Summer vacation 2013. More about Montenegro.

One of the beaches near Petrovac, which we've visited the most

OK, this year we went on a 10 day vacation to Petrovac, Montenegro again. We liked it so much last year that couldn't resist not to come and explore MORE of this beautiful country and its nature. The weather was wonderful (as almost always in Montenegro during the summer) and we had a chance to enjoy pretty much everything there's to enjoy about seashore vacation: sea swimming, snorkling, suntanning, cooking fresh sea food, seeing many ancient cities, exploring Adriatic cusine.

This time, instead of writing too much here in the blog we've decided to record short videos with tales about parts of our trip to Montenegro. So here you go. Enjoy! (appologies for the in/out of focus during the video - out camera needs repair:-)

One of the new things we've done is visiting the ruins of the old town of Stari Bar, which is one the towns that Roman's founded on

ART Improve 2012 conference: new experience

This November we had a chance to partisipate in planning and organizing of Art Improve 2012 - a first conference in Ukraine for Christians of creative professions: artists, musician and actors. Both myself and Katya have always been interested to encourage and work with people of creative backgrounds and this time we've had a chance to unite our efforts with CCX Ukraine (part of IFES) and Ukrainian Evangelical Theological Seminary.

The conference was an experiment and in the very beginnig I was just going to help in the area of web-site creation (blog, ro be more precise) and Internet advertising. Then, unexpectedly it has grown into an involvement of both of us, of about 30-40 hours per week and Katya becoming the director of the conference :-) Well, it was quite a ride, I have to tell you!! :-)

Vacation in Montenegro

In Dubrovnik, Croatia, during our vacation in Montenegro 

Ok, from the very beginning this blog entry name should have sounded as "Summer vacation in Italy". It was up to the point until Katya didn't get her visa (since Italian Embassy is a strange place:-) just 4 days before our flight from Kyiv... and we had to cancel our trip to Italy.

Good thing is that (even though in past 2,5 years Ukraine is getting more and more isolated internationally, which is no surpries with our current President) there are still some countries where Ukrainians can travel without a VISA. One of them is Montenegro, where some of our friends have been already and recommended us to go. So we decided... why not?

Passion 2012: Volunteer experience

So, this year, again, by the grace of God and generous help of one of our very good friends in the States we were able to attend Passion 2012 conference in Atlanta. It was an answer to our prayers and prayers of many friends in Ukraine, the States and around the world. In this post I wanted to write a bit more about the conference and what we've experiences there.

More about trip to Mississippi/Passion 2012

Wanted to share with you some videos we've filmed while going to US to visit Chuck (in his home in Mississippi) and then Passion 2012 conference in Atlanta.

Video interview on the way to U.S. in Amsterdam airport (Schipol):

Christmas in Mississippi...

We've celebrated Christmas at Pinelake church at Starkville, MS

This year we got to celebrate Christmas in America for the first time together as a family (me and Katya) . And it is now NOT a cold and snowy Maine (which would be usuall for us), but rather warm and sunny Mississippi!:-) We were invited to the States by a good friend of ours Chuck, whom we've met at Passion conference in Atlanta back in 2010... eversince, we've become really good friends and we've visited Chuck in US before and he came to visit us in L'viv Ukraine. One other reason we've came to the States is to participate in Passion 2012 conference in Atlanta, Georgia. We are looking forward to that VERY MUCH, cause this year we will be volunteering. Here are some pictures from our trip for now:

Celebrating Christmas with Lovorn's family

2,000 pageviews at our blog

Here we go, it took our blog almost 1,5 years to get first 1,000 views and now, only within some 9 more month we've got another 1,000.

On Dec. 20th 2011 we "celebrated" 2,000 views at this BLOG. It is encouraging. I guess it means that this is interesting at least to some people to read. So, we will continue on doing this... Please stop by anytime, leave your comments and subscribe to the blog by e-mail (it's in the upper right conner, where it says "Follow blog by e-mail") - you will get a notification by e-mail everytime the new post appears.

Finally settled in Kyiv

OK, well, finally, I've got to write in our blog about how we've settled in Kyiv. This is actually the very first weekend (eversince we've moved our stuff to Kyiv from L'viv on Nov. 19th and moved ourselves) that we had at least some free time, which was not consumed in unpacking bozes and visiting with parents/relatives/friends.

How we've moved?
Actually, today it has been exactly ONE MONTH after we've moved to Kyiv!! Amazing, how time really flies! But on a more informative side I wanted to let all of our good friends (and readers of this blog, I hope) know that we are doing really well and grateful to the Lord that He has provided everything needed to "transport" us to this beautiful city (of course, L'viv is beautiful as well:-)!!

The move itself went really smooth and we were able to use a really large truck - big enough to transport BOTH of Katya's piano's!!:-) So, now, we just need to figure out what to do with them both. Our Kyiv friends and my brother Slavik, came to help us unload the truck. We arrived around 20:30pm and by around 22:00pm all our stuff were upstairs and truck unloaded. Thank you, thank you again to everyone who has helped us in L'viv and Kyiv with this move!

Where we live?
We are renting a 2 room appartment on the 21st flooor (yes, no kidding) of a relatively new appartment building near Zhytomyrskaya metro station. Here's the picture of me on the street right near our building, which was taken by Katya from our balcony...


Can't see me? I'm that little gray spot right near the black car...:-)

Anyhow, you probably can tell that we sort of live "on the top of the world"!! However, our windows do not face downtown Kyiv, so we rather see the Zhytomyr highway and nice forests, which are on the suburbs of Kyiv.

Переїзд до Києва: потрібна допомога

Привіт друзі, так, ми переїздимо до Києва і я пишу цей пост, щоб детальніше розповісти про нашу потребу в допомозі при завантаженні/розвантаженні машини. Речей накопилося досить багато і нам потрібна допомога, щоб все це успішно і швидко перевезти. Отож:

Хто може допомогти у Львові:
Потрібна допомога в завантаженні машини (4-5 моцних хлопців:-), бо машина буде порівняно пізно (біля 9:30-10:00 ранку) і нам потрібно її за 1-1,5 годинки завантажити, щоб ще встигути доїхати в Київ і там розвантажитися до кінця дня.  Тому, якщо ви можете допомогти, підходьте будь-ласка до нашої квартири (вул. Вол. Великого 73, кв. 45, під'їзд 3-й) біля 9:45 в суботу 19 листопада.

Хто може допомогти у Києві:
Потрібна допомога в розвантаженні машини (5-6 моцних хлопців:-), бо машина буде порівняно пізно (біля 20:00-21:00 вечора) і нам потрібно її як можна швидше розвантажити. Тому, якщо ви можете допомогти, підходьте будь-ласка до нашої орендованої квартири (вул. Феодори Пушиної 19, зразу на виході з метро Житомирська) біля 21:00 в суботу 19 листопада.

Productive day in KYIV: US VISA, new boss, appartment to live in



Well, yesterday was a very LONG but one of the most productive days in my life for past couple of months. May be I should rather say the day when many things, that have been happening on the background (preparations, thoughts, prayers) just fell into place and I have seen the physical results of those. To summarize all that 18 hours long day I have got my VISA to US, received approval for my Christmas/New Year vacation from my new boss (which means we can come to Passion 2012 and spend Christmas with our friends in US!!:-) and, I think, I have found an apartment to live in when we move to Kyiv. So, now so many questions that we had in our heads cleared up and we can continue on with our move to Kyiv and plans for next 4-6 months of our life.

I have got my US VISA , received approval for Christmas/New Year vacation and found good apartment to live in.

Funny story from that morning... I came to US consulate around 7:45 (as was written at the web site) and there was already a huge line there. Maybe around  25-30 people in front of me to get their visas! I was last in that line... ok, I thought to myself I will wait.How surprised I was when one of the guards asked "Is Mr. Shekhovtsov here?"... I said "Yes, its me". "Please follow me and stand here" - he said to me pointing