Day 15.2.2--SDA and The Open Market in Kiev

The SDA appointment went very well.  Everything was in order and the ladies laughed when they asked the mandatory question, "Have you changed your mind about adopting this child?"  After thousands of extra dollars and probably the equivalent number of hours spent on making sure we COULD adopt her, we also laughed when we nodded our heads and signed their book. 

The woman called the orphanage to make sure nothing had changed and both children were still okay to be adopted and we were done.  In about an hour from this writing, we will pick up the referral paper and be on an overnight train back to the orphange city.  We'll sign papers there Saturday morning, spend as many hours as we can with Ruslan and Nastia and hop back on an overnight train to Kiev.  We'll be on a plane home at 2pm Sunday.  This will be my last blog post until we have word about when we can return.

I just had to share our WONDERFUL day yesterday.  The Lord continues to find little ways to spoil me and show me He is interested in all the little details of my life.

After the SDA appointment, we settled back into our good ol' Kiev apartment and then went to the open market in the area.  We had no idea it was as extensive as it was.  I managed to walk around with my iPod on video camera mode...not sure what I got but I can't wait to show it to my kids!

We found, of all things, HUCKLEBERRIES for sale!  Now, if you know anything about us, you might know that we go huckleberrying in the Idaho mountains every summer we can and then hord our spoils in the freezer for the entire year.  It's a tradition from Marsh's childhood.  We spend hours upon hours swatting bugs off our arms and heads, carrying used milk jugs on our waists and breaking our backs picking huckleberries.  If you want to just purchase them already picked, you can plan to pay around $60 per gallon.  Imagine our total shock when we found them available at the open market at 2 cups for about a dollar!  We had to take pictures.  THIS was monumental!

The huckleberries are just there at Marsh's right

They are for sale at just about every fruit vendor's space!

We couldn't help ourselves, so we bought the cupful of huckleberries and a cupful of raspberries...also favorites from Marsh's childhood.  We came home with all these berries and had no idea what in the world we were going to do with all of them...those cups are tall and hold a LOT of berries!  We knew we were leaving today and wouldn't have a way to really carry them, but we did it anyway.  It was just one of those things you HAVE to do.

We continued walking through the open market when I saw a little cross-stitch shop.  I was so surprised to find a needle work place because I had been wondering where I could get some of the traditional Ukrainian patterns for cross-stitch...a very common thing to find on traditional Ukrainian dress and tablecloths.  We would like to have traditional Ukrainian shirts for all ten of us for a family picture, but it would break the bank to purchase them already made.

We walked in and I was disappointed to see only modern stitchery sets on display.  We started talking to the sweet ladies who owned the shop (a mother and daughter) and became fast friends.  It felt like we already knew each other and were bonded from the moment we met.  We talked and laughed and cried together...and then I asked if they had what I was looking for.  They just happened to have a table runner set with two different traditional Ukrainian patterns included....for less than $10.  I was thrilled!  Then they pulled out patterns for doing the stitching on shirts and dresses...less than a dollar each.  Then I saw the ribbon...yards of Ukrainian pattern already stitched on ribbon that could easily be sewn onto a shirt.  I was so thrilled...not only had we found what I was hoping for, we made friends that are already precious to us!  We walked out after saying goodbye, promising to visit again today and I said to Marsh, "That was a gift."  He agreed.

With Gallina and her daughter, Irina.  Fast friends!

Because I need to post this before hopping a train, I'm going to do the rest in picture caption form....


Cherry verinky (cherry and farmer cheese stuffed in dough and boiled), smetana (sour cream), ice cream, raspberries and huckleberries.  Yum.

We called our friend, Nastsha (next to Marsh in the picture) to find out if she could ask her friend to do some special painting for us.  They live in Kharkov and we visited them during the last trip.  Turns out, they were in Kiev!  So, we invited Natasha and her wonderful friends over for dessert.  We were suddenly SO glad we had all those berries!  We picked up some ice cream and boiled up the cherry veriniky we bought (I wanted to know what it tasted like so I can make it at home) and had a GREAT dessert!  It was wonderful to be able to host them and make even more new friends!

It was the perfect end to a wonderful day!