Celebrating our First Date 25 Years Ago!

This last weekend Jonathan and I celebrated happy memories of some firsts in our courtship and marriage 25 years ago.

Jonathan asked me Saturday, "What was the date that I arrived in Kiev the first time?"

This Sunday, March 25, was the 25th anniversary of Jonathan's arrival in Kiev--the first time he and I met each other. 

He had first written me in September of 1993 to ask if I would be willing to get acquainted by writing to each other, sending his letter through the Durfees who came to Kiev as missionaries a few weeks after I arrived in Kiev. After some mixed feelings about writing to someone I had never heard of before, and upon the encouragement of the Durfees who were impressed with his respectful letter and neat handwriting,

I wrote him back, willing to correspond and become acquainted.

Now nearly six months, several long letters and a few phone calls later, we finally met for the first time.

When I first met him at the airport, I did not recognize him, because he did not look like the photo he had sent me. He was so much better looking! His face was tanned, he'd gotten a new style of haircut in China where he had just been on a trip with mutual friends, and he had such a broad smile on his face!

His handshake was firm and strong. He shook and shook my hand as I welcomed him shyly to Kiev.

He gave me a beautiful bouquet of flowers complete with a vase!

(And twenty-five years later, he surprised me with REAL flowers)

And then our first experience together there in Kiev was a big squash!

Jonathan's sister and her husband who had come along to Kiev, our mission field director who was driving, Jonathan and I all had to fit into a small car. 

Despite how small we all tried to make ourselves, it was still a squash with Jonathan and us two ladies in the back seat!

Well, that was the first sight of each other and the first experience with each other, and on that first day, things went a bit downhill from there at first because Jonathan was so tired he couldn't think of much to say, and I was so nervous that my mind kept going blank! I stammered, and forgot words, and in general was a total mess. In bed that night, I cried and cried because I was so afraid things might not work out, or if they did, it would be a year or two before anything would be serious.

Well, Jonathan was too serious about me for that to happen!

The next day, after a night of rest, things began to get better. In the picture above, you can see Jonathan trying on a fur hat in a hat shop where our Ukrainian friend Sima took us after other errands. This fur hat perfectly matched his coat he'd bought in China, and I was so proud of him!

"Do you like it?" he asked, looking straight at me with a broad smile.

I told him it matched perfectly and was wonderful!

The ice broke at that point.

After a very late lunch/early supper of borsch and biscuits which  my coworker and I made for our guests, everyone else left for the evening so that Jonathan and I could have the evening just to ourselves--our first date. 

Jonathan had bought a drill for a Ukrainian Christian brother who needed this tool, and so first we needed to take it to the apartment of this brother Stepan's family. 

Here are pictures of that evening.

    

         We waited together at the elevator in the hall outside our apartment door, and and then we got inside it together to go down three stories to the first floor, from which we would trot down the final steps to the street.

           There we were, he and I, alone in the tiny elevator. I felt shy.  But he looked straight at me and smiled and said, "It's nice we can finally be together," and suddenly I was comfortable with him. 

            First we went to the market to buy eggs, which I put into my own plastic egg carton as you have to bring your own bag for bread and your own carton for eggs. And then we walked to Stepan's apartment to deliver the drill I had asked Jonathan to bring with him for this dear brother. Of course, you can never just deliver a thing to these dear people without them inviting you in and serving you tea! So of course, we were invited in and we had to sit and wait for tea. Only this time, it was coffee instead of tea. Stepan himself was not there at the time, but Luda, Stepan's daughter, fixed us coffee and a type of cookie called a biscuit.

           Stepan's family had a little parakeet that flew all about the livingroom as we sat there. It perched first on Jonathan's shoulder, and pecked at his lip! Then it landed on my shoulder and pecked at mine! I asked Luda to take pictures of Jonathan and me with the parakeet at our first tea together! The picture she took is the one of us two above. It was a very memorable evening!

        

Yesterday Jonathan surprised me with this beautiful planter of tulips when he arrived home from work.

That picture of us was his idea! He likes tulips because that was what was blooming in Kiev when we were courting there throughout the month of April, and because 

tulips remind him of "two-lips!"

I had made cupcakes out of a carrot cake recipe, and I let Hannah frost them with cream cheese frosting and sprinkles.  I used this heart-shaped cupcake holder that I'd gotten two Christmases ago as a white elephant gift!

It was a very special evening. 

After supper and worship and chores and dishes and reading two chapters in the book Hidden Rainbow (a true story about a Slovakian couple who were converted from Catholicism) that I'm reading aloud to the children, Jonathan and I spent some couple time together.

We read the three or more pages of my diary from 25 years ago telling about that first full day that we spent together in Kiev 25 years ago.

We read about our first "date," and how our hearts melted together from that very first evening we spent together. We read about talking together,

crying together, and praying together for the very first time.

And almost every night before going to sleep, we still thank God over and over for giving us to each other. Maybe having to wait until our late twenties and all the years and months of waiting,

and the heartaches we both faced just before we finally found each other helped us really appreciate one another.

I've been writing up our story and memories from those early days. 

It is my favorite romance story because it is our own!

25 Years Ago Today--I Got My First Picture of Jonathan

Twenty-five years ago today, March 9th, I finally got a picture of the young man who had asked to write to me nearly 6 months earlier, and who had to wait three months to get a letter from me, after the first one was lost in the mail. The day was a Wednesday, and our mission field director in Ukraine had just gotten back from a business trip to the States where he had been in Colorado.

While there, Jonathan had met him and given him an envelope to bring to me in Ukraine.

The envelope contained a photo of him!

I was eagerly, and anxiously waiting for that picture.

I had been told by one person that Jonathan would probably be "semi-geeky."

I was so afraid this might be true. 

I didn't care nearly as much about looks as about character, and I talked to my field director on the phone about Jonathan after he'd met him. He told me that Jonathan "was a wonderful young man."

Then I said I had been worried about what he might have told Jonathan about ME!

I wrote the following conversation in my diary:

"I told him that you were one of the best treasures a man could want," my director said.

"This is all joking aside," he went on. "I told him you had much to offer a man, that most men aren't worthy of."

Gulp, gulp. I didn't deserve those kind words!

After some of the issues we'd had with each other, my unpredictable but predictably kind field director was telling me this!

"You know this is true," he said. "You know it! I'm not just blowing sunshine at you."

I called him by name and said, "I was worried, but deep down I knew--I knew you would be nice about me!"

"How could anyone be anything else?" he said. "But I'm not going to give you Jonathan's envelope till you withdraw your resignation from this mission!"

I said, "I reckon you can keep the pictures. I'll be seeing Jonathan in just a couple weeks."

"I'll go to the airport and take him away," declared my director.

I said, "You go right ahead, [Mr. Director]. Go right ahead! I'm not a bit worried!"

But this particular evening things were looking bleak about getting my picture. 

  I had absolutely no idea what Jonathan looked like, and was very anxious to know!

And my coworkers thought it was great fun to give me a hard time! 

The field director, who was engaged to my coworker, had been gone a while to the States, and my coworker was so eager to have some time with her fiance that she told me they did not want to lay eyes on me till about Friday!

 

 I left my class a little early Wednesday so I could hurry home and let my coworker meet her fiance after her class all by herself--without having to lay eyes on me! I made myself a sandwich and headed out walking to my dear friends the Durfees. They were the ones who had urged me to reconsider writing to Jonathan when I didn't think we should until we had met. 

Now, six months later, I still didn't even know what he looked like! I saw my field director's car arriving with his fiance to our apartment, and I stopped for a moment. I so much wanted that picture! But not until Friday---my coworker wanted her fiance all to herself. So I walked on, and I wanted very much to cry.

I wrote in my diary that it was an awful evening. I tried to copy some recipes and helped the Durfees with some Russian as I often did, and we talked. I had for some reason felt frightened that evening, something I rarely felt, and the Durfees had offered for me to stay with them. But I was afraid my coworkers would worry about me, so I went on home. My apartment was empty, and I was afraid there would be nothing for me. 

But wait, on my desk were two envelopes and a tape. 

But nothing from Jonathan!

 I flew through the apartment, and found another envelope on the kitchen table. 

In fear and anxiety, I opened it. I had been writing to this man now for a couple months back and forth, and he had even called me on Valentine's Day, so I knew he was starting out in all seriousness.

I might be going to spend the rest of my life with him. 

What would he look like?

I wrote in my diary, "It took a while for that picture to sink in. Semi-geeky?"

It took a day or two for it to sink in that he was NOT geeky. 

I could be proud of him!

I had a little mischief in me, too. Since my coworkers had given me such a hard time, I posted Jonathan's photo on a paper on my coworker's door with these words under it:

"I dare you to say semi-geeky!"

Now exactly 25 years later, my NON-Geeky, very handsome husband is trading out fridges for me with my 21-year-old son. Now he wears a very whiskery, but very good-looking beard which makes him look and feel even better! And the best thing is that

25 years later, after lots of trials and troubles mixed in with a lot of bliss and a lot of joy

my handsome, non-geeky husband is still taking care of the little lady that he finally met across the ocean in Ukraine in March of 1994.

  Together we trust God to meet our daily needs as he works hard at remodeling and going on Mission Helps trips, and I take care of the home and school our children and try to be a good helpmeet.

And when fridges give us trouble and free ones from jobs he's working end up not doing too well, God supplies one from nearby for just $100. The men of the house trade it out, and we ladies wash and clean and restock.

And I remember--25 years ago today--the day I first saw my dark-haired suitor

and knew I could be so proud of him!

New Piano at Our Church in Denver!

A week ago  Sunday while Jonathan was gone, we got a big surprise when we arrived at our church in Denver. The old piano was sitting back by the door, and a "new" one was up where the old one used to be!

What a blessing!

Here Pastor Walker's little girls are up with the new piano, given to our church by the Bible Missionary Church which had just gotten a baby grand piano and just needed to get rid of this one.

Pastor Walker had been able to get it with the help of a couple other men Saturday.

It is such a boost to have a piano that sounds better, is in better tune, is easier to play, has a softer touch, and does not have such a high back, making it so the pianist can see the song leader!
This is the old piano, a picture I took of the pastor and his wife singing a special a few weeks ago.

The pianist was gone this Sunday a week and a half ago, but Holly Walker did well. Then Crystal played the piano for the song we'd been asked to share. We had been practicing "Sweet Jesus, What a Wonder You Are" together with "He's the One," a song my sisters and I used to sing together many years ago.  It was such a joy to sing this time with three of my daughters.

Here is Hannah with the pastor's little girls. They dearly love her, and she has a good time with them!

I read a quote recently that has not left my mind.

"May all that has become noise within you be changed to music again."

Like the old piano, sometimes our lives simply become out of tune, weary, old, and anything but beautiful and bountiful. 

Sometimes there is simply no energy or time or money or hope to make the necessary changes.

And then Someone steps in and simply hands us a gift--a new piano with a soft touch,

love, joy, new energy, hope, forgiveness, kindness, mercy, refinement, chastening, tuning, gladness, abundance, laughter.

"The chords that were broken will vibrate once more!"

Crystal has been asked to play more than once for the Bible Missionary that has been without a pastor and also without a pianist.

I'm so thankful for a small chance every once in a while for the girls to use the skills they have been spending years learning. I used to be taught that if you didn't use a gift or a skill, you would lose it.

It's so easy to forget when you don't use a skill. I've been so grateful for these times when the girls can use their piano training.  They have learned so much on their own, and Crystal took lessons at college as well. Playing for congregation takes a different skill than a classical arrangement.

Here is a scene of one of the snowy mornings on our way to church in Denver.

Here is a fun read about how a different culture feels about music conducting!

http://ajoyfulchaos.blogspot.com/2019/02/when-cultures-collide-conducting-music.html

Another very good post.

https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/we-murder-with-words-unsaid

More scenes on our way to church.

In Denver

 

Our family loves country, and going 90 miles one way into the Hispanic suburbs of Denver did not fit into our dreams 25 years ago when we first got married, expecting to spend our lives on the foreign mission field.

Our ways aren't always His ways, and His are best, even when He asks us to drive 90 miles one way to church, and to help with Kids' Club when you never know if there will be ten or sixteen or just two children like we had last time.

There is so much "noise" in the city, literally and spiritually.

May what has been noise there be turned into music once again!

The Catch-All at Our House

I'm sure you don't have a catch-all desk or chair or counter at your house like we do at ours.
It's just so easy to dump this and that on this desk.
So easy to clear things off the table and set it here instead of taking it where it belongs.

I was thinking about catch-alls a couple days ago as I was clearing this desk.
It reminded me of catch-alls in relationships--the black sheep, the scapegoats, the people that others like to blame and dump responsibility upon instead of going to the trouble of taking responsibility themselves for their part in problems, or checking out the facts before placing responsibility where it needs to be.
Taking personal responsibility is like simply taking the stuff from where it does not belong
and placing it where it does--in your own room, in the drawer or shelf or out in the garage.
If you don't know where it goes, ask someone who does.
Sometimes the thing is just plain trash and needs to be thrown away and forgotten about.
Not everything that lands on you deserves to be kept in a special place.
Some of it just needs to be tossed into the trash,
or into something my mother used to call her "mystery bag."
We've all been guilty of dumping blame on people who really weren't responsible or who were only partly responsible for fiascos that happened.
And we've all been on the receiving end where blame and responsibility was dumped on us where it didn't belong.
It's very painful, and one can spend years trying to recover. 
Like, "Who forgot to clean the lint-catcher in the dryer? Looks like it went through several loads without being cleaned!"

Yes, I pulled this whole wad out of the dryer lint screen!
But the girls were gone, so nobody got fussed at. I just cleaned it out and went on with life.
The same girls who forgot to clean out the lint make the cutest, yummiest cookies.
I'd rather focus on the beautiful things my girls do for the family and others than on the mistakes they make and the things they forget.

 It is not a sin to compliment our children, to be proud of them and tell them so.

I want them to be glad they belong to our family.

Let's let some kind words fall on some listening ears today rather than finding someone to be the catch-all of blame and complaints.

Twenty-Five Years Ago Today--Waiting for my Sweetheart

Twenty-five years ago today I was still waiting for my sweetheart.

Still checking the mailbox anxiously 25 years ago today.  

Now 25 years later my oldest and youngest daughters are happily holding the baby of a sweet young couple who weren't even born yet.

The sweetheart whose letters I was so anxiously waiting for was showing pictures to friends this Sunday afternoon, photos of his 44th Mission Helps trip, the one he took to Guatemala in the last two weeks.

And my oldest son who will be on call tomorrow with his "red bag" to leave on one hour's notice for deployment to fight very real wildland fires,  

is, however, today literally climbing the walls to dangle a ball down with a long string for his dog down below at the bottom of the stairs.

 Yeah, he actually did that, and on Sunday morning before church, to boot!

 Jonathan managed to capture it on camera!

Twenty-five years ago today I kept going down to check the mailbox.
I didn't know the happiness that awaited me in only a matter of weeks.

 I had gotten Jonathan's first letter in Ukraine in September, hand-delivered by other missionaries who had just arrived in Ukraine, the Durfees. I waited a few weeks before sending my response, not sure at all if I should go ahead with a relationship by mail or not. 

But that first letter to Jonathan never reached him. 

One or two months later, I was afraid my letter had been lost in the mail,

yet afraid that it had not, that indeed he had gotten my letter and he had been turned off!
It was a very difficult time!

I wrote again.

Lacking confidence in my ability to write an acceptable letter, since Jonathan hadn't responded to my first one, I let my coworker read it to make sure it was okay.

She read it out loud, adding all sorts of juicy comments which had me rolling with laughter.

However, it passed inspection.

Later the next day, after having sent the letter, I made the mistake of asking my coworker's fiance what he would have advised about writing a second time.

He said he would have waited another week. 

"In a few days," he said, "you're going to get a letter, and then you'll be sooo embarrassed."

He probably made certain droll faces and eye rolls and such like to add to the surety and truth of the facts he was saying.

I wrote in my diary, "My heart sank to the ocean floor...I was so upset that I left them at the elevator and walked the street for half an hour, and then went to my room and wrote a poem..."

But the fact was, the facts Mr. Other Lady's Fiance said were not true. 

Jonathan never had gotten that first letter, and he had been waiting in deep despair for months!

He got that second letter one whole month after I wrote it. 

And his response took another month to reach me!
To this day we don't know why God allowed that terribly long delay, because every other letter we wrote or that anyone else wrote to us only took about 9 days to reach their destinations.
Perhaps God knew that I would not value Jonathan as much if I got his letter sooner without the discipline of waiting,
or that he wouldn't value me as much without having to wait.
But the long wait made us eager for each other, and God used that to knit our hearts together when things may have been different otherwise. 

Suddenly, hope was shining its lovely rays at the ends of our dark and lonely tunnels. 

But still it was lonely. It took so long to get letters back and forth. I was afraid writing too often would appear that I was chasing, yet I was so desperately lonely that I resorted again and again to penning letters to the young man clear across the world. 

Twenty-five years later, two Thursdays ago, I'm surprised by a letter in the mail from my Jonathan who was in Guatemala--addressed to 

simply

"Sweetheart"!

The mailman figured it out okay!

And my handsome prince was thinking about all that had transpired in the last 25 years--and how much mail still means to his wife! So two weeks ago he wrote me after I left him at the hotel in Denver near the airport on his way to Guatemala on a 10-day Mission Helps trip. 

True, it was just a page torn out of his tablet, and not torn exactly straight, either, but a love letter nonetheless!

Twenty-five years after his first letter to me, I slipped this newest letter inside my Bible. 

Memories of those long, long months of waiting--

of one coworker trying to set me up with a young Russian man named Sergei, a very sincere and talented young Christian who wrote poetry,

of me heading to the Russian supermarket to buy a prettier scarf when I knew Jonathan would be coming to Ukraine, and letting my friend Tatyana teach me how to wear it right.

"I will teach you how to dress," she said, "so when your young man comes from America, you will be pretty!"

I still don't know how to wear a scarf right, and I'm still not very pretty, but my young man looked beyond all that. He did notice that I could cook.

Twenty-five years later, his wife is making potato/ham chowder and deviled eggs for supper for his mother's 81st birthday, along with strawberry cream pie made by Rose, while he is climbing a Guatemalan volcano thousands of miles away!

And she is making a spaghetti supper for him the day he comes home, doing his laundry, teaching his kids, cleaning his house.

And making a taco salad meal two days later for a young couple who asked to stop in yesterday.

 We had met them when we took the 5-day training at Caring for the Heart where this newly engaged couple also was involved, along with her parents and a number of others.

 Nick and Katrina invited us to their wedding several months later, and now, almost a year and a half later, they have a little baby and were spending the weekend in Colorado Springs,

so asked if they could stop in.

 We enjoyed sharing with each other about their overseas ventures and ours, the missionary endeavors of their close relatives and our Mission Helps trips,  showing them the pictures from Guatemala, 

bringing in baby bunnies, and loving on their sweet little one.

Just before they left, I suggested we pray together, and Jonathan agreed.

To our amazement, this young couple stepped forward, her with her arm around me, and Nick with his arm around Jonathan, and both us couples with our arms around each other.

Four heads bowed, while our children watched and listened.

Jonathan prayed for them, and then Nick asked to pray for us.

He asked the Lord to bless us as we live quiet and humble lives--

then he corrected himself.

"Well," he laughed, inside his prayer, "maybe not exactly quiet, with all the wild things they do!"

But then he went on, asking the Lord again to bless our lives.

He does. 

Our quiet but wild, humble but crazy lives.

Twenty-five years of them so far. 

 

Jonathan Home Again--and I Get to Do His Laundry!

After almost eleven long days, my sweetheart is back home again!

It was strange having him arrive home in the middle of the week wearing dress clothes!

But he had traveled lightly and when laundry had been done in Guatemala, somehow his jeans hadn't gotten back to him. So he came home in his Sunday dress clothes!

Sammy picked Jonathan up Thursday afternoon at the airport because Sam had driven up to a fireman's gear shop in Ft. Collins, and it wasn't much out of his way to pick his dad up on his way home. 

While we waited, the day seemed to crawl. After school, Danny and Hannah were out building a "dam" in the ditch where melted snow was sloshing.

The two of them also made "Welcome Home" signs for the front door!

I made a fresh batch of homemade laundry soap.

One of the girls took this sunrise picture.

And finally Jonathan was home! Lots of hugs and kisses all around!

I am so thankful my wonderful hubby freely hugs all the kids--even the older ones!

But he saves the biggest, longest, most affectionate hug for his "spring chick"!

He was soo tired.  They'd had to leave the hotel at 4:30 this morning to catch their plane at Tapachula, Mexico. But from Mexico City then, Jonathan had a non-stop flight.

Yesterday in Tapachula he managed to find a few treats to bring home including pineapple jam, mango jam, marmalade, Snickers made in Mexico, some kind of yummy candy.

And he also had a bag of fresh coffee!

I helped unpack.

I get a kick out of how he makes use of every tiny space!

He packs his vitamins and morning stuff inside his boots!

I was sooo happy to be able to do my hubby's laundry again. It brought back memories of the first time I did laundry for him--something I just read about in my old diary from 1994. It was during our courtship in Ukraine when he was visiting for a few weeks with his sister and her husband. Jonathan was wondering one day how to get his laundry done, and I offered to do it for him. My coworker and I had a tiny washing machine that just barely fit in our bathroom, but it worked fine as long as you did small loads. 

So the next day Jonathan brought his laundry to our apartment when he and his sister and her husband came for the day.

To me, it was such a privilege to do this small job for my sweetheart!

My coworker was horrified. I guess she had not grown up with brothers like I had, and had different ideas about who should do laundry under such circumstances when you are courting! However, her fiance felt differently.

When the first or second load of laundry was done, he was sitting in the livingroom watching me carry a basket of laundry out to the balcony to hang to dry, and he said, "I'd like to hire you for my housekeeper!"

This time it was my turn to be horrified.

I did not know what to say, so I did what I usually do when I don't know what to say.

I say the first thing that comes into my head.

So I said sweetly, "I'm already hired!"

And I went on out to the balcony.
When I returned, my coworker's fiance tried again.
"I would pay you well," he said.
Without missing a beat, I replied evenly, "I shall be paid well," and then I went on out into the kitchen where I was the one who had made most of the meals during our time in Ukraine.
My coworker's fiance had made his choice, and I had made mine.
I had decided whose laundry I wanted to wash, whom I would be cooking for, whom I would be cleaning up behind, whom I wanted to be a helpmeet to,
and whose heart I wanted to care for.
It would be one and only one person. It would be MY sweetheart, and not somebody else's.
And I am still happily washing his laundry every week!