Day 10-Thursday, part 2

Alright Vika, this one's for you!! Masha sends her love and she misses you and will send a letter! Tania says hello, too. Today was GREAT!!! I love this place. The kids are so awesome. They love to hang out with us and play. There was a traveling Christian group that performed for the kids today and they did a great job. Their message was that there is a God. He is their Heavenly Father. He and Jesus love us so much that Jesus came to earth as a man and died for us. They know and love each of you. Everyone needs to hear that, especially these guys. Then they passed out little children Bibles to each of the kids and even gave us one so that the boys would have scripture in their own language when we got home. What a great bunch of people. Then they had a few activities for the kids. They each made a bracelet, a balloon animal, a little photo, and had their faces painted. After that the boys wanted to play soccer. The boys as in the older boys. There are 11 of them on a team and they are dang good. They have a tournament tomorrow that we get to go to. Totally excited!! So Huz played with them for a bit and I watched, sort of. I actually visited with their coach. She has been working at their orphanage for 43 years. The boys love her, and therefore so do I. She was awesome. She said that none of the other teams have women coaches and all the other coaches are very young. When the coaches have to take the field at the beginning of the tournaments and she walks on they always say, "Oh great, here comes the grandma with the team that will win all the trophies." Isn't that so funny? I'm laughing right now as I can hear her saying it to me. I also have an entourage of littles that follow me around. I love them. This post will have LOTS of pictures. If you feel so inclined, they all need homes:) Love these kids!!! Tomorrow we will head to the notary first thing and then off to the soccer game we go. After soccer I have a hot date with a ton of little kids for hair braiding, coloring, and jump roping. Da Svidaniya!!

p.s. I try to greet everyone we pass. It's like a game for me to see their reaction and see who answers back. I have passed one lady with her stroller three times since we arrived. First time she looked at me like I was high. Second time she apologized and said she didn't know I was talking to her. This third time, tonight, she saw me coming, smiled and waved. Hello progress!! Also the same set of babushkas are always sitting on the bench outside our apartment building every morning when we leave and every night when we come home. I wish I had a hidden camera to see if they even move during the day. I have seen them set out little bowls of water for the birds and use drinking water to water the flowers in the garden just outside our door. Other than that, they are on that bench. They all started answering back when we greet them but tonight as we came up the walk, one red headed babushka smiled big, waved and called out 'Dobre Veachair!' which is good evening! It is starting to feel like home:)

p.s. Kels, yes to your question a couple days ago about the kids in your class at school:)



Parrot inside the notary office. Guess what pet I want now???


Sorry, I won't be able to remember a lot of these kids names. If I do, I'll put it down.

Just happened to look over at him and this is what he was doing. Where does he get this from?!

We let the kids use the camera for a while, a popular activity here. This is one shot that I found when I got it back. So cute.

Soccer stars. Notice how only about half have soccer shoes on and the rest are wearing slip on sandals. Hmmm, wonder if that's how it will be at the game tomorrow. BoyOne is in the black shorts with the red shirt that has the number 10 on it.

They let Huz be one of the captains:) Here they are rock, paper, scissoring to see who chooses first.

This is our translator, Yana, our amazing translator, and one cute little girl, Katya, or Kat.

Here I am with Yana, or little Yana as I call her so as to differentiate between her and our translator. Yana has, get this, 5 older brothers that live at home, 1 younger brother here at the internat with her, a younger sister at this internat and an even younger sister at a different internat. Her parents have not lost their rights yet so therefore she is not available for adoption or any type of hosting. What a crapper. She's a doll.

Today I worked on getting the kids to pose for pictures and pull faces. This was one of very few where I was successful. Kat and me.

These guys hung out with us during the soccer part of the day. Not sure if they are a 'thing' as this was the only time they sat together like this. Who knows....

Watching the game, eating a chupas chupe or lollipop.

One of the girls took this picture. I don't know who she is but she is cute, so I put it on here:)

Showing off some stylin' face paint.

Can't remember their names. Sorry. They are sweet girls.

Soccer coach rock star. Can't remember her name either. She's not really that short, I'm standing on an incline. The boys love her. Back in the day she was a gymnast.

Good grief. It must be after midnight. I can't remember anybody's names. This little guy has a serious sweet tooth. He is ALWAYS trying to get more treats from me.

Great kid. He ping-pongs with us. Can't remember his name either.

Keeeem, this is the road on the way to you know where. Not sure that it is THE road, I think it's one of the more main streets. All the streets are tree lined. I love it.

More of the drive. This one is for sure the highway on the way there.

This is the road to there.

This park has been set up on the corner across from our apartment building. Both corners have little cafes with tables and chairs out where people gather to chat and eat. There is lots of music, too. It's not a great picture because I was trying to be sneaky so that I wouldn't get pegged as the creepy woman with the camera from America.

A different shot of the park.