Will picked up his new passport yesterday and made some progress on reregistration. That will be his focus in the upcoming week.

We had a lovely time meeting part of the family that I mentioned before when I asked for prayer for their adoption. Please keep praying; they're in the home stretch.

We've had some fussy, sickish days and long nights lately. It's nothing serious or really out of the ordinary, but please pray for rest and health in our family.

Please keep praying for the church here!

The biggest practical thing that we need prayer for right now is our documents, although everything does seem to be going fine there. When Will went to Vasilevka (what I called the "county" level) they told him that he needed a new passport, so he rushed off to Kiev and applied right away. Now we're waiting for that to come in, before we can do anything more. Pray that it will come quickly. It was very nice to find out that the lady in charge in Vasilevka seems to be nice and professional, like the one in Zaporozhya; praise God for that!

Also, please pray for peace and unity in the church here. Even though we are pulling back in our involvement, we still love the people here very much. The church is really going through a hard time now and needs lots of prayer.

Will just got back from the summit. He had a good and safe trip. Thank you for praying! You can add prayers that we'll all be able to rest up now (it was a full trip for him and some tiring nights for me here) and have opportunities to talk through anything from his time there.

I think the adoption in progress that I mentioned last week is going well. Please keep praying for them.

Coming up: Will needs to work on our reregistration now, in the week ahead.

This is insignificant, but could you please pray for me to find time to work on a few projects myself?

Document update: registration is transferring from Zaporozhya (which is like the state capitol) to Vasilevka (which is kind of the county seat?). Please pray that Will will be able to figure where and how to register us there. The lady at the "state" level is such an easy-to-work-with professional that it's going to be hard to say goodbye to her!

We're having trouble with our landlords. Or, actually they're having big trouble. This apartment is owned by a divorced couple. Please pray that they can figure things out between themselves.

Will is leaving for Kiev on Tuesday to attend the summit I had mentioned before. Please cover his travels and time there with lots of prayer. Pray that he'll make good connections with people and get insight into where we should be headed. Of course, you can pray for us at home without him, too.

Also, there's an American family adopting in our region right now. I can't give details, because their story isn't ours to tell, of course, but they're very heavy on our hearts and minds right now. Please lift them up with us.

(I think I fixed the return email address for this blog. If you're getting this by email, you should be able to reply now.)

I spoke too soon last week when I said that we were well. We've had another week of sickness; even our poor cat had a trip to the vet. But now we really are back to normal and very, very thankful for the great health that we're usually blessed with!

Will's going to Zaporozhya on Tuesday to see about reregistration.

We've decided that he'll go to the summit I mentioned before by himself, instead of our whole family trying to attend. Please pray that it will be a really good time of connecting with other people and learning.

Health is getting better around here. Thank you for praying! We're still not quite back up to 100%, though, so you can keep praying.

I can't think of anything else that's new.

How can we pray for YOU?

Updating again

Once again, I ask: is anyone still reading here? I'd like to start updating once a week again, instead of only mixing prayer requests in with my general updates elsewhere. I'm going to try for every Saturday here.

So, first, some longer-term prayer requests:

• residency renewal in March (shouldn't be any problems or fuss or travel involved, but we should still pray)
• decision making: just that we would be able to think about where to move to! and that we would be wise

I probably won't update those any time soon.

And then right now:

• praise for a wonderful Christmas season
• everyone (except me) has colds right now
• maybe going to this summit next month?

Visas

The visa laws have been changing here. Will is going to Zaporozhya on Tuesday to see what he can find out about how the changes will affect us and what we'll need to do to renew. Please be praying for us in this!

Traveling soon

I need to do better with updating here! Is anyone still reading?

Here's an email that Will sent out to both our home churches:

We wanted to ask you all to be praying with us over the next couple of weeks. We need to make a trip to Kiev that we've put off for a while now.

Bogdan still isn't American, and Raia currently isn't either! We need to get a new Passport for Raia and a first-time Passport for Bogdan. The process shouldn't be too difficult, but it isn't cheap, either.

We've been wanting to make this into a little more than a 3-day, there and back again trip, w/two days on trains. We want to have time to do funs stuff with the kids and spend a week or so there. (We haven't done anything like this in almost two years.)

Right now we're looking into housing, which is a bit pricier than we were thinking, but we're trying to look into as many options as possible.

Please be praying with us, as this trip is shaping up to be more of a challenge than we'd thought it would be.

Pray for God's provision:

-as we take our 2nd train trip with Bogdan (4 kiddos now, fun on a 12-hr train trip!)
-in finding affordable housing.
-in quick and problem-free processing of Bogdan and Raia's passports.
-that this could be a 'mini-vacation' for all of us.

Thank you so much for your prayers!

We're leaving on Friday. I think we have a place to stay, but I'm not quite sure about that yet. Please also be praying that we will be healthy before we go and not get sick again while traveling. We all have the tail ends of a cold hanging on.

Going to camp!

Next week Will and Jaan and (hopefully) one other little boy are going away to camp. This friend of Jaan's doesn't have a father; his aunt and grandmother are raising him. He really wants male input, so we're hoping it will work out for him to go. Please pray for those who are going to camp and for me staying home with the younger three of our children.

(By the way, we finally got Bogdan's birth certificate. Praise God with us for that!)

Updates

We seem to be making progress on the birth certificate. Please keep praying.

And I forgot to post here when I got my registration. Thank you for praying!

Registration and birth certificate

Please keep praying. We're still waiting... waiting for court dates for both my registration and Bogdan's birth certificate.

Baby!

PRAISE THE LORD FOR OUR SWEET BOGDAN!

Please be praying that we'll be able to get a birth certificate for him as quickly and easily as possible. There are more details here.

Youth conference

Will just left for a youth conference in Kiev. He's taking a pretty big group with him: 12 people, I think. This could be a little interesting, because most of them are the ones who show up once a year or so, not the regular church crowd. Also, pray for us while we're home without Papa. He'll be back on Tuesday (after staying an extra day to renew my passport).

Answers

We found out that Will can renew my passport for me, so I don't have to go to Kiev. Hurrah! This week is just a whirl of him traveling around working on documents and plans, though, so please keep praying for us.

Documents

Our visa registration will run out right about the time our baby is due. Also, my passport will expire soon after that. The woman in charge of visa stuff for this region seems inclined to figure out an easy solution for us, but it wouldn't hurt to have you all praying. Will is going to meet with her sometime this week to explain everything and get a decision. Please pray that we'll be able to renew my registration, even with a soon-to-expire passort! (Then I'd renew my passport when we get the baby's and transfer my registration or something. The worst case is that I'd have to go to Kiev to renew my passport now; not horrible, but inconvenient.)

K.

We went to visit our homeless friend yesterday, but he had just been taken to a tuberculosis hospital, so we couldn't see him. We thought maybe just Will could visit him, but even that wasn't possible. The general city TB hospital wouldn't take K., so he's out in some small town. Please pray for him! He's been in a Christian shelter all this time, but now he's back with all his old prison buddies.

School!

Today we started school at home! Please pray for that to continue to be as much of a joy as it has been for us already.

Also, on Wednesday we'll be going to the first day of music school, to enroll Jaan in piano and other music courses. Please pray that we'll be able to get good teachers and a good schedule for him. We already know that they would want him there 4 days a week, and that's a little too much for us. Pray that we'll be able to work out a compromise and that this whole adventure will be a great experience for Jaan.

Various updates

Camp went wonderfully. Thank you so much for praying! So far, I've posted a few photos and a little recap, if you're interested. Please also pray for our family (and everyone else) as we settle back into normal life; it's almost hard to believe how tired we are and how fussy our children can be.

Our computer is working more reliably the past few days, and I've also heard rumors that a new one is on its way to us. Thank you so much to anyone who has contributed to that! I really don't know how much longer this one would have kept limping along. (Please keep praying for it to last until its replacement comes.)

Will went to visit K. yesterday. He's doing okay, but please keep praying for him. He's had some problems lately.

And then the next big event: on Monday Will is leaving for a quick trip to Charlotte for his sister's wedding! Please pray for everything connected to that trip.


As always, thank you so much for supporting us in prayer! Please let us know how we can pray for you, too. Leave a comment here, or write to us at mayakovsky@willphyl.com.

Don't forget

...that camp starts tomorrow!