Shiny Catherine

I'd like you to meet Catherine. She arrived at the children's hospital this week for an infection she has on her elbow.  She is not one of "our patients" -that is she is not an ENT patient.  However, Catherine was born with some disabilities.  Her femur bone in her left leg did not form properly which makes her left leg much shorter than her right.  She also has issues with her eyesight which makes it hard for her to focus. 

You would never know it from this picture, but when Catherine first laid eyes on me, she was less than impressed.  In fact, I could not get even an inkling of a smile out of her on Monday.  She kind of just stared at me.  So after much persistence on Tuesday she began to crack a little smirk at me when I passed.  Then Tuesday afternoon she took me by surprise.  As I passed by her, she grabbed both my hands and started dancing with me.  Thankfully, she speaks good English and we have been able to talk quite a bit since our dance.  The last two days at the hospital have been sweetened with her contagious smile and unlimited hugs. Today at chapel we laughed as we watched her dance and sing to the praise songs. What a blessing to us to see someone with so many difficulties to overcome, embrace life with such force.  She is one of those "shiny people" - people whose smiles make you smile. Notice she is wearing one of the pillowcase dresses made by our homeschool group Classical Conversations. It was made by Donna and Noah, I believe. She wore it all day today and I'm guessing she'll have it on tomorrow, too.

Catherine's mom is in the picture with her.  Although her mom loves her dearly, she needed help dealing with Catherine's disabilities.  So Catherine lives at Joytown which is one of the few schools in Kenya for children with disabilities. To check out more about Joytown go to:  www.bethanykids.org/medical-work/joytown