Blessings

Lena's cat, Romeo.
A friend gave me these plants. All that I used to have, froze last winter.

I've been looking, thinking about how to get more seating for our "play" room where we have things for the kids to do while they are here. When I saw a picture in the Do It Yourself Magazine and thought of the doors that had just been taken out, I had to try it.Here are some of the pieces of our front door.

Here is our bench. The only thing I bought for it was some foam for the cushion on top. It cost 5% of the cheapest couch or beanbag I could find.


A quiet walk to the river.


A grain elevator is being built right behind our house on the river. We hear lots of noise of pillars being driven into the ground everyday. but the elevator should provide more jobs and help the small city be more prosperous.

In and Around Nikolaev

Recently we took one weekend off and went to Nikolaev about 25 miles from us and got a room. Here are some of the things we saw in and around Nikolaev.
On the walking bridge.
A newly built orthodox church in the center of town.

At the zoo.These tigers are quarreling over my pop bottle that accidently dropped over the ledge while I was taking another picture.
Skunks --in a zoo??? They aren't so ordinary in this country.

Lena got a cute picture of a monkey.

These are black swans.
We have seen horses at a riding school in passing by. We took time to take our teenagers there. They each got a fifteen minute lesson on how to ride European-style.

Flowers in front of the train station(above)when we went to get a train ticket for a friend. Beauty in front of drab gray--to me, it's such a contrast.

Close-up, the ticket line was long!
A child thoroughly enjoying bungee jumping at the riverside park.
Too big for sister's touch.

An elderly cashier at a pay toilet chatting with a friend.

The little white spot on the sailboat is a bride going out for a very quick whirl on a sailboat after her wedding.
This is how Charity and Nathan's car was supposed to be decorated after their wedding. We got the ribbon from Ukraine but it didn't make it to the wedding.
Liked the pigeons that caught in this pic of the sailboats. Couldn't have gotten them if I had tried.


A girl skulling in the river.

An ornamental light that Lena got a good phot of.
A lock placed by a couple on the bridge for good luck and to hold their love together forever.

Nikolaev is known for its shipbuilding. Aircraft carriers were built here during the cold war. We went to the ship building musuem. This is one of the many, many ship models that we saw. This was from the time of the Greeks in this part of the world.

And skipping up to World War II a very sobering sign. It says the people on this list were shot for possessing weapons.