Homeschool Basketball

The kids played Basketball again this year. The public school had a few kids that wanted to play this year so the homeschooled kids (my oldest five and Josh Armstrong) practiced with them. Our homeschooled kids joined up with two homeschooled boys, William and Lee Clark, from the next village and played many games against teams from villages around Lake Iliamna. Lake Iliamna is a 20 mile drive across our frozen lake, up a trail and down a very icy road. Most of our games were played at the Newhalen school which is the closest village on Lake Iliamna to us. They host many tournaments every year and they invited us down for some of those and for several scrimmages as well. Twice the older kids drove with Paul to Iliamna and then got in the Clark's airplane and flew to other villages around the Lake to play their highschool three man teams. There are still a couple of schools they hope to play after spring break. They've had a great time especially since Paul is their traveling coach. Before Paul's elbow was healed enough to travel, they played in a Jr. High Tournament and Abigail was the coach. The Jr. High tournament has become an annual event for us. Levi and Micah Natewick fly down from Port Alsworth to play in it with us. Because Paul had an infected elbow Joel and Lisa Natewick flew down and picked our kids up on the way and chaperoned them for the tournament. They've had a tremendous season with lots of great memories of traveling in sleeping bags in a pickup in single digit weather.

Crossing the frozen lake in our pickup.

(Sorry about the quality of all the pictures, I snipped them from our video camera.)

Going up the hill on the other side of the lake.

Paul giving instruction during a time out.

Abigail working to get open.

Abigail scoring?

Deborah bringing the ball down the court...

...and driving for the basket.

Quentin has put on some muscle this year. All that sawing and splitting wood has paid off.

Here he is soaring to the basket.

Quentin driving the length of the court.

Quentin with the rebound.

Anna shooting the jumper as Quentin watches.

Anna is an awesome defensive player.

Joshua got to play in the Jr. High games even though he's a fourth grader. It evened things out since Deborah (9th grade) had to play to make enough players when we played five man teams.

Joshua is actually a great little player, he made this one.

A couple of times the mighty mites and pee wees in Newhalen were playing while we were there. They invited Caleb and Joshua to play with them.

Below Caleb has the ball. Joshua is on the far right.

Josh Armstrong going up strong for a shot.

Lee Clark is our best ball handler.

William Clark starting off the game with the jump ball.

Below Lee lost the handle on the ball and stopped to retrieve it which caused Abigail to trip over his leg and the kick the ball away from him. It looks really cool in slow motion...

New Moon Celebration

Psalm 81:3 Blow the shofar in the new moon, in the time appointed, on our festival day.

As we have been studying the appointed times or feasts commanded by God. The day of the New Moon, which is also how God commands His people to start a new month, is included along with the Sabbath as one of God's appointed times. So, we have been celebrating the New Moon each month. Below Sarah is blowing the shofar for the new moon celebration.

The last few months we have gotten together and had supper together. This particular month started on the Sabbath. A Jewish tradition is to make challah bread and start off each Sabbath with the breaking of the bread and the drinking of wine. As we have studied the Passover it appears that this is what Yeshua's (Jesus') disciples were doing when they had their first communion. Yeshua tells us to do this in remembrance of Him until He returns. So we have been starting off our Sabbaths with the breaking of bread and drinking the fruit of the vine (grape juice) and remembering how Yeshua gave His life for us. The girls and I are getting pretty good at making challah bread (although if I am left to myself, I have to turn on a YouTube video to remember how to braid it.)

Below Paul is giving thanks for the bread.

And passing out the grape juice.

(notice Sarah's bangs, she did that herself! At least she only cut the front...)

Regina, a teacher in the village that fellowships with us, has a large living room. We use the new moon celebration as an opportunity to practice our circle dancing.

It's a lot of fun and good exercise.

Paul's infected elbow

One evening a couple of weeks ago Paul complained that his elbow hurt. In the morning it was red and swollen. It continued to hurt throughout the day and the next morning the swelling had increased. My dad is a doctor and I talked to him on the phone. He was adamant that Paul needed to go to Anchorage and see a doctor now. Within a half an hour Paul was heading to Anchorage and had an appointment to see a doctor. They lanced his elbow to drain the infection and put him on an antibiotic. He spent the next two weeks mostly in Anchorage getting it cleaned out every two days. He got to come home a couple of times in between appointments. The doctor put a partial cast on so he couldn't bend his elbow.

Abigail went with him on one of his appointments so she could learn how to take care of his wound so he wouldn't have to go back quite so often.

The doctor put a wick in the incision to keep it drained. Below Abigail is inserting a new wick into the incision.

The next village to our south is about 20 miles away. In the winter you can drive there by driving across the lake. The Clarks pastor the church there and their son recently turned 16. Paul had planned on going with Abigail, Deborah and Quentin to his party but he couldn't go because of his infection. We (prayerfully) decided the kids were old enough to make the trek on their own. Below Paul is not using his arm as he makes sure the kids make sure the gas, oil and tires are good before they head out.
The kids play basketball at the school every afternoon. It's very low key and the older kids skipped to go on their trip. That left Joshua to give Anna a ride to practice in the sled behind the snowmachine. Anna is holding 7 month old Hazel, whose mom is a teacher at the school.
Praise to Yhwh, Paul's elbow is doing great. All signs of infection are gone and it's just a little tender. Thank you for your prayers. Please continue to pray, the elbow is a particularly difficult place to get rid of an infection. The doctor says that if there is no sign of infection for 30 days it should stay gone.