Christmas is Coming!

The handful of Americans living in Krasnodar are already putting up their trees and getting funny looks from the neighbors.
Russians start decorating about the time the American trees are all dried out. New Year's is their biggest celebration of the year and the Orthodox celebrate Christmas on January 7th.

This is one tradition that we have not abandoned in our attempt to blend into Russian society.

Here are a few pictures to prove it.

International Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving!
This is a picture of me and my neighbors/landlords. Unfortunately, it is out of focus, but I am sharing it with you because it is the only picture I have to offer of Thanksgiving this year!

I prepared my first complete Thanksgiving Dinner EVER for 21 people or so (I never got a head count) and we did not take one picture of my beautiful Turkey or the people enjoying it. I guess that could support the opinion that everyone was too preoccupied with the culinary delights to pick up a camera, or it could just be that it was all too chaotic and no one knew where the camera was. Take your pick...
For those of you who do not live in a country without a Wal-Mart, let me tell you, cooking requires a little more preparation than you may be used to. We are blessed to have a great variety of flavors at our disposal, but just not in a can ready to go. I got to roast my own pumpkin and boil my own cranberries. And fortunately for my guests, every pie crust was made from scratch. The next challenge is getting everything done at the same time in an oven the size of a large microwave. Normally, in the States, you would have everyone bring something and in the end you would have all the trimmings. Well, our guests were from places that don't know what stuffing is and have never even seen a sweet potato. So, I just told everyone to bring their appetites (with the exception of Christine Rasulov's great green bean casserole and Becky Hedgepeth's wonderful deviled eggs and relish tray).
To sum it all up, we had a nice time being grateful for all that we have... great friends, delicious foods, a warm and welcoming home, and, of course, football! (Someone loaned us a tape of an old game. We already knew the outcome, but it wouldn't have been Thanksgiving without it!)

Meet Яна...

This is Yana. She helps me with the kids. They had never had a Russian babysitter on a regular basis before and the progress in their language skills because of it has been amazing. Brooklyn is speaking English and Russian... and both with a Russian accent!
Yana is not only good with my children, she spends her weekends visiting orphanages in the villages. She also makes slideshows of the children that raise awareness of the needs they may have. She shared some of her photoshop talents with us when she gave us a disk of pictures of our kids last week. I thought I would share some of them with you all.

She also took this picture of Aubrie when we went to the Black Sea for the day.

Men's Retreat

Men's Retreat!

Steve joined this International group of men (Russians, Americans, Australian and Brit) for a day of hiking and shashlik (Russian version of grilling meat over an open fire). They traveled about an hour from our home and arrived in a region that is part of Russia, and yet all its own. It is called Adigeya. The people who live in this region are primarily Muslim. Their homes, towns and way of life are different than the Russians living just right across the river.

Steve said they had a great time and would love to build a house right there in the middle of the woods! Ironically enough, about twenty minutes from this site, IKEA has bought land and has taunted us with promises of thinking about building on it in the next two years.

Meet the kids...

Meet the kids...





Brooklyn will be 2 in December. She loves babies and looking "beauty", as she likes to call it.Aubrie is learning to read and write her name. She will be starting 1st grade next year at a real school. She is very excited.




Maddie (10 1/2) and Cady (almost 8) have madelots of friends in the neighborhood as well as at their new Russian school.Their language ability is really thriving this year.


India is our youngest. She is part dachshund and part toy terrier.
She is ALL trouble!


And then there is Steve.
All the fun started when I married him almost 12 years ago.

Can you even believe it?!?

I never EVER thought I would be doing this, but I guess one day you read just enough of the blogs of others and think, "They need to see the pictures of MY cute kids!"
Actually, I have been encouraged for many years to keep in touch better, so here is my feeble attempt to write to all of you in one swoop! I pray this does not become a diary, but just a weekly (Lord, please give me consistency(and enough new news)!) update on the comings and goings of the Hayes family. Now if I can just get the picture inserted...