As I posted last year International Women’s Day is a big deal here is Ukraine. The thing I love about it is not only is the focus on all women of all ages but everyone expresses great value and concern for all women of all ages. Our two Ukrainian Elders each sent me sweet messages – not just Congratulations on Women’s Day or Happy Women’s Day but messages of their expressions of love and appreciation. One was in Ukrainian and I had to us google to translate it but it was so sweet that I used google to hopefully send a nice reply.
Tonight our branch had a huge party for Women. Now, here that means the whole family is invited to come – not just the women. Last year was good but this year was amazing. I give a great deal of credit to our branch president and to our Elder’s Quorum President, both husbands with sweet wives who are not yet members of the Church. These are two great men who value women greatly.
When we arrived the chapel/multipurpose room was set up with balloons, a huge container of roses, and other decorations.
Room set up for the celebration.
Hint of the upcoming video. Mohammad is the first person on the video which came later. This is a tradition, at least since last year. Each of the brothers in the branch give a message in Russian. Elder Morgenegg’s message was “? ?????.” (I love you.)
Container of roses which were later moved to the top of the podium.
Prior to the beginning there was time to visit with the members and to watch the joy that they have in seeing each other.
Brother Igor is in the back (the Elder’s Quorum President). The brother in the front often wears this beautiful shirt of vyshyvanka embroidery.
Some of the members
More members
Our branch president introduced the meeting and welcomed everyone.
Elder Morgenegg was asked to start the meeting with a spiritual thought. The young man next to him is our branch mission leader, who translated what Elder Morgenegg said. Elder Morgenegg talked about how we met and the revelation he had that he was going to marry me before we had even met. He also shared that next week we will have been married for 48 years – amazing where revelation can take you.
Than our branch president came in wearing a police man’s uniform. He is so funny.
He got this good brother to come up and play his guitar and sing. It was very good. I didn’t understand the words but the music was beautiful.
Here our branch mission leader, Kostya (“coastya”) is trying to teach the brothers to dance.
Still trying.
Still trying.
He is kicked out.
They know how to dance.
This young woman dances solo – she used to dance with her brother but now he has another partner. She is very amazing but it was hard to get pictures.
This was a skit kind of like telephone only the first person was given an action and had to pass it along. Like telephone it changed a lot at the end.
Passing it along. It was very fun to watch and the sisters were such good sports.
Igor and his daughter did a skit about a cave man and a cave woman. It was very funny.
His daughter.
Turns out she fought the bear and won.
This was a wonderful surprise. This brother sang a lovely love song and he has such a beautiful voice.
He invited his beautiful wife to join him for a dance and he sang just to her. Lovely.
Kostya dancing to Michael Jackson’s Beat It. Pictures cannot capture all he did.
Our branch president enlisted the help of three young women to pay back up for his trumpet. He is a professional musician and he is amazing. Truly gifted. It was a pleasure to listen to him play and the young women were a good back up.
Our brethren have a great sense of humor. the one on the left is selling roses. The one on the right want koses (I think). It is quite a discussion and he is sent off.
Then the second man wants loses. No.
Finally, this man wants noses. In the end they decide to give all the roses away and each woman of what ever age gets a long stemmed pink rose. What a lovely gift.
There was also a wonderful video of all the brethren saying something wonderful to the women, individually, and pictures of many of the women in our branch and then some bloopers at the end (which were very funny).
Then after a closing hymn (we did have an opening) and closing prayer we went into the other room for the food the brethren had prepared. The table was beautiful and the food was so good. It was such a wonderful treat to have the brethren host a party for all the women and they obviously delighted in every moment.
After, the counselor in our district presidency and Igor were joking around with the wigs from Igor’s skit. So silly.
It is truly wonderful to see the love that the brethren in our branch have for the women of all ages in our branch. Truly they are a blessing to us all.
