There seems to be a massive station clean up of bushes and trees. I actually enjoyed the tall bushes, but no worries. The girls were outside for several hours and that they came up with and some help from Dad on his way home from work. Now they say flowers are needed for decoration.
There is a patient that I have fallen in love with. She is adorable. Sherry was playing with matches and her skirt caught on fire. It burned the back of her legs ankle to top of buttocks. Sherry was burned in Feb. and was at a near by hospital. They did many skin grafts, but asked us for a transfer to finish her care.
You can see from the pictures they used much of Sherry’s arms for donor sites. Last week, I was with Sherry during a dressing change. She was very talkative as she was waking up. She told us all about her daddy dying. She also looked straight in my face, stared, and said “You have 3 noses!” That is my nick name now, 3pela nus.
When we took her back to the ward, we found out that her father had died of heart problems in March. Her mom has 3 other kids and lives an hour away. Please pray for Sherry’s skin graft to heal and for her to remain free from infection.
Needless to say, Sherry has had more pain in the last few months than most of us in our life time! She said “I am so tired of all of this pain!”
While she was waiting in preop for her skin graft, I brought out a syringe for her to play with, after her screaming stopped at the sight of the syringe, she had a blast calling people over to “help her” and then dousing them with water from the syringe!
She also celebrated her 5th birthday last week. The girls and I took balloons for each person on the ward and a birthday hat for Sherry. She is going to wait for a birthday cake until she is discharged from the hospital.
This is the least burned buttock, but I am not sure the others are able to go on the blog. You can see her lower legs in stages of healing.
Group picture!
After months of coordinating schedules, we were able to plan a day of going to my friend Grace’s waterfalls. It was a fun hike along and in the river!
The women staff of the hospital had a retreat, Thursday night, Friday and Sat. I was able to join them on Friday morning for awhile.
My friend Judy shared with the women how we can reflect Christ in our lives and I spoke about running the race that God has for you. I had a bit of trouble being back in PNG this time after furlough. God showed me that I was trying to run other races that He hadn’t ask me to run. I pray that I can continue to run another mile.
Al and Em went camping with Daddy, so Liv and I had our own party at home. Olivia was in charge of everything we did!
Happy birthday MOM! Here is our birthday celebration! I wish it could have been with you and the rest of the crew. The chocolate brownie supreme was horribly good, sweet gooey mess, that you should be glad you missed. I love you! Thanks for being the most wonderful mom!
A tiny little 70 year old lady.
A 9 month pregnant abdomen, which was growing for a couple years.
Produced a uterine fibroid/cystic mass that even I was impressed by! I am sure she feels so much better today!
There is a family that lives in Hagen (45 minutes away), who we have been able to get to know over the years. Brad and Deborah have 7 wonderful kids and all are musical. They came out to the hospital to sing songs on the wards and then we had a fun time playing together.
During a song about the blood of Jesus that covers all our wrongs, Dr Jim noticed that a patient had tears in his eyes. This patient had came to the hospital a couple days before covered in blood after a gun shot wound to the chest. Dr Jim talked with the patient, Petris, and Petris wanted to pray and ask Jesus to change his life.
There is not a full spectrum of entertainment options here in Papua New Guinea, especially since we do not travel on the road after dark (and dark comes at 6:30pm). We are required to make our own fun. Which usually includes food and sometimes games. When the Mike, Nancy, Kreigh, and Lauren came over, it was like having family as we all just settled in and enjoyed each others company!
Photos by Olivia Dooley, age 5
We got a box on Friday from my mom and then Monday from Joetta, Scott’s sister! The expressions on the girl’s faces are genuine! Shock and excitement of the contents of the box! Thanks for loving us!
We took Luke’s money…changed it to a lot of kina!
Bought some mosquito nets (as Luke requested) and gave them out to people who have a high chance of getting malaria. Luke bought 7 mosquito nets. 
The last net, we gave to my friend Rebecka. She works at my house and I was able to show her a picture of Luke. She was so touched and blessed by Luke’s giving. Rebecka was going to go home and challenge her children as to what they could do for others with their coins. And makes me ask myself and you…”What are you doing with your coins?”
This is our friend Luke, he saved his change for people in PNG. Luke gave us his money, with the amount rounded out by his parents. God had put a burden on Luke’s heart, and he wanted to buy mosquito nets for people here!
Scheduled to start at 4. 4:30 the first people arrive. We played “pass the person” while waiting.
We broke into teams for a scavenger hunt. Where teams had a find 4 objects before following the clue to the next point, complete a challenge and then off to the next 4 objects. 
There are 25 college of nursing students each year and the program is 3 years. The students are from all over PNG, and a great bunch of kids.
After the games, they ate supper, and we met together again for cup cakes, popcorn, crystal light, and Princess Bride movie. It was more fun watching them watch the movie and seeing their reactions than the movie itself.
As I was walking back to surgery, after going to the little store for my lunch, I remembered the wonderful lunches I had while working at Cox Hosp. in Springfield. There was a little deli next to L&D, Thursdays was chicken salad with grapes and pecans on croissants, with baked Lay chips and a diet DP with one refill.
Lunch in PNG, I choose Coke Zero (where there is no Dr Pepper, let alone diet!) Tiny teddies, a lot like Teddy Grahams, and a kaukau (sweet potato) which is served wrapped in old newspaper. Other choices were a hard boiled egg, flour ball, cream bun, or coconut scone.
It’s not chicken salad, but better than walking 1/2 mile to go home and back!
The fourth of July is just another day to our PNG friends, but we try to make the most of it!
We break out our red, white, and blue! We usually try to have a pot luck near the 4th with all of our expat friends from around our area of PNG. Even at the potluck there will be more than 10 nationalities represented.
Everyone that knows their national anthem will take a turn singing it, we’ll have games and a church service in English after eating together.
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