Christmas Day Memories

I have not been very good at blogging these days, but once I did one, then I wanted to do more. So I think I will go back and share a bit about Christmas. This year I was able to do my traditional PNG Christmas activities. I went down to Bowers for breakfast and presents on Christmas morning. We had a great time reading the Christmas story and opening gifts. There was a little time between when we finished with gifts and our planned dinner. So I ran home and called my family. Thankfully we had a good connection.

Our dinner was full of friends, food and fun. This year there were the Bowers (5), Askews (5), Martens (2), Paul, Burlesons (6) and me. We didn't get a group picture, which we are kicking ourselves about, but we had fun. We had enough food for a couple Christmas dinners....

After we ate went took a little walk to sing Happy Birhtday to a neighbor. Yes, her birthday is Christmas Day...

After that it was time for the Christmas story. The kids moved the nativity scene pieces as Dana read. All the rest of us stopped him if we had a Christmas carol to sing that went along with that part of the story.

Finally it was time for pie and then an afternoon and evening of games and movies.

Quilting during Break

Joanie and I have been collecting PNG fabrics for over two years for quillows (quilts that fold up into a pillow pouch, so that it is a quilt and a pillow). The first one we are making is for Joanie's daughter, Jacqueline, who will be graduating in June. Today we finished the top and Joanie started quilting on it.

We are certain Jacqueline will love it. It holds many memories from growing up as a missionary kid. It is very PNG!

Class Christmas Party

A few moms organized the party for me and made an extra special day for the kids. They started the party by decorating Christmas sugar cookies.
Then we had our gift exchange...

Each of the kids got to paint their own ornament and then were sent home with a frame ornament with their very own picture in it.

After that is was time for food!! There was an amazing amount of food and the even more amazing part was that there was not much left at the end. I heard many families say that their kids didn't eat lunch that day.

At the end we watched Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown. All in all it was the best Christmas party held in Miss Posenjak's class, thanks to the moms that came in and organized it. What a great job they did!!!

Silliness at Grandma's 95 Birthday Party

Grandma celebrated her 95th birthday on the 13th of October with her three children. Mom sent me this picture and commented on how Uncle Ron now has a mustache. I wondered if he was competing with Uncle Paul. And then I commented on how glad I was that Mom and Grandma did not join in and grow mustaches.
Of course Mom and Uncle Ron had to do something about my little comment. Aren't they cute?

The October 3rd Birthday Bash

Well for the last three years my friend Becky and I have celebrated our birthdays in Madang. This year we could not make the trip so our friends brought Madang to us. We had a wonderful afternoon!
Joanie and Becky decorated and organized a wonderful luncheon.

Brithday girl number 1 - Becky

Number 2 birhtday girl...

Our Mandang "ocean". Pretty silly, but very fun.

The hostesses of the wonderful birhtday celebration. Thanks so much ladies!!!

PNG Independence Day!

Our band starts the day with a march...

Then they play the PNG national anthem...

Our parade is next, including a local drum band, little kids on decorated bikes, individuals in golf carts and buggies, then the class floats...

And the rest of the day is full of games and activities. It was a good day. The sun was out so things got a bit warm but all in all the day was fun.

Staff Retreat

This weekend we had our second annual staff retreat. It is so much fun to hang out with our coworkers. As teachers we spend the day with students and don't get much time to interact with each other.

We had some great professional development sessions. One was about how to prepare our MKs to enter a world that doesn't have a biblical worldview. The other one was about personalities and how to use the knowledge of each other personalities to communicate better. Here are a couple pictures of the activities.

We also had lots of fun playing games and eating amazing meals. We were so thankful for the hospitality of Interface.

First Day of School

Today we started school at Numonohi Christian Academy. We started two weeks late but we started none the less. I am back in the classroom after two years of administration. I love being in the classroom so that isn't a hardship. I am teaching grades 3 and 4 which is a bit different than teaching grades 5 and 6. So I am learning right along with the students. I am still the elementary principal, which has been juggling act. I am missing 5 students for various reasons (hopefully they will arrive soon) and have one visitor. We had a great day and I am looking forward to going back tomorrow. I hope the kids are too.

Here we are...

This is my view all day....

Just sitting there all ready to learn....

Oh how studious they are...

A Picture for My Sis

My blog posts are never as exciting as my siblings because I don't have any cute kids to take pictures of an publish. I guess I have lots of "kids" since I am at a mission school, but you know what I mean. So I was talking with Carol today about blog posts and she said again - remember we want pictures of you too. Well it is hard to take pictures of yourself and sometimes kind of weird to ask people to take pictures of you, but here goes...

This is a picture from dinner this evening. Starting on the left we have Emily, me, Paul, Vince and Carrie. Vince is a visitor and we were going out for dinner as a farewell. It was nice to get off base and see a bit of different scenery.

Here is another picture, not of me, but it was an interesting PNG shot. We were riding behind this truck as we went to the airport one day. I believe it is a picture of the election ballots coming in. I like the security with the man riding on top of the ballot boxes.

Slumber Party ? Sleep Over ? Almost All Nighter?

One of the extra fun things that is included in my life at our school base is that I get to see the students in many areas of their lives. Last Wednesday night there was a grade 7-12 sleep over in the teen lounge. It was pretty fun for me since many of those girls were ones I have taught over the years. It is great to see them growing up.

Now I am not sure why it is called a sleep over since no one really wanted to sleep. We started at 9:30 pm,but really it wasn't until 10 pm that all the girls arrived. We watched 2 movies with a bit of a toilet problem in between the two movies, but all in all it was fun. The last movie ended at 2:15 and most of the girls were ready to turn in. There were a few wide awake girls that weren't too excited that I told them that it was time to quite down. Anyway, most everyone was asleep around 3 am.

The girls seemed to be able to sleep in a little bit but I was up by 6 am. So I left at 6:30 and started my day. I was a bit in a daze for the first couple hours of my day, but eventually I was back on track.

This was a good evening of memories.

Haircut Adventure

Well as some of you may know, everyday routines are not the same in PNG. Yesterday was "Haircut Day". It took about a week and a half to plan but we got it worked out. Barb wanted to get a haircut and so she found a time when our dear friend Jana could cut hair - Wed July 18 from 9 to noon. Then she proceeded to find another 4 people that also wanted a cut. A van had to be booked, a man needed to be found to drive and off we went.


The drive is now only about 30 minutes on a bumpy road. It used to be 45 minutes on a VERY bumpy road, so we were happy for the improvements. We all took turns sitting in the chair and getting our own time to be pampered.

Here is my good friend Joanie getting her cut. Anyway, we were actually done by 11 am but we planned to stay out there for lunch and so waited an hour and a half reading and visiting. We had lunch, visited with the students that were at the ITF center and then headed back home just before 2. I think we made it home by 2:30! I guess you could say that my haircut appointment was from 8:20 am to 2:30 pm. Everything takes a bit longer here.

Dinner at the Mandarin

5 O'clock rolls around and my friend Becky calls and says "Mandarin?" Usually she says it with lots of enthusiam, but tonight her husband Neil was the excited one and she was a little hesitant since she had already started dinner. Within minutes Becky too was excited. It is so nice that my good friends, the Burlesons, let me tag along with them for dinner out. Tonight we were the only ones in the restaurant and the food was good.

We always see to have a good time laughing and carrying on. The kids have grown up so much now that we don't even have the fun of counting how many items fall on the floor. Such a great evening! Thanks guys!

Home Again, Home Again

I am back in PNG and most things are put away. Here is my living room....a little crooked in the picture but not that way in real life.

My nieces and nephews wall...

The kitchen, even have some pictures on the fridge from my friends here...

My bedroom, still a couple piles of things to put away there...

Last is the spare room/office/sewing room/guest room - it has become the catch all. Still a bit of work to be done here...

Just thought I would give you a little tour of my house. Next I will have to take the camera to the school and show you what I am doing down there.

Waiting in PNG

I arrived in Port Moresby with plenty of time to catch the 9:45 am flight. However 9:45 came and went and soon I was still sitting in the airport at 5 pm. I met up with a few co-workers so, thankfully, I had some company for my long wait. Just after 5 pm we were told the flight would be cancelled and we could come back in the morning.

A couple scenes from the airport

We eventually were given vouchers for a hotel in town for rooms and food. We were checked in fairly efficiently and then were shown our rooms. My room was the most interesting by far. There was some trash on the floor, no towels and no toilet seat. The man who showed us the room said he would be right back with a towel and a toilet seat. I guess I should have thought to bring one with me. Thankfully they switched me to a room across the breezeway, yet still near my traveling companions. How I wish I would have thought to take a picture of that room!

Goodbye to Posenjaks

Another hard goodbye was to my brother's family. I really enjoyed living in Wenatchee for part of my furlough. It allowed me time to get to know Brad's boys. I don't even want to think about how much they will grow and change before I get back to see them.