Ukraine is rebuilding its shattered cities even as Russia keeps attacking. Now kindergartens come with bomb shelters.

• Ukraine has been devastated by Russia's invasion, and missile attacks are ongoing.
• Projects, include a kindergarten being rebuilt with a new bomb shelter, are seen as highly symbolic.

Ukraine is starting to rebuild parts of its country, even as Russia's missiles continue to fall and threaten to undo any progress made.

New projects include a kindergarten being remade with a new bomb shelter, in a symbol of how Ukraine is repairing before the war even ends, but how it also can't ignore the dangers still facing its citizens.

Russia's missile attacks across Ukraine have only increased over the past few months, killing civilians and destroying buildings. But Ukraine and its backers say work to repair and rebuild should not wait until the war is over.

They point to the needs of the tens of millions of people that remained in the country, as well as the hope and motivation that Ukrainians get from seeing their nation reconstructed.

Rebuilding as bombs fall

Roads, bridges, and apartment buildings have been repaired and rebuilt, sometimes overnight, despite the risk that they will be destroyed anew.

Polya Tereschenko, a Ukrainian citizen, described seeing roads rebuilt in the northeastern city of Kharkiv as something that gave her strength: "I rebuild myself after every missile strike," she told Insider.

"All these rebuildings give hope for future — calm and peaceful."

Ukraine has even bragged about just how fast it can repaired after an attack:

Even so, there is a growing realisation that rebuilding the country is likely to cost hundreds of billions of dollars, and take many years. For now, much of the money flowing into Ukraine is going to military needs.

Still, there is increasing attention on repairing parts of the country now, and some of Ukraine's backers have been convinced to support projects that are not directly related to the war effort.

Estonia, Ukraine's neighbor and one of its biggest allies during the war, is helping with multiple rebuilding projects, including the bomb-sheltered kindergarten.

Kaimo Kuusk, Estonia's ambassador to Ukraine, described to Insider how Estonia was initially skeptical about some of the projects Ukraine wanted to rebuild, given how quickly they could be destroyed again.

But Ukraine convinced it they were necessary.

"You cannot wait just at the end of the war or the end of active fighting," Kuusk said.

Rebuilding a kindergarten

The kindergarten, in the town of Ovruch in the northern region of Zhytomyr, is expected to be complete by the end of the year.

Kuusk said Estonia picked the kindergarten as one of the sites to help rebuild because "we wanted to help the most vulnerable groups of society."

The plan, he said, is to create a modular building similar to many kindergartens in Estonia. But the design took longer than expected, he said, because of the need to include a bomb shelter.

Work is now underway, with Estonia's foreign minister laying the cornerstone in August.

Kuusk said he hopes Estonia's work in Zhytomyr will also help Ukraine by encouraging other financers.

Oleksandra Azarkhina, Ukraine's deputy infrastructure minister, told Insider that Ukraine wants to rebuild facilities like kindergartens so that people can still have normal lives, despite the war.

But she also pointed to the psychological effect such rebuilding can have: "It's also symbolic. It keeps you sane."

One Zhytomyr resident, Sofiia Zinchuk, told Insider she felt "wonderful" when she heard the kindergarten would be built.

"It really gives a sense of hope."

Rebuilding as a form of resistance

Azarkhina, the minister, described the rebuilding as an act of protest against Russia's invasion and the bombs that are still falling across the country.

"We understand that Russians are doing that because they're failing on the front line and are trying to make us less resilient by influencing civilians," she said.

Liubov Tsybulska, the founder of Ukraine's Center for Strategic Communication and Information Security, said repairs being done near her home in Kyiv give her hope.

"It feels very right. It shows that we're not going to comply with destructions and inconveniences," she told Insider.

"It's a signal to the Russians also. We will not surrender and we're not afraid."