Harvest Party

Today, at 10:30, we had a great harvest party. We moved to our house, since it is a little more private than the school yard.

A huge spider came and took over our yard. If you squint, you can see the spider's web. Each child followed a web (yarn) all over the yard to a hidden "bug", which happened to be smarties.

We played a lot of games, including the spider web, and our PNG custom of lemon bobbing (lemons are free, apples are expensive)

My favorite was making slime. It was very fun, but very temporary, it dried in minutes. I love Jerome's concentration in the picture! The kids had to take the slime from the bowl to a bucket on the other side of the yard. It was a ooey, gooey mess. When I went to clean up the bowls, it made a nice slime again and Mommy had fun with the clean up.

We had snacks and balloon games and the kids and teachers had all worn costumes. What fun. Wish you were here!

New Characters in the Dooley home

I would like to introduce you to Kissin' Kate Barlow. The wanted outlaw from Louis Sachar's book, Holes. The most amazing thing about Kate is that she wore her mom's shoes today and they fit.



This lovely spider's name is Charlotte, from the book Charlotte's Web. But please don't tease her about the end of the book! Across her forehead is her extra 6 eyeballs.

And last, this is Princess Beautiful. She is a Princess, and she is beautiful.

Remember the amazing lady from Greeley Colorado that gave me so much quilting material? Here is another of her gifts!

Betty, is very close to delivering her baby and was so anxious to finish up this pretty quilt for her baby (yes, I know it is a big quilt...but she loves it) All of this material came together in a kit with directions and a picture. It was so fun to make with her!

We got it all finished and now just waiting on the baby to come. They are sure it is going to be a boy because they have 2 girls at home. Good rational, right? They have picked out the name of my dad to give the baby. Betty's husband, Matthew is a carpenter, and Dad has given him lots of tools and stuff for work. So they are thinking of naming the baby James. (Don't tell! There will be an official naming ceremony 6 months to a year after the baby is born). It could be a very pretty girl that is named James! :)

4 kina-from Emma's point of view

Friday afternoon there is a knock at the door.
Mommy and Olivia are sleeping. Allie and I are watching a movie.
I see our teen age friend Stanley outside.
We chat for awhile in Pidgin.
He needs 4 kina.
I ask him "Why?"
He says he is going to go somewhere and needs the money.
I say "Okay."
I go to my piggy bank, find four kina and give it to him.
He leaves and I go back to watching the movie.

I told mom about it when she got up.
She gave me four kina to replace mine.
I said "It's okay mom, I have lots of kina! Like 40!"
Then mom explained that Stanley works for the school on Fridays. He was coming to get his pay for cleaning the roof of the school.
I thought it was just a friend in need and gave him the money because that is what Jesus would do.

Overflowing hospital blesings

The 5 of us went on about an hour trip to a bush church on Sunday. They said we were the first white people to ever visit their church. (we are told that a lot, but this time it seemed more genuine). We ate lunch in the church. They gave us the food first and then when we were done, they came in and ate what we had left. The lady in the middle of the picture is the pastor's wife. Let me tell you her story.

12 years ago, she delivered twins at her local health center. She lost a lot of blood and came to Kudjip Hospital. While she was at our hospital, she accepted Christ as her Savior. Then she went home and told her family, they became Christans. Together, they started a Nazarene church. Over the last 12 years, that church has planted or supplied pastors to 12 additional churches. That is the amazing God that we serve!

Hard work Saturday!

My girls are such good girls. They work and help keep the house clean. I don't make them help with yard work much, but we decided that it would be Saturday work day.

Olivia just dug holes around the yard, but she was an encouragement to us workers.

The main job was picking weeds out of my grass.

Cocky had trouble with the rake, but was very curious. Scott worked on the gutters to get them to flow into the new water tank. The girls and I only worked 2 hours, but Scott worked all day! It was a nice way to spend time with the girls and enjoy God's creation.

Cocky goes to school!

After devotions on Friday, the children had a art assignment of drawing birds. So Cocky (we are still voting on an official name for the bird) got to go to school. He was pretty well behaved and the kid's drawings were fabulous!

After Cocky messily ate his passion fruit, he decide it was time to show off. He started laughing and fluffing his feathers and kept it up for a good 15 minutes! What a funny bird.

First fun for Friday

The missionary kids sang songs and recited their memory verses at the hospital work site devotion time on Friday morning. It was so fun to watch! The children stood up very straight and smiled while they sang. They didn't look nervous at all. The men clapped after each item and really seemed to enjoy it.


The last song was "One Door"the lyrics you may remember from your childhood "One door and only one, and yet the sides are two. Inside and outside and which side are you?" Teacher Janet closed the time relating the song to the doors on the hospital that these men are building. How do patients get well and see the doctor if they will not go inside. She challenged the men to make a choice to come inside the door of God and not stay outside.

It isn't easy being 3!

Some things about 3 are easy, like looking cute, talking cute and twirling in a fancy pink dress.
Other things are hard.
Like not hitting your sister when you are mad.
Like understanding why you can't have a brownie when you want it.
Like cleaning up when you are not done playing.
Like doing something because you mom says so.
Like not sticking a bead up your nose.
Like pronouncing hard words with "s-blends". So spicy is "picy" and starving is "tarving!" and school is "cool".

But our family is complete with our wonderful 3 year old!

Food at Garoka!

I love cotton candy! As I put the sugary heaven up to my lips, I instantly picture, fair grounds, farris wheel, quilt shows and huge vegtables. Yummy! In Garoka, you can get a big ol' mess of cotton candy for 1 kina (40 cents!)

Olivia, who had been looking forward to the "Cotton balls" would not even try the cotton candy, but she didn't go hungry.

Strawberry milk shakes were more than 40 cents, so we had to share. However, sharing is much more fun!

Of course the real reason for going to Garoka is the Chinese food resturant. So, the question of day is...would you travel 6 hours over a nauseating, bum breaking road for Chinese food? All of the Dooley's would say it was worth it!

Garoka 08

If you are a missionary and need to get away for a little while...here is an adventure you might try.
I could do a whole blog about the roads, but here are 2 of my favorite pictures. Notice the picture with the guard rail that is hanging down into the HUGE hole in the road!

Anyway, after 3 hours to cover 75 miles, we arrive in Garoka. Why go to Garoka? Well, there really isn't much reason besides a change of scenery. There is a little park we found everyone loved it. The family loved swimming. I only swam a little, because the water is pretty cold, warmer than Hagen, but that isn't saying much.

An addition to the Dooley family

"Hello, Cocky. Kai kai!" This is our new bird and this is all that he says right now. Yesterday afternoon, he must of said it 100 times!


A teenager brought the bird by on Friday. I really wanted my friend to buy Cocky, because he seemed so tame, but she didn't want to. I finally caved in and thought "Well, the girls can have fun with him. There must be some benefits for living in a tropical paradise." Sure enough, the whole family loves him. Even though I haven't had the courage to hold him yet. I let him stand on a stick and then carry the stick around. Olivia loved him until she saw poo on the porch and said "We have to give that bird back. HE POOPS!"

Yes, that is an ice cream cone. He loved it.
Living in PNG as we do, we expect unexpected things to happen.
Sunday after church, our Cockatoo was missing from his cage and the teenager who sold me the bird was wandering around station with a white cockatoo...hmmm....He said that he had 2 birds at home and this was another bird.
Eventually, we got our bird back. It was the one that the teen had stolen from our house and trying to sell again! Always an adventure!

My umbrella girls!