Late September Update

MEDICAL
Things are going fairly well at the clinic. We are getting more patients lately and have been getting some good feedback on having new stable providers. Russ' picture of Jesus helping to guide the doctor has been hung near the patient's rooms. We have gotten copies of the physician's life reference ( a New Testament with scriptural answers to different life questions) to place in the patient areas. Dr Parker showed Russ this at Riverview about a year ago. Russ has had many routine visits, but also had 2 auto accidents involving moose, flown women out in preterm labor, and we even had a grizzly attack. In that case, the patient was flown directly from the scene by a helicopter. Our team of nurses and providers is getting used to working together, and overall it is going well. The tourists have pretty much all gone home, so now we are seeing mostly local people ( local meaning within a 2-3 hour radius).

MINISTRY
We continue to work on reaching out through the medical clinic, as above. Russ has had the opportunity to pray with patients in the ED, some of which were not Christians, but still appreciated the prayers. AWANA is starting at the local church. They have the AWANA circle in the basement with a pole in the circle! It is padded. Hopefully Russ won't have to treat any concussions! Sue will be working with TNT girls, Luke and Bridger with TNT boys, Case with games, and Ansley with Cubbies. Russ will probably help out, but as he is frequently on call for the clinic, is not going to be a full time leader at this point. This weekend Sue is at a women's retreat for the local church at a camp that I think is similar to Camp Bethel. I told her to take a good sleeping bag since it is now in the 20s at night!

LIFE
2 weeks ago, Sue's parents and Jessi, our neice from Tennessee, were able to come for a visit. We had a good time together and were able to take them to Seward as well as Valdez to see the sights and the wildlife. We also went fishing, but only Russ and Case caught the artic grayling we were fishing for. Sue's dad did multiple repairs around the house, and Sue's mom had us all eating too much, as usual! The last night before they left, we had an Alaska game night with salmon that we had caught and a moose roast that had been given to us. We really enjoyed the time with all of them, it was a real blessing for them to be here. Case has decided to try and play for the middle school basketball team and has had 1 practice so far. Right now they play 4 weekends, 3 of them away. Because of the distances, they leave on Friday, stay in the school where they play, and come back on Saturday. The last weekend is in Cordova, which is a 2 hour drive followed by an 8 hour boat trip! We're getting used to this, as we don't know that many people yet and this is all very different for us! We're planning on trying it out for a week and gathering more information before we make a final decision.

PRAYER REQUESTS
We need nurses at the clinic as well as a lab tech! We are already short and may have more leave after the 1st of the year. Please pray that God will send mission minded nurses who would like to work in a rural area in Alaska.

For the clinic in general, for encouragement. The clinic has been through many challenges over the last few years and it has been discouraging and tiring at times. Please pray for encouragement and continued vision for reaching the lost through the medical ministry here.

The AWANA Ministry at Glennallen Community Chapel

God's leading on what ministries/opportunities he would have our family be involved in during our time here.

Sue's knee- it is getting better and she is off crutches. However it is still clicking and bothering her at times.

Thanks for all of the prayers, it means so much to know that many people are praying for us!

September Pictures

Fall is here. The aspens give the yellow color. They tell us that usually we have had snow by now, but we have not had any in Glennallen.

Case, Ansley and cousin Jessi at the Valdez harbor.

The kids, Jessi, and Papa Hoot, Sue's Dad, at Worthington glacier.

The copper river, good salmon fishing they tell me.

Case eating a gummy worm from his dirt cake on his 14th birthday.

Mount Drum, the snow is coming down the mountain!
Everybody keeps telling us to post more pictures, so I tried to put more on this time. We have some from Seward, AK and I'll try to add those soon.

Sites from the shore and the air

Medical- Work at the clinic has been fairly busy. There are many administrative tasks to take care of that have not been done recently. Our new PA and nurse practitioner are starting to see patients and doing well. Continue to pray for nurses. We just got a new graduate from Biola University in CA, but could really use another experienced nurse.

Missions- We are starting to work on more organized outreach in the clinic. We have a chaplain who does a devotion over the intercom each morning for staff and patients. Russ has been talking with him about other outreach possibilites. We have started a weekly devotion and time to pray for our patients who request prayer, which is similar to what Russ did in Pearisburg. Luke has started to volunteer to help the IT specialist at the clinic and at the local Christian radio station. Sue continues to be involved in the ladies Bible study and the kids are really enjoying the youth group at church.

Life- School has started! The kids are actually studying Alaska history, which is required here.
Luke is taking 3 classes at Alaska Bible college- Old Testament Survey, Speech, and Principles
of Bible Study. Sue is actually taking the last class with Luke and both are enjoying it. Last weekend we went to Anchorage to shop and run some errands. We were able to stay with the Caseys, who are missionaries with SEND. Mr Casey is a pilot who flies missionaries to remote villages. We had planned to stay into Monday, and then realized that Luke needed to be back for classes. We're still getting used to college! Mr Casey was giving a flying lesson on Sunday and set it up so that they could take Luke back to Glennallen. He was lucky and got to see the trip from the air. The picture is from their backyard. I've never seen a canal that had floatplanes instead of boats in the backyard! We went to church with the Caseys and the kids walked home from church with them. They got to see a floatplane take off from the lake on the way home.

After church we headed south out of Anchorage to see some sites. We went down to an inlet named Turnagain Arm. We were able to see some Beluga whales in the inlet. We also were able to see the bore tide. If the tide is high enough, when it comes in it will travel up the inlet in a wave 3-6 feet high. The first picture is a picture of this wave moving up the inlet. People were out surfing the wave and kite boarding on it. The kite boarding looked really fun!
On Monday we finished our errands, and our shopping, loaded up the trailer and headed home. Russ is working this weekend, so we are having a quiet weekend at home. Sue's knee is slowly getting better, thanks for all of the prayers!

The Meltons

A Fish Story

This is my rainbow trout that I caught a couple of weeks ago! Its 16in. long! We haven't cooked it yet, but I'm hoping to soon! I was soooooooooooooo excited to catch it! I was the only one to catch one. We were in the canoe not catching much. We had been out there for a couple of hours and hadn't caught anything! Most of the time we'd been catching lily pads. And then all of a sudden I felt a big pull on my line! It jumped completely out of the water twice! When it got to the boat dad grabbed the line and right as he did the end of the rod snapped! Not the line the end of the rod SNAPPED! Dad had just enough hold on the line to throw it into the boat. It was jumping all over the place! Dad was holding the fish down with his legs! It was a very exciting day for me!

Pictures

"The rig" at the end of the trip. Needs a bath!
The Worthington glacier from a distance.
The Worthington glacier up close.













Bridger with a silver salmon, he actually caught all 3!

2 Weeks In

FAMILY

It's been a good first 2 weeks. The people here have been very friendly and everyone is settling in. The kids have been able to be involved in the local church youth group and enjoy it. This is a good place to ride bikes and they have been able to do that almost daily. Karie Pepe, a PA that is also new here and grew up in France as a missionary kid, has been spending a lot of time with us and that has been fun. The house has been good. We're still looking for a bunk bed for the boys' room. We've been up to Alaska Bible College with Luke to look at classes for this fall. We're considering Old Testament, Speech, and Principles of Inductive Bible Study, which we hear is excellent.

Yesterday was Ansley's birthday, and besides a bike wreck, she had a good day. Today, as a continuation, we went to Valdez for the day. The trip is very pretty, through the mountains. We stopped to see the Worthington glacier and were able to hike to the face and touch the glacier. It is a really neat place. Then we went on to Valdez and took Ansley out to lunch overlooking the harbor. We were able to see some seals in the water. Right now the silver (coho) salmon are spawning and they were everywhere. We decided to try some fishing. I had brought some old rods I found in the garage here that looked pretty big and an ugly stick with 12 pound test. I hooked into a fish the first 2 casts I made! The problem was that the fish immediately started to take out drag on the old rods! We kept trying and eventually landed 3 fish (Case lost 2 right at the shore). If we had had a net with us, we probably could have had 5 more. I really wasn't expecting that, I'll be prepared next time!

MEDICAL

I've been working quite a bit in the first 2 weeks, but I do have this weekend off. I've already flown 2 people to Anchorage, and sent one by car for a shoulder fracture after rolling an ATV . We have a total of 3 new providers starting this month, myself, a PA and a nurse practitioner. We had another PA coming, but it looks like it will be next May. We just got a new pharmacist who is from the Phillipines and she seems very good. I've been doing some sports physicals and seeing general patients, as well as some prenatal and emergency visits. For you sports fans the school sports here are interesting. For away games they frequently go away for the weekend and stay overnight. One place is an 8 hour boat ride away and for another school, they have to drive to Fairbanks and then fly! And we thought travel soccer was bad!

MINISTRY

We are going to wait awhile to decide which church to join, but will probably end up at the community chapel because of the proximity to work when I am on call. They seem to be very mission minded, last week a missionary to Ireland that grew up here spoke. Sue is involved in a women's Bible study. The boys went this week and helped the pastor at a local village work on the baseball field. We are still working at the clinic on many issues, including how to incorporate our faith as we treat people medically. We do have 2 chaplains that work at the clinic.

PRAYER REQUESTS

For Sue's knee to get better, she twisted it earlier this week and is limping around

For the ministry at the clinic and a good team with a mission focus as we blend many new people

We still need a lab tech , 2 nurses and 2 medical assistants

For leadership for our family in direction concerning the local ministries in which our family should be involved

We Miss Everyone!

Thanks for all the prayers!

Russ

A few favorites from our trip and our first few days in Alaska

Hey, everybody!

Luke here. We've been in Alaska for a couple of weeks now, and we're settling in well. Sorry we haven't made any new posts for a while. It's really cool here, with lots of bike trails around the house and lots of cool people to meet!

The trip went well, with relatively few crises. My favorite part was seeing the sign post forest. It was a place where workers on the Alaska Highway put up signposts telling how far it was to nearby towns. However, they had some fun with it, adding in their hometowns and famous cities. Then, people from all over the world started putting up signs from their home towns, and how far away they were! It was amazing to see how many people had been there, and how many places were represented.

Hi

this is Ansley! I had a couple of favorite things. One of them was going to Wisconsin Dells!!!!! I oved that waterpark! I also loved seeing all of the beautiful scenary in Banff and Jasper. The views of the mountains there were UNBELIEVABLE!!!!

I loved seeing all of the wildlife life! We saw a lot of bears, bison, elk, and some moose! My last favorite part of the trip was getting to Alaska! I was really relived when we finally got there! I love and miss all of you!!!!!!!!

Hey!

This is Bridger. My favorite part of the trip was seeing the DOUBLE RAINBOW!!!!!!!!! (just kidding). I really liked Wisconsin Dells and all the national parks we visited. The first week in Alaska was great. The second day here, we played ultimate frisbee with some kids from the youth group at one of the churches. We've also been mountain biking on trails around the bible college. I miss everybody in Virginia and hope that you guys can come visit.

Yo!

This is Case. My favorite thing was the water slide . My first week was fun and I've made some new friends. I can ride my bike everywhere and I can play soccer with some of my friends!

Goodbye!