Homeward Bound

It's Friday evening and we are flying home tomorrow. An early rise at 4am to get to the airport! It's been a busy week with little time to update this blog but I will up-load some photo's after I get home.

Last week we continued work, completing the boarding in of the ceiling of the 4th floor and the panelled walls. We cladded and floored the eaves cupboards, concreted in the pipwork on the 3rd floor and installed ceiling tiles in the passageways and boxed in structural pillars. Some other jobs were started but put on hold until later. The front forecourt has had several tons of hardcore laid.

This last week Church has been busy leading up to Easter this Sunday. (Yes). We attended a service on Tuesday evening and also Thursday evening for Communion.

On Wednesday afternoon Peter and Lydia plus others from Church took us to Black Sea Camp for the traditional BBQ  and in the evening we took some of the children from the Shelter to Ten-Pin bowling. We had a great evening!

We are looking forward to coming home.

It's the Weekend!

Today is Saturday and we have the day off today! We are half way through our time away and we are expecting reinforcements this evening. (Charles is joining us for our second week!) The weather is overcast and we haven't much planned for today. We are all enjoying a bit of a rest. This afternoon we are planning to go into Odessa City to take a look around.

(Emlyn getting stuck in preparing the floor
 (a past-time apparently)

Work-wise we are making good progress. We have now got different jobs which will make us more productive. Emlyn is tasked with cleaning out the storage areas along the sides of the community area and laying laminate flooring.

The finished job

John, (perhaps recognised from previous visits as having great skills in grouting between tiles) has been tasked with preparing and pointing up the two large pillars at the centre of the room. These will then be painted white next week.

John thinking his wand would do the work for him!

Where's Nick?

Nick is working with Igor in building up the metal work for the side walls. These will then be boarded with a wood effect laminate. This has not been an easy job as there are no designs to work to and it's been a bit of trial and error. Igor has in mind what it will look like but translating to english instructions is not that easy.  It will be interesting to see how they will look like!

Ah!

Day 3 & 4

We have just completed day four (Thursday). We have made good progress and have completed installing metal work in the ceiling and finished boarding it ready for plastering. This afternoon we have made a start on constructing the metal work for the walls. It took a while for Peter and Igor to deliberate and decide on how this should be done (the design), but after our tea break we have made a good start and we hope to make good progress tomorrow.

We had a lot of rain yesterday and its been a lot cooler. Today is sunny with a cold breeze.

Work underway

We have just finished our second day of work. Yesterday, Monday, we started work on the fourth floor. This is an open plan area above the dormer windows you can see in the picture of the outside. This area will eventually become the communal meeting area.

Our task is to complete the metal work and plaster board on the sloping ceilings. After the usual slow start whilst we try to understand what Igor wants us to do we have made some good progress. We met Igor Bhandura from Kiev who visited on Monday lunchtime. He used to be a Pastor at Grace Church and whilst he has moved on, the Transition House is his project.

On Tuesday at mid afternoon Emlyn & Nick were whisked away from construction work to help plant seven pine trees at Black Sea Camp whilst John had a Russian language lesson. Whilst we were there we had a message that Emlyn's luggage had turned up, hopefully they will deliver it to Transition House soon. We have returned quite late to Transition House.

So what's been happening whilst we have been away?

Work has been carried on at the third floor. The floor tiling of the main passageway has been completed and the walls painted with an interesting pattern, designed by Peter.  Floor and wall tiling has also continued elsewhere and some of the rooms are in the course of decoration. There is still the fitting of kitchens and bathrooms to do and many of the doors also still need to be fitted. (Maybe they are waiting for John and Rob to return!

Who's Nick?

The keen eyed amongst you may have noticed a new author to these posts! With both John and Rob not in Odessa on the latest trip they are not able to keep you up to date with what is happening, so John has allowed me free access to add my thoughts and try to keep the blog updated for the next couple of weeks!

This is my third visit with the team to Odessa (previous vists September 2014 & May 2015). Many of you will know my daughter, Lydia who has been a regular at Wood Green, though studying in Newcastle only tends to get to Wood Green during the holidays. I regularly attend St Peter’s Church in Droitwich but have got to know a few of you now through these connections. The last two times I came to work at Transition House involved tiling walls and floors and installing suspended ceilings. As I write I am not sure what we have in store this time and will tell more tomorrow.

For now please keep Emlyn, John and myself in your prayers, that we have a safe and productive fortnight. We send our love to you.

Nick Stone

Safe Arrival

Just a quick note to say that Emlyn and myself (Nick) arrived at Transition House safely last night, albeit without Emlyn's luggage! This is becoming a habit. We hope that it might turn up very soon. It was a long day, made longer due to the one hour flight delay at Kiev and waiting around at the lost luggage counter in Odessa. It was great to exit the airport arrivals barriers  to see Peter, Alex and little David waiting for us with John Collinson who has been working here for the last six weeks. We set off from Worcester at 7am yesterday morning and eventually got to bed at 12.30am this morning! We are two hours ahead. Off to Church this morning and will update more in the next day or so. Watch this space!

Car wash & breakfast

Many thanks to everyone who came to the car wash & breakfast last Saturday, well done all the car washers and cooks who washed 22 cars, cooked and served around 60 breakfasts and raised over £900.

This money will go with the men later this month to buy materials for Transition House.