Monday, February 6, 2012

New Year #2

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New Years Pictures


We forgot to put the New Years pictures on the blog. Here it is too light to shoot off fireworks on July 4, so they have that on New Years Eve. This is a picture from the youth group party. It was so cold they had to light the fireworks with a blow torch!
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Saturday, February 4, 2012

A Cold January

Medical
It has been cold this month, so people don't travel as much. Despite that, we still saw 100 more people this January than they saw here in January 2011. It has been great to see the practice here grow, which I think is related to having a more stable group of medical providers. Before, they had different people that would come every month or two, and now we have 3 providers that have been here since January. We are still seeing a mix of different problems with natives and non-natives, thankfully no major trauma. We did have a little girl that got frostbite on her hands, and we had to fly in a person who had to have open heart surgery.

Ministry
Sue and the kids continue to work with AWANA. Two weeks ago, they had Family Fun Fair, which was like a smaller version of the Fall Bash that we have at Riverview Baptist. We even used some of the ideas for the games here! We've gotten to know the kids better with time. So many of the children seem to come from broken homes and abusive situations. 4 of the 6 girls in Sue's group come from broken homes. AWANA seems to be not only a place to learn God's Word, but a place to show these kids love and hope. The boys continue to go to the youth group at Copper Center, where they get to meet more of the native teens. Hailey, that we put on the prayer list last month, is still coming. Russ seems to be getting more and more hospice patients. He actually seems to have more here right now than he usually had in Pearisburg. We are able to make house calls on many, sometimes traveling more than an hour. We continue to pray with and for our patients, and to share with them the hope found in Jesus Christ. Sue will be leading the Women's Bible Study here for a couple of weeks in February. We continue to deal with alcoholism in the area and the many effects, including children with fetal alcohol syndrome.

Life
It has been very cold this month, we really got a taste of winter here. It was around 40 below for about 10 days straight. When that happens, you don't go outside for very long. Now we know what cabin fever is like! We did go into town last weekend to stock up for the month and took some pictures to put on the blog. We saw at least 15 moose on the way home and thankfully did not hit one. We were planning to drive down to see Valdez. They have had over 300 inches of snow and were paying $20/hr for people to come and shovel. They told us that the snow was so high that it was like driving through a maze. We also heard that 3 boats sunk in the harbor due to all of the snow. The day we were planning to go, they had a blizzard in the pass, so we stayed put. It's an adventure! Thanks for all of the prayers, calls and packages! The daylight is getting longer every day!

Prayer Requests
For wisdom for the leaders at Cross Road Medical Center as they plan for the future

For nurses for the clinic- we are in desperate need of nurses this spring and hopefully will be getting one to come from Lynchburg, VA for 3 mos

For a lab tech to work in the lab this summer

For the continued outreach of the AWANA program here

For two of the native churches here that will be losing their pastors this spring

For our continued outreach to the patients in this area through the medical center, and encouragement for the people who work here

For N'Kara, a girl in Sue's AWANA group, who will be moving to Anchorage to live with her great grandparents due to a broken home situation

In Christ,
The Meltons

January Pictures

We saw this moose in the Arbys drive thru, not sure if it was planning on taking the snowmobile!


Moose in our neighborhood, two doors down

















A snowblower on the roof!


Bridger and Case shoveling off a neighbor's roof


Shoveling the roof at Grizzly Lake











Sue has not been able to ski because of her knee, but she can snowshoe!


From 50 below to 30 above in two weeks!





You get ice on your eyelashes when it gets really cold
( and the hair in your nose freezes, too)


When you drive at 40 below, you have to scrape the ice from the INSIDE of you window!


Only in Alaska can it warm up 70 degrees in 10 days (feels like spring) and still be snowing!
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