We had the extra hour to sleep, but I woke up early anyway. I let the guys sleep a little longer, well, Sergei anyway. The other two were up on their own before too long. I wanted to work on our dinner preparations. I had bought lots of chicken and wanted to let it marinade while we were at church. So I got it out and cut it all into strips and put it in some oil, garlic and lime juice. Once the boys were ready for church, we headed out. We had not gone to church from the apartment, so we had to go downtown and walk from the direction we were used to going. It took more time than we anticipated and by the time we got there, they were already singing. Oh well, we joined the Open Arms team near the back and I tried to sing along. This week we had mostly slow songs, so I could almost read fast enough to sing a few words. I can always pick out the Jesus. I am learning some other words too, but still feel so inept at the language.
I had no clue what the message was about, but I was able to follow the verses as they were put up on the screen. Mostly from Peter and 1, 2 Corinthians...which sounded pretty close to the English pronunciations. At least the boys were paying attention and seemed to be getting the message. There was a guest speaker this week, one of the men who had been at the grad retreat. So it was nice that the boys were already familiar with him. Hopefully, it made the message seem more personal.
After service the gals planned to get a quick bite to eat, then run errands and come late afternoon to our place. So we took them up on the offer to grab some lunch. We walked a few blocks to a "Chicago Pizza" place. The girls ordered some pizzas for everyone. When they came, they were not anything close to a Chicago style pizza, more like Napoli style, thin crust and thin toppings. They were still pretty tasty and we had a big dinner planned so better to not get too full.
They needed to go to the open air market for one of their errands, so we walked that way with them as well. I needed a grater for my cheese and some other things I have been hoping to make, so it worked to get it there. After I got the grater, my boys and I walked back to the apartment to get some rest and finish dinner preparations. They were going to call when they were ready to come over. Since I had most of the stuff done that I could do ahead of time, we had some time to just relax.
They called around 5 and were headed our way. I had the boys help with grating cheese,smashing avocado and cooking the chicken. I prepared some other stuff and tried to get a little more organized. By the time they arrived there was not much to do, but use the garlic press they brought to put garlic in the guacamole and set everything out. It was all pretty tasty. The chicken needed more seasoning, but the salsa turned out pretty good. A little too spicy for Anika, but okay for everyone else. The team had brought some soda and cookies to share. After eating we sat around and chatted sometimes in Russian and sometimes in English. At one point, Annie made up a fairytale, which Anika translated from Russian for us. It was very cute and everyone in the room had a part in the story. We got out the cookies and I heated water for tea and hot chocolate. The girls had not yet tried the hot chocolate that I found at the Billa market, so they wanted to see if they liked it. I think it is pretty close to American hot chocolate. It was a lovely evening and so nice to entertain a bit.
Sergei had been pretty worn out from the early morning wake ups and had gone over to my room and crashed on the bed. By the time the team left, he was completely asleep and we were not able to wake him. We had planned for him to do a Skype call with his best friend Sergei in PA, but I could not even get him awake for that. So Yarik and Vitalli and I talked to Sergei a bit. I was pretty tired too, so shortly after that, I got myself to bed as well. I had to move Sergei, but he was awake enough to at least give me back my spot!
After the team had left I realized I had forgotten to take pictures again. I guess we were enjoying ourselves too much! Maybe next time!
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