How your donations have helped the kids!

    First of all I would like to start out by saying how grateful we are for all the donations that we have received to help this ministry grow over the years! Without generous donations we would not be able to help the kids in the orphanages like we do.  Also since the decline in the economy world wide I heard of a lot of ministries were losing donations or receiving smaller ones but thankfully with this ministry we only saw an increase of giving.  It seemed that every time I went to check our balance after I had withdrawn money from the bank machine there was more in the account then when I first withdrew the money!! Praise the Lord!!!! And now I would just like to share a few pictures of where it is your money goes.

    This first picture is of a boy named Yan and he is from #9 boarding school and over the last month we have been able to support the group that he is in by buying tool for woodworking and paint for these boys to use.  These boys are not the typical group because they look for ways to earn money to finance their art project.  They take on small cleaning jobs to earn money that they then buy stuff for their group!  It is just incredible the heart that this group of 15 boys have and their determination of their male educator to look after the boys and help them learn skills that will help them once they graduate.  We will be posting more pictures of their group in the near future.

It reads "Thank You for your help, from the bottom of our hearts. #9 Boarding School

    This groups of girls we helped buy material for them to make dresses and these girls are very talented as the dresses that you see them wearing we all handmade by them! The red dress was made in one evening and with the encouragement of their educator they have been able to put on small fashion shows.

    These are a few pairs of wrestling shoes that we have been able to buy kids that are training.  This last weekend we were able to attend a wrestling competition in our city where a lot of the kids that we knew were competing and they did very well.  There is even one girls from #9 boarding school that placed 1st is all of Europe for her weight class.

    These kids are just a few that we were asked to provide glasses for!  They are not that expensive to have the prescriptions filled and I know that a few Canadian team members have taken the opportunity while they were here to get new glasses.

    As winter is now upon us we thought it might be nice to replace the windows in our team apartment.  The city heat keeps the apartment warm but with holes in the window cold air likes to blow in.  So we now have a very nice warm apartment that actually now almost keeps in too much heat so the windows have to be vented to cool the place down.  But I would rather have it too warm then to cold.

 
    There are also many different kids that the ministry helps support in English, art and dance lessons.  And here is a picture of David holding up some of the art supplies that we were able to supply.  At each orphanage there are so many different kids that are very talented and we want to try to help them in any way we can to help further on their dreams.

    These last pictures are of different materials we have been able to provide the different orphanages this last year.

We helped another Canadian work team with funds to renovate some of the kids sleeping areas!

These bars on the windows were added to keep the kids safe at night!

Team Trip to Dnepro!

This last weekend we enjoyed a week away with our team and stayed with E-Free missionaries the Bellamy's.  We had a great time getting to know their family better and also were able to introduce the rest of our team to them.  On Saturday morning with met with pastor Vova (Word of Life) and Andre (Morning Star) and we were able to tell them about the ministry in Krivoy Rog!  We had a great meeting and the pastors and they had many encouraging words for our team and we are looking at ways that we might be able to work together and find ways to possibly support each other. 

Later that evening we went to a Thanksgiving celebration that was held the Alpha & Omega which is a christian center in Dnepropetrovsk.  So we all got dressed up and had some fun taking pictures and only got a little bit lost trying to find the place!

On Sunday we attended the Word of Life Church and Luba and I were able to do a presentation about the orphanage ministry and the congregation prayed for the ministry and told us that they were happy to hear that the ministry is going so well.  Also by talking with the pastor I found out that there might be another guy that would like to join us working with the kids so we will meet him this next week so please be in prayer because we need more guys to help in the ministry.  For lunch on Sunday we were able to meet up with the Verhoog family and spend a great time seeing them again.  And we are looking forward to coming back to Dnepro in December when the missionaries from the EFCCM in Ukraine are going to try and get together! 

 

Our Team!

We have now been working in the orphanages in Krivoy Rog (Ukraine) full time for the last 3 years.  We have 4 Ukrainians and 2 Canadians.  Vika and Tanya have been working with the ministry full time for the last 3 years, Sveta (a grad from one of the orphanages) has been with our team for the last year helping us out.  Luba my wife teaches kids English 2 days a week at one of the orphanages and also works at a local collage the rest of the week.  Last of all is Curtis and I, we have been here in Ukraine for the last 3 years working full time in the ministry. 

For those of you that don't really know what we do ill let you know!! We are basically friends to the orphanages that we do our bible programs in.  Our team is working doing a smaller day camp program at each of the 3 orphanages during the week.  Three out of the six days we do our bible lessons, crafts and games.  The other 3 days we hang out with the kids playing soccer, watching movies and just getting to know the kids better.  Two mornings out of the week we also do a program with the little kids that don't go to school and just have a blast hanging with these little guys.

This last year Curtis, Luba and I joined the Evangelical Free Church of Canada Missions organization which has been a great transition.  This last summer we had a EFCCM conference in western Ukraine and it was great to meet all the other missionaries in our area and we are excited about where God is leading us!

Early Christmas!

Well Santa came early this year and left us with a queen size bed!!!

Kids With Cars!

Today was a beautiful day to be able to play outside with the little kids at Zarechney orphanage! The weather is getting colder but with the sun shining it doesn't seem to matter much.  For those of you that don't know 2 days out of the week we go to the orphanages and hang out with the kids who do not go to school.  We either play games outside or when they are inside we tell bible stories and do crafts.  We have a blast with these little guys and just want to take them all home!
Also we handed out toy cars to the kids today that were passed to us from Daryl and Molly Porter and the kids just loved them! Thanks again.

Shura with her new car

Nazar

Yana

Hanging out outside!

Tanya and Dima

A teaching moment with uncle Curtis

Vika

Grad Bible Study Night!

Every 2 weeks we hold a bible study for kids that have left the orphanage.  Last night we had 11 kids out and talked about Jonah and how hard it can be sometimes to actually listen to what God is telling us to do.  We had a great discussion and after that we went around and talked about our highs and low for the last weeks.  It was really cool to hear how much the kids wanted to share about their lives.  We are so blessed to have this opportunity to be part of the kids lives and it is amazing to see how many of them are following God!!

Our Kids!

Luba and Ira

 

Jana and Tanya

Shura and Sveta

Vika and

Ura, Dennis and Ira

Janna, Vika, Tolia, and Nina

Playing games

Vitally and Curtis

We also had Ura and Dennis join us (they had once lived in a handicapped orphanage outside of town and now Dennis is living in a group home and Ura is living on his own).  Dennis had been sent to another handicapped orphanage just our of Krivoy but through all your donations we are working with some local Ukrainians to keep Dennis out of that place because it is more like prison then a home for handicapped people.

Dennis and Ura (both had been from a handicapped orphanage)

Kids Day!!

Every year the Praise Church in Krivoy Rog puts on a kids program and invites all the orphanages!! It was a fun time with games, skits, and a whole lot of noise! So here are a few pictures of our time there. 

Little Ira (she hung out with me the whole time)

Luba and Anya

Left: Alona (she just arrived at the orphanage 2 weeks ago) Right: Kirel

Having lots of fun!

 

Luba, Kirel, Yegor, and Anya

Waiting for the bus