Life Lesson . . . Don't ride a bike barefoot!

I remember that growing up my parents had the rule that we always had to wear shoes when riding our bikes.  I assumed it was because the ridges on the pedals would hurt your feet if your rode barefoot.  Today, this poor 7 year old and I both learned why it is important to ride a bike with shoes on.  She was a passenger on the back of her brother's bike and her foot found its way into the bicycle spokes.



The girl is missing her entire big toe and part of her second toe.  The third toe is missing skin, but the bone is all intact.

Using bone rongeurs to cut off the ends of the exposed bones so that I could close her skin over the ends of the bone.

The father pulled this out of his pocket.  It is the child's big toe . . . he looked very sad when I told him I would not be able to reattach the toe.  He would not throw it away though, he is going to bring it home and bury it in the house.  I guess it is a superstition, that if a person lives and you have discarded a part of the person without a proper burial of the part then the person can die.