My Adventures Where in the world is ….

We started our Saturday a little late.  Elder Morgenegg needed a haircut and although we did not bring our hair cutting supplies our mission president’s wife supplied us with a set they had but did not use as President has a very chic haircut and his wife is just too busy to do it for him.  So I am back to cutting Elder Morgenegg’s hair – but it is not too bad and it is better than trying to find a barber that we could communicate with that would not butcher his hair – many of the missionaries sport butchered hair.

Then after showering we were off to the store.  We have a plan.  The carts are different sizes but the size we like to use allows Elder Morgenegg to mount our cart on the rail of the cart and then hold it on as he pushes the cart.  I just move along and put things in.  He is very patient as I pick and choose produce, meat, cheese and other things.  His main job is to remind me when we get close to capacity as our cart to carry home groceries does have a limit.  Mostly he just follows me around as I shop for what is on my list (and other things I think look good).  Sometimes he offers suggestions as well.

Today, I thought I would share what our cart looks like.  Here it is after we got home – it is full.

When we come home we unload all the groceries and put them away.  Today I put them all on the counter so you could see what we bought today.

After we put them all away we folded up our cart for storage in our coat closet near the door ready for next week.  I actually keep one of the grocery bags in my bag that I carry to work.  It is what I use to carry mail in when I have a lot to carry like the last two weeks when I have filled it up and then some.  Here is our folded cart.

Now I had cooking and baking to do.  First I used the tomatoes I found in the clearance basket to make a large pot of sauce for the lasagna I would make for the couple who are coming to dinner tomorrow night.  I used onion, garlic (the cloves of the garlic here are huge – in one large bulb there are usually only four or maybe five cloves), red pepper, carrot, and spices to make a good beginning sauteing them in olive oil.  Then I chopped up about twelve tomatoes and put them in with some water and a little tomato paste.  I let it simmer while I made oatmeal cake for our dessert and then the dough for cinnamon rolls for breakfast (tomorrow is our general conference Sunday), wheat rolls for dinner and wheat bread.  After all the dough was ready I began to make the lasagna and got it into the frig.  By then the oatmeal cake was done and Elder Morgenegg was cooking his peanuts (we can buy them raw here very cheaply and then he roasts them in our oven – they are really a great snack) while I worked on the dough.

In between somewhere we stopped for dinner and now as I write this (it is now 6:10pm) Elder Morgenegg is almost done vacuuming our apartment and all our little rugs.  I still need to clean the bathroom and mop the kitchen floor and, of course, we need to do all the dirty dishes I have piled up.

Here is a picture of the rolls raising in my new silicon baking cups.

And here is the end result of my day so far.

So now I am off to put it all away, clean the bathroom, mop the floors, and crash – oh, we also did two loads of wash which are hanging to dry in our hall so Elder Morgenegg will probably be ironing later as mostly he irons his own shirts and other clothes here – most of my things just hang and don’t need to be ironed – yeah for that!

As soon as we finish out cleaning we plan to watch another session of General Conference.  Probably the Priesthood session and then tomorrow we will watch the last Sunday session.  We have seen the others but love that we can watch via the internet or downloads.  What a wonderful blessing to live at this time.

The couple we are having over tomorrow are very young.  His name is Pavel (there are lots of Pavels in our branch – and lots of Sergeys and lots of Igors – very common names here).  Her name is Sondra and she is so gorgeous – she is a model but right now she is on “vacation” as they just had their first child – a darling little boy – in June.  Sometimes she leaves him with her mother – I hope tomorrow she brings him.  They both speak enough English we hope it works out but we will love having them here no matter what.  He sent me a text this morning saying they look forward to tasting our delicious meal – I hope they like it.

Love you all!  Hope you enjoyed seeing my homemaker day.

In Ukraine where everyone loves a reason to party every city has a special day.  I don’t know if these days are related to a specific event or just a day that was chosen.  I cannot find anything that says the day itself is special so probably just a day they picked to celebrate.  For your information Dnepropetrovsk was first established as Ekaterinoslav in 1776.  It was named Dnepropetrovsk in 1926, Dnipropetrovsk in 1992 when Ukraine declared independence from Russia and in May of 2016 was renamed Dnipro.

So Saturday morning we got up a little later than usual but as usual we started our day with our weekly shopping.  When we were coming home there were lots of people out and about and we noticed that our road (Poliya) was once again blocked off from the main road and there were police cars to make sure no one passed the blockades.

Later I was cleaning and cooking and I heard a lot of commotion outside.  At the window I saw that the street was filled with people and it seemed to be a parade of some sort.  We watched for a while and then I decided I had to go down and take some pictures.  So I left Elder Morgenegg in charge of the plum tart in the oven and went down.   The streets and sidewalks were packed with people for as far as you could see both directions and the costumes were amazing.  People were happy – waving and smiling and singing and dancing.  The music was loud and crazy and it was very festive.  Here are some of the pictures I took.

Bringing up the end of the parade was this cute yellow mini van.  Semki is a Sunflower brand here.  Elder Morgenegg had some and he says they are small but taste pretty good.  In the states the seeds are much bigger.

So that was the parade.  The road was blocked off until late that night and there were lots of activities.  One thing we worried about is the huge stage right across the street from us.

Turns out this was not as loud as the other end of the road where the loud raucous music comes from, in fact some of the music from here was very nice.  You could see groups lined up outside the stage to come on.  The karate group was lined up at one time.  Later I think there was ballet as we heard swan lake and parts of the nutcracker and other classical music – that was a nice change.

One last picture – these two girls were dressed head to toe in traditional vyshyvanka and they were so cute.

Even late that night there were lots of people on the street and on the sidewalks going both directions.  Families with young children, strollers and children on shoulders as well as teens and older people.  It was a huge celebration and the next day it was sooooo quiet – almost eerie quiet going to Church.  However, by the time we were coming home the city was awake again.

Next year we may have to plan to be out and about.  I heard there was an artist festival and a food festival and a flower festival.  The missionaries said it was crowded all over the city but we should try it once I think.

Hope you enjoyed a taste of Dnipro City Day.

Saturday night We cr decided to talk a little walk (almost a two hour walk) and go somewhere we had not yet been but not far away.  We walked north on the road by our apartment and the river – mostly on the side across the street from the boardwalk (or so they call it).  It was interesting and since it was a cool evening a good evening for a walk.  It was getting dark when we got home.  Here is some of what we saw.  Not as interesting as some walks but still…..

So that was our short walk on a Saturday evening.  It is the first we have taken in a while.  It has just been too hot.  For the first 22 days of August it was over 90 degrees outside and for 14 of those days it was over 95 – it was just too hot to go anywhere so we had people over and just stayed home.  We do our shopping first thing Saturday mornings before the heat is unbearable and before the stores are crowded.  The store we shop at is open 24/7 and we like to go and get home by 9 or so.  That makes it much easier.  Then we have hibernated in our air conditioning.  These last few days have been so nice to be able to have our windows open and fans maybe going.  So much more comfortable – even if I am cooking.

By the way, I actually bought a muffin pan to make muffins in.  The first ones I made were banana with too ripe bananas.  Wonderful.

Saturday, August 5th.

This morning we went shopping like we usually do. We were out early as it was supposed to be in the high 90s. When we were going to the store it was not too bad but coming home I could really feel the humidity climbing.

Elder Morgenegg took an exercise walk and was gone a while and so I while he was gone I wanted to get our budget and finances caught up so that took some time but all is well and all balances so that is always a good thing. I guess I take it a little too far as I balance the checkbook and then I created a spreadsheet to track our cash as well as our other expenses while we are here. I think we spend more cash here than we did at home.

Then we did laundry and our usual Saturday cleaning.

Sometimes necessity is the mother of invention.

I wanted to make muffins. We had these delicious blueberries and I was so hungry for Andrea’s blueberry muffins but no muffin time available. One day I found muffin papers at the grocery and I bought them. Yesterday I was thinking, why not create something that would hold the muffin papers to create my own muffins. I took a Ukrainian version of a 9×13 pan and used used foil to divide it into three sections lengthwise. Then I put in the papers and they sort of fit. Then I made the muffin batter and topping. I carefully put the muffin batter in the muffin papers and added the topping. They are not exactly round but they cooked all the way through (in a longer time – between the oven and the situation it took longer). We will eat them latter. I am excited to try them.

Do not send me a muffin pan.  I don’t know where they have them here but if they have muffin papers there must be muffin pans somewhere as well.  We will see if I ever see one.

I also made cookies. I had remembered cookies I have made from time to time – kind of like a sugar cookie but not so sweet. You cut out circles and on one circle you put a raison filling and then another circle on top. Crimp it and delicious filled cookies. I had not uploaded or saved my recipe so went looking for something similar. The filling only went for 13 of the 20 cookies so I used blueberry jam in the rest. The look delicious. I hope they are. They are bigger than I would choose so next time I will have to find a smaller cutter. I just used a round container from something we had bought.

After I cleaned up I suggested we take a walk.  It was seven thirty and I thought maybe a little cooler.  It probably was but it was still hot.  I suggested we walk up to the park that is not far from our apartment where the missionaries had their bubble activity.  Elder Morgenegg had been there earlier in the day and I had wanted to see what was called the “Palace of Students.”  The reviews on line were mixed.  Some said it was a must see, a few said it was a typical Soviet structure – beautiful in its day and now run down and falling apart.  It was both.  I was surprised how huge it is though the pictures on line do not do it justice in that way.

In reading about the university later I learned it is a preforming arts university that has lots of activities.   The pictures on line are varied and interesting.  I don’t know if we would ever go there or even if we could.

As we walked home the sun was almost down and there was lots of activity as always across the road at on the river walkway.

We came home and turned the air conditioning back on to cool off.  Thank goodness for air conditioning.  I feel bad for those who don’t have any at all.  It is just plain hot here and the humidity (although not as bad as New York) makes it hard to handle.

All is well and we still have lots to see and do.