the woods

In between morning language lessons, Mike preparing for and leading the evening conversational English class, we escaped Uzhhorod for a few hours!
Our friend, Valya, invited us to go to the woods. It was amazing. It was 20 degrees cooler than the city. Seriously. Not to mention beautiful!
You know how in 'Lord of the Rings' (the best novel ever written by man), the elves are always like- "the sea... the sea... (sigh), it calls me"; well that is how the Ukrainians are about the woods- "the woods... the woods... (sigh), i must go to the woods". Well, now I know why.
So when it is 93.7 degrees Fahrenheit in our apartment on a blazing Thursday afternoon, I will dream about going to the woods.

The water was SO cold. I dipped Solomiya's feet in it and she screamed. (what?... she was hot!)

Our friends, Valya and Matchik (he is from Poland).

Solomiya strolling.

Yes, the 3rd picture of everyones back- except Solomiya!

Piecaken II

Had a border-crossing adventure today. Our friends, also NY'ers, had their truck (NY plates and all) shipped over to Ukraine earlier this year. Because it has foreign plates/registration, it must leave the country every 60 days to stay legal. Our friends are in NY for the summer, so they asked Mike if he would drive it over the border for them. They had special documents made up and notarized from the American Embassy in Budapest that stated Mike had permission to do this.
So... we decided to bring the truck over to Hungary today to fulfill its 60 day requirements. No problems getting across- took maybe 1 1/2 hours to get through the Ukraine border/customs and then the Hungarian border/customs.
Once in Hungary, we then drove maybe 10 minutes more to TESCO.
http://www.tesco.com/
"TESCO: everything you can find in the supermarket and much more". Yes, their slogan is quite correct.
Trip home: once again- no prob getting through Hungarian border, but a bit of an issue getting through Ukraine's border. Remember those temporary-residency permits that we got just a couple of months ago? Apparently, having these permits makes us temporary Ukrainian citizens. Ukrainian citizens cannot drive foreign vehicles over the border (unless they are your own). So technically, Mike was not allowed to drive the truck back into Ukraine. Why did they let us leave the country with the truck in the first place? God only knows. Seriously, only He does.
We did get home though. Thanks to God and Solomiya. Yes, having a baby with you generally works in your favor. Mike said that as 3 custom officials were discussing this case with him, one of them said- Look, they have a baby, let them go through- (Solomiya and I had gotten out of the truck because it was too dang hot and she was quite fed up with being hot, tired and hot and she was letting everyone know).
Thank God, customs allowed us to pass through. They said that if Mike has to drive the truck over the border again, to only give the customs agents his passport- not the residency permit- and they will allow him through with no problems. Hmmm...

Had an awesome thunderstorm this evening and it was followed by a drop in temperature (maybe about 20 degrees- every window is open) and a kickass rainbow. Many rainbow pictures will follow, I warn you. It's not that I have never seen one before, but it kept getting brighter and brighter, so I kept taking pictures.

Peaches from our friend's tree. They tasted just like peach. Awesome.

silly.

so many rainbow pictures starting here.

double rainbow.

looks cool with the Soviet-era buildings.

Piecaken

Our friend made us this bookcase!

Top shelf down: bibles/study material, Ukrainian history, music, occupational therapy books. To the right, a television (just for show- it doesn't play anything- the tv, along with all the furniture, came with the apartment).

I caught Solomiya vacuuming. In this photo, you can also almost tell that our wallpaper has sparkles in it.

We have definitely had a change in the weather the last few weeks and summer is here! It is HOT, but not humid (we are very thankful for that). It has been in the 90's and higher and there has been bright sunshine and cloudless days for about 2 weeks (very nice). We are looking forward to some thunderstorms that may start tomorrow and a reprieve from sweating out of every pore of our body.

Weather for Uzhgorod, Zakarpats'ka, Ukraine

32°C | °F

Sat

Sun

Mon

Tue

Clear

Wind: N at 6 km/h

Humidity: 36%

34°

20°

33°

20°

32°

19°

29°

18

June Pictures

Solomiya is getting very good at pointing.

Tato made her a bread mask. It later became toast.

Happy Father's Day to Mike! S sporting a fo-hawk in honor of the day.

The dude who takes care of the grounds at our apartment complex (using the push mower). He does such an excellent job at keeping everything looking good.

He has got a lot of ground to cover with that push mower...

Super hot today. S passed out on the bed for a 2-hour nap.

S waving for the camera and her fan club.

Just finished reading a copy of the local newspaper: Transcarpathia Pravda

And the moral of the story is...

Updates on the current activities of the people living in apartment 22, building 7 on General Svobody street, Uzhhorod, Ukraine 88009:

Mike: This man is getting quite popular and has given the Sunday message at 2 different churches in the past 3 weeks. In addition to mentoring some young guys in the church, helping out at the English school, taking an online TESOL course, being Annie's personal translator and hanging with little S while mama goes out to see patients; Mike will also be taking Ukrainian lessons 5 days a week for the summer with a professor at the local university.

Annie: Continuing to work with her stroke patient 3 mornings a week as well as evaluating other clients here and there (6 month-old baby with flat head; soccer player with knee injury). Yesterday, our friend Marina brought someone to our apartment for Annie to evaluate: a 2 1/2 year-old girl with Down's syndrome. Can you believe the "special-needs school/center" here in Uzhhorod will not evaluate her until she turns 3! What the crap?!!! So, Annie will now begin to see Yulianna 2 days a week to help her "catch-up" developmentally.

Solomiya: 9 months old has proven to be an exciting time of development for this little baby. Not only has Solomiya started to point with her finger, clap her hands, crawl backwards and pick up her finger-puppet monkey when you ask, "Where is your monkey?"; she is also reading chapter books out loud every evening before going to bed. In addition to this, Solomiya has quite a good pincer grasp for one so young and enjoys  her current hobby: al fresco painting on the kitchen walls.

Solomiya crawled backwards and ended up under her pack-n-play.

She was having a good time until...

... she realized she could not back up any further. Tato had to rescue her.

We cut this tomato in half and realized it looks like a heart. Not a real heart with aortas and ventricles sticking out, but a heart-shape heart.

boo-yah

Guess how much all these fresh veggies cost? 13r. That's right, $1.60. boo-yah.

exotic and vibrant

Check out this article about Uzhhorod:

http://ukrainianweek.com/Travel/50981

From Mike's facebook:

"Nice little article, with an overview of our home town of Uzhhorod. (Thanks to Clinton White, who I "stole" this article from ;-)
> My favourite quote: "the city still boasts plenty of uneven pavement and piles of litter to satisfy tourists looking for a grittier experience" LOL...great way to talk up a tourist destination."

Small City Lights - Navigator - The Ukrainian Week

ukrainianweek.com

Exotic and vibrant, Uzhhorod is a striking mix of the multiethnic past and present

Woohoo!

As of May 31, 2012 we are legal, temporary residents of Ukraine for 1 year!

... the documents ...

When we went to the Ukrainian Consulate in Budapest in April, we were given 45 day visas to enable us to return to Ukraine and apply for temporary residence. Once back in Uzhhorod, we worked with a lawyer to complete this process. (There was SO much paperwork required along with official signatures and notarized copies needed, that a lawyer was very necessary. We had no idea what to do by ourselves.)
It took about 3 weeks, but we have the documents in hand! And, we found out that Solomiya is registered on Annie's document- so all 3 of us are now legal.
Thank you to everyone for your prayers!

Next year, we will have to apply again- but our lawyer said it would be much easier and require less documents.
Why not apply for longer residency? Our lawyer said that even President Obama would only receive temporary residence for 1 year. Well, 1 year is good!
If we are in Ukraine for 5 years, God-willing, we will be able to apply for permanent residency.

Also in the news today, Solomiya now has a highchair: -Ukrainian Style-

This chair is cool because it is 2 separate pieces. The top chair comes off and the bottom portion of the highchair turns into a table. And... if that wasn't cool enough, the top of the table hinges up and turns into an easel. Only 700r or about $87.50; bought it at a baby consignment shop. There were no babies up for consignment, just baby accessories. (We saw this same chair at a baby store in town and it was over 3000r! Oi.)

-happy dino- (and on the seat is a pic of a penguin and it says -happy penguin-)

She was so excited to sit in it.