goodness of icing to my mouth I had the presence of mind to remind myself not to be disappointed when it did not taste like my Mum's. You can imagine my surprise and pleasure when it tasted EXACTLY how I remember hers tasting!?! Score one for me!

And the proverbial icing on the cake is this little beauty! A whole bag of leftover icing! Haha. I put it in the freezer hopping I can come up with something else grand to frost in buttercream frosting soon - otherwise, I am just going to eat it by the spoon full. Haha.

Lily Of The Valley.

I have found a friend in Jesus, He’s everything to me,
He’s the fairest of ten thousand to my soul;
The Lily of the Valley, in Him alone I see
All I need to cleanse and make me fully whole.
In sorrow He’s my comfort, in trouble He’s my stay;
He tells me every care on Him to roll.

He’s the Lily of the Valley, the Bright and Morning Star,
He’s the fairest of ten thousand to my soul.
He all my grief has taken, and all my sorrows borne;
In temptation He’s my strong and mighty tow’r;

I have all for Him forsaken, and all my idols torn
From my heart and now He keeps me by His pow’r.
Though all the world forsake me, and Satan tempt me sore,
Through Jesus I shall safely reach the goal.

He’s the Lily of the Valley, the Bright and Morning Star,
He’s the fairest of ten thousand to my soul.
He all my grief has taken, and all my sorrows borne;
In temptation He’s my strong and mighty tow’r;

He will never, never leave me, nor yet forsake me here,
While I live by faith and do His blessed will;
A wall of fire about me, I’ve nothing now to fear,
From His manna He my hungry soul shall fill.
Then sweeping up to glory to see His blessed face,
Where rivers of delight shall ever roll.

He’s the Lily of the Valley, the Bright and Morning Star,
He’s the fairest of ten thousand to my soul.
He all my grief has taken, and all my sorrows borne;
In temptation He’s my strong and mighty tow’r;

Just Not My Day.

It was raining when I headed out to church this morning. I briefly thought about riding the bus to church but knew if I did I would be late (yes, it takes longer to ride the bus than walk). It was not raining that hard so I figured that is life … and just walked. By the time I got to church the lower half of my legs were soaked and my umbrella had begun to leak. Lovely. Nothing like sitting in church with muddy, wet pantyhose and squeaky damp shoes. As the service started a woman got up and began giving a recitation in Ukrainian; my friend who was sitting next to me leaned over and asked “how is your Ukrainian?” We laughed knowing my Ukrainian is even worse than my Russian. To add to that we had a guest speaker; he got up and started speaking – in Ukrainian. E leaned over to me again and he said “it is just not your day is it?” Nope. Not really.

After church I had a wonderful lunch with my friend L. Till I realised she was leaving me for the states in 5 days! We ran over to the market together after lunch and I discovered the bakery had my favourite cookies lose in a bin, so I could buy as many or a few as I would like (I usually only see them in costco size boxes and that is just too much – even for me). I bought 200 grams. That was about four hours ago. Now I am sitting here looking at a completely empty sack. Yes, I ate all the cookies. It is just not my day.

I have a lot of days like that when the moments of being “just not my day” overwhelm everything. I am learning to see through those moments and to see them for what they really are. Simply moments. They do not have to take over my attitude or change my responses to other moments; they do not have to be the moments that define the success or failure of a day. If I look for them and am open to them I have just as many great moments in a day as I have tough ones.

Take today, for instance:

By walking to church in the rain I knew I had blog material to share (haha) – because try as one might walking in the rain down muddy streets still leaves muddy splashes up the back of your legs (just like the splashes bikers get, that I usually laugh at). As I walked, I listened to the sound of the falling rain, I watched it wash away the dust, dirt and grime (ok, the huge puddles of yellow pollen-y water was kinda gross) and I prayed that God would do the same to my heart. Sure, I could not understand the sermon today but it never ceases to amaze me how much I love to sing in Russian and Ukrainian. When a familiar tune starts on the piano, I get a little thrill to know that I understand the words that I am singing. Even when I do not understand them, I can trust that God does.

And lunch. I will ever be blessed by the moments spent with L. I am not sure she will ever truly understand how much she has meant to me these months, how much she blessed my life and my time here and how thankful I am that she allowed God used her to teach me, to love me and challenge me. I would take a million “not my day” moments just to have the chance of a moment in time with her.

The cookies … well there really is no justification for that. Thank goodness tomorrow is a new day! Perhaps, I should only buy 50 grams next time! Haha.

Back Up Blogging.

Sometimes, I am jealous of my many blogging friends* who have cute little babies. How amazing it must be to have a back up post constantly on the ready?! Haha.

Have not experienced anything new, interesting or exciting? Post a picture of your cute little one and call it a day.

Tired, but feeling obligated to blog for the people back home? Post a picture of your cute little one getting into some kind of cute trouble and wha-la … you have a blog post and the family back home is satiated for another day.

And then there are the times when I have those thoughts in my mind; you know the ones. The ones that have not been flushed out, the ones that are difficult, the ones that make me feel insecure and vulnerable or the ones that only exist to highlight my failures and my own discrepancies. Often these are the thoughts that creep in and leave a negative mark on my soul – not exactly fodder for the blog!? There are all the situations and circumstances that exist in my daily life that I feel should be kept close to the heart rather than published throughout cyberspace for the planet to read (I have not mislead myself to think the entire planet is really interested in what I write … perhaps only a small portion. Haha). Plus, who really wants to read about my successes and failures with my food journal, my workout routine or my lack of excitement over cooking because I hate leftovers?!

It is in these times I think it would be fabulous to have a kid waiting in the wings to pose for a cute picture, or to do something completely silly that I could write about. Gosh, perhaps it would even work to have some kind of home remont project I was working on to post update pictures and to talk about. I am not sure how that would work because talking about my neighbors remont only brings visions of sitting in the dentist chair for days on end … usually neighborhood remont leaves me with a toothache and no pictures of the progress.

In the moments of normal life … I wish I had something that was nicer to post about than the grossly awful “summer scent” of public transportation. Although, perhaps it would rival a few diapers along the way!

*Note to my friends with cute little ones ... I love seeing your pictures and hearing your tales, so keep them coming!