Hey

Hello! 2 more days till vacation :) yay!!! I'm really looking forward to getting away, I'm not expecting too much, just relaxing away from the parents, school and horrible stress of senior year. Haha the words stress and senior year should never appear in the same sentence! :) It's been an awesome year and it's finally coming to an end. I have waited for quite a time now (13 years?), and here I am. It's bitter-sweet to be honest, but on the most part the sweetness of it overpowers all other aspects!
Continuing, this weekend was the annual Syracuse Tent Conference. Good times! The last sermon on Sunday night is sticking with me the most (I was a tad distracted during other sermons on account of a puddle of sweat magically appearing on the floor :P) Yeah, it was HOT. Anyway the last sermon was about holiness. I always knew holy meant "set apart", but in the back of my mind I tend to hear the word holy and imagine a person, with a beautiful gleaming face among white robes and preferably a halo of some sort. It's time for me to change that image! In 1 Corinthians 1:2 Paul writes:

"To the church of God in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus and called to be holy, together with all those everywhere who call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ--their Lord and ours..."

He called them HOLY! Yeah big deal, but if you keep reading, Paul clearly writes about things such as disputes among the church, sexual immorality, food sacrificed to idols, and a bunch of other things that the church needed guidance with. They made lots of mistakes, yet were still called holy. That’s beautiful! Ok I have to go, hopefully my thoughts made sense!

By the way I had a fun day today mowing the lawn with my mom, grandma, Pushok, Tanya and her sunburn.

This Week

Hi!
The newest thing that's been going on with my life is being sick :/ I worked more than thirty hours over the weekend with Natalya, and I then I realized I was really sick when I woke up on Monday morning. (Aw my mom is so nice she just came in and gave me V8 splash with mango. I can hardly taste it cuz my nose is stuffed but she's so nice!)
Oh man Monday was a crazy day... My partners and I had a 25 min presentation and I forced myself to go to school... I fell asleep on the bus and drowsily went to class in Brockport, so I really didn't look over what I had to present at all but I walked into class and  was shocked to see my partners are already up front practicing. I quickly wiped my nose and went up front and when the next slide came up, it was my turn. I just looked at it. And then went out of the room to burst into tears. Yes, me! This is embarrassing but I'm sharing it anyway. My partners who are also my closest friends in my class came to find out what was wrong and they really helped me by talking to me and by making me laugh. I love them! Yeah I felt horrible because my head was pounding and I was having trouble making my voice loud, but we ended up doing really well on the presentation, Praise God!
Moving on, today is my Nursing Orientation at MCC which I'm really happy that Dasha is in it with me. Dasha is an awesome friend that is totally silly but mature at the same time. She's a really awesome girl, and I have so much to look forward to in the next three years.
Oh yeah and I have won three scholarships so far, God is good because He just pours out His blessings when You ask Him and trust Him!
I'm out, thanks for reading! :)

Dear Rochester

Dear Rochester,
The day I met you 15 and a half years ago, I knew this was where I belonged, or at least in a suburb nearby. You have given me ice storms, blackouts, humidity, hail, rain, snow in incredible amounts! What a talent you possess, you are so very generous! I know you love me and want to give me lots of gifts, but maybe you should lay off a bit.... Your getting clingy. You will give me great joy if you stop with the rain at least. Well, Rochester, your not that bad. I respect you, and I plan on staying. We still cool? Sorry if I was harsh :)
Love, Me

KYN Brownies*

Ingredients

• 1 box (18.5 Ounce) German Chocolate Cake Mix (I Used Duncan Hines)
• 1 cup Finely Chopped Pecans
• ⅓ cups Evaporated Milk
• ½ cups Evaporated Milk (additional)
• ½ cups Butter, Melted
• 60 whole Caramels, Unwrapped
• ⅓ cups Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips
• ¼ cups Powdered Sugar

Preparation Instructions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a large bowl, mix together cake mix, chopped pecans, 1/3 cup evaporated milk, and melted butter. Stir together until totally combined. Mixture will be very thick.

Press half the mixture into a well-greased 9 x 9 inch square baking pan. Bake for 8 to 10 minutes. Remove pan from oven and set aside.

In a double boiler (or a heatproof bowl set over a saucepan of boiling water) melt caramels with additional 1/2 cup evaporated milk. When melted and combined, pour over brownie base. Sprinkle chocolate chips as evenly as you can over the caramel.

Turn out remaining brownie dough on work surface. Use your hands to press it into a large square a little smaller than the pan. Use a spatula to remove it from the surface, then set it on top of the caramel and chocolate chips.

Bake for 20 to 25 minutes. Remove from pan and allow to cool to room temperature, then cover and refrigerate for several hours. When ready to serve, generously sift powdered sugar over the surface of the brownies. Cut into either nine or twelve helpings, and carefully remove from the pan. 

*they are called Knock You Naked Brownies... lol it sounded naughty so I abbreviated it. If you lived on these brownies, you will probably end up naked though cuz you wouldn't fit into any of your old clothes :P 

And all props go to The Pioneer Woman, I loved her book and also think her blog is hilarious and very interesting!  

http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2011/05/knock-you-naked-brownies/ 

her pic is almost as good as mine... haha not.

Stormy Weather

It's been stormy weather, leaving me vitamin D deprived and feeling a tad blue. I can't help it! So I decided to share with you the state of our weather this evening. By the way, I prob looked a bit odd running around outside in the rain, Sunday night, in my pajamas tucked into my dark long socks, camera in hand, snapping photos of random house accessories. Just be thankful that your not my neighbor. :P I'll leave it at that.


When it's windy out, I see this tree bending side to side, and from my bedroom window, I pray it won't fall on me. And then I peacefully fall back asleep, secretly loving the thrill. Wow I'm weird.

I left this photo unedited because I thought it looked pretty cool just the way it was.

When taking this photo, I thought to myself: "Why am I taking a picture of our driveway lights in the rain?" I couldn't think of a rational excuse to my behavior.

And life goes on. And, yes, I had to add this photo.

 

Mini Cheesecakes

 Mini Cheesecakes

For Crust Need:
-½ package vanilla wafers, crushed
-1 stick melted/softened butter

For Cheesecake Filling Need:
-5 eggs
-1 cup sugar
-3 packages cream cheese, softened

Directions:
Preheat oven 350 degrees. Mix together crushed vanilla wafers and butter, add about a tablespoon to each aluminum foil cupcake cup. In a bowl mix sugar and cream cheese with blender and then add eggs after fully blended.  Add this mixture to the muffin cups with a ladle and let bake 45-50 min or until brown.
Let cool then decorate with fresh strawberries or fruits and whipped cream. Enjoy!

God Saves

Yesterday was Open Door mission and it was the most blessed time I have ever had there!
Captain was back! He is pretty much in charge of everything at Open Door but I have never met him in person. People keep quitting the kitchen job, so he was on duty. Thank God for men like him!
First of all, before we served the food we stood in a mini circle (Captain, Natalya, me, Alesya, Yura and Paul) and we prayed. This was the first time we prayed in the kitchen before serving, and guess what? We prayed after too. Captain also shared his testimony, he was one of the guys sitting in the seats, a homeless drug addict. After hearing the gospel at Open Door, Jesus saved him and he began a program to get off of the drugs and start serving the Lord. He said "If God can save me, the worst sinner, He can save anyone".
Recently, I feel like I have been backsliding... when was the last time I really read the Bible? It seems like after one day of me saying to myself "OK I'm not going to care today, I'm just gonna chill, relax and not do anything for God"- this was the lie of my flesh. Once you do that for one day, the next day you really feel even worse and think to yourself I'll just do the same thing today, one more day won't hurt.
Then a week later in this same position, digging my hole deeper and deeper, I look up and think to myself "What am I doing?" You'd think after so many years of following Christ, I'd have a smidget of wisdom, but no, I still fall, I still am so weak. But one thing I know resounds in my life: "My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness". Yeah, I rock at the whole being weak thing, so God here I am; weak, You said Your strength will be perfected in my weakness, so do Your work.

Falling

            I've stumbled...

                         and tripped

                                     my whole life.

                            Now, I'm at the point where I have to ask You...

                               Please,

                     teach me to fall,

         teach me to fall in love with You.

                                               This is the one fall I want to jump into,

                                    I'm clumsy,

                         prone to failure,

                   accidents.

                        After all these years,

                            I still need a lesson on how to fall...

                                                                    How to fall in love with You, Jesus.

This Week In Photos

I gave Pushok a bath.

Inna, Lesya, Natalya and I visited our friend Lesya, who was in a car accident and had a broken leg. I made these for her :) I love the girls who were there, and I'm glad we visited because I bet it gets lonely when you have a broken leg.








I was practicing my puppy face as I was getting ready for my scholarship interview... we shall see in few weeks if my puppy face won me some mulah.

The kids... What to say about them?... A picture says a million words I guess :P










This is my new friend Mr. Turtle. I found him in the backyard after my mom mowed the lawn. He's a miracle turtle! He's so small and not poisonous, because I googled him, and turtles cannot be poisonous, they can only be snapping turtles. Watch out readers, he's gonna snap ya!





Pushok was amazed by this little creature. He must have smelled weird. And who ever said turtles are slow? It's a misconception, it is not true. Dude, Mr Turtle moves fast like lighting.

Spring is so beautiful. I love the trees! It's a new beginning and it just amazes me!
So have a good day folks, I'm off to work :)

Family Fun

I just had a great night! First of all, it's national prayer day... and I skipped prayer! It's okay though, I got to have a ton of fun with my family, it was really a learning experience. And I can catch up with prayer in my personal prayer closet time :) Kids are so hard to handle. I don't know how some people raise little angels, it must be some kind of secret potion. Sadly, as a minor in child care abilities, I took it the easy way out... Movies and candy if your good. What did people do before these things were invented?
Parents: "Kids, let's go farm and I'll give you produce if your good!"
Kids: "YAY!"Uhh... Anyway... moving on... We watched Tangled, and I probably enjoyed it more than them. Best move ever. You know how after kids sit for 90 minutes straight, they have a strange yet undeniable urge to run in circles? Well, I saw pure proof of that today. And since I am an honest person, I will confess that I was the first one to jump out my desk chair and start "jumping" to this song (let's call it jumping for now):

Come on! And since I am a honest person (again I will confess)... We probably jumped to this song in circles for about 8 entire minutes, until Victoria had cramps. That image just mades me crack up. No, I am not laughing at the pain of a child! So that's that, I'm off the memorize my biology definitions. Night!

Tuesday- Last Night

Yesterday was Andriy's Birthday, apparently he turned "20" but that's obviously not true. I think he turned nineteen. Anyway we went to Sakura Home, YUMMY! It was Chinese food, and we had hibachi which was way too much food but was yummy. Yo, it was good. Haha.

 It was quite classy looking inside, as you can see. You know how Chinese people eat on the floor sometimes? There was a room where you could pretend you were doing that, it had cushions on the ground and everything! Paul said it was a scam though cuz there was a hole to put your feet in at the bottom.

This is Natalya and I. She's my BFFAE! (Best friend forever and ever) Hehe! I love her.

Here is Inna. She "made this cake". She told me to say that, but we all know what quotation marks mean... haha! She is a great role model, as a cousin, friend, and nurse.

 

This is Inna's little tea table full of sweets. I adore the flowers! I'm just a flower lover in all ways, unless a bug is crawling all over it. Even then, I will ponder the beauty of the flower from a distance! Great job Innachka, hazayka. Anyway, I added little "reaction" things to my blog, so click away about what you think, it's anonymous so I'll man up if you click bored, I'll cry only a little. Promise. :) Oh yeah today I had an interview for a 5K scholarship, it was very... Well, I'm not sure how to describe it, I just would be very grateful if I won cuz Dee needs a car, and I promised God I would donate some. Haha! If only I were kidding. 5 week count down still taking place, can't wait.

And so, life goes on.  

Simple Beauty

 

How amazing are the deeds of the LORD! All who delight in Him should ponder them.

Psalm 111:2

Mt. Zion Trip

What a weekend! I love how spending hours and hours with certain people on a bus can shape your friendships to a great extent! I'm not going to describe the trip in order... I'm just going to blab about random things.
The graduation was great! The location seemed like a little piece of heaven... so full of nature and beauty. I love that. The worship was phenomenal, and in the middle of the ceremony we had a moment of silence for David Wilkerson. It lasted a whole minute... Let's just say that was the longest minute of my life. I think I was probably bright red and looked extremely weird because I was holding my breath to keep from exploding... It was great! Haha because there was a snoring baby that was really loud, and you know my sister and I, we are just a silly pair. So we tried so hard not to laugh, and I think we did pretty good so no one really heard us cracking up. I felt like God should have struck us down for our disrespect until I looked over at Dima, and he himself was trying to contain his laughter. I think everyone within a few foot radius was doing the same.
Haha another thing, there was this REALLY really cute guy from the school and we just happened to be taking pictures together and he was there with his voluminous golden locks of hair and blue eyes and high cheek bones, oh boy. He kneeled right by Tanya and I and she exclaimed quite loudly "toy holpis iz clasnami volasi tut prishov!" (that kid with the cool hair is here!) It was hilarious because I'm pretty sure he is a fellow Ukrainian. How embarrasing! Cute story for their future wedding. LOL. (Please become my brother in law, whoever you are!!)
Continuing, I was pretty full of thought about how girls thrive on details. I don't know but it seems like we tend to over think things a lot of times, and over analyze people's behaviors. It was not bothering me that girls are like that, I was just left thinking.. Would I last a week with these girls on a trip? I was doubting it. Then I finally understood that though I may be different in some ways, I'm the same. We like talking about hair and comparing what color bras we had on and our nail polish. I love that about girls!
Anyway by the end of the trip I was able to give our fellow bus driver some girl advice. Who woulda thought? Yup. Lol! So that is summing up the trip. I will forever remember it :) Now especially because it is written down! Thank you for reading :)