july 19

July 19

Today we met up walked over to the church and met up with several members and the pastors to do some work on the church grounds. Their church is not a typical church building, but rather a house where the upstairs is the sanctuary and the downstairs is the kitchen and fellowship area to have tea. It is pretty awesome. There is a pretty big backyard as well for more fellowship events. There were a lot of us there so we were able to do a good bit of work. We took down the fence in the backyard to put up a new one (which hopefully we will be able to do on Monday or Tuesday). Brandon used the weed eater and cleared most all of the backyard (this time with no stork following around behind him) for most of the time we worked. There was a lot of wood left over from the fence and from a house that had been torn down behind their property, so the girls mainly worked on making the firewood and stacking it. The pastor sawed the logs and planks, Sasha used the axe on the stumps, and we carried and stacked the wood to stock up for the long winter ahead. They have been able to use the wood from the house though for about seven years now so it has been a huge blessing for the cold and snowy winters for the church. We took a break for lunch and then finished working around 5 and had some tea and more fellowship time.

After saying goodbyes until the morning, we went back to the flat to grab our bathing suits and meet up with Anya, Nastya, Sasha, and Vika to go to the river for a little swim. We took two taxis out a ways and were let out and then the adventure began. We walked down a street, which turned into a path, which turned into a field, under some pipes, through another field, which turned into a dried up river, up a hill, through some gushy mud like substance that they claimed was sand (I am still skeptical of this), which led to a small river that we crossed to our final destination of a small island of sand in the middle of a deceptively powerful current. We swam for a while and played something akin to badminton but with a small ball. It was a really fun and relaxing time to hang out with new friends and fellow believers. After the sun began to set, we followed our footsteps back we parted for the evening and went back to the flat for some pasta and veggies (and much needed showers!) around 10pm. Today has been a great day and we are really excited about the service tomorrow!