Thursday

This morning after breakfast we all got to witness a Texas thunderstorm with heavy rain and lightning. Luckily it cleared up by this afternoon and was a pretty nice day again. We all went to the big project house today. Most of us worked on various portions of attaching drywall to the walls and ceiling. John's team focused on installing a new front and back door on the home. This evening we're going to a local restaurant for SE Texas grub and dancing.


Thunderstorm are extra exciting when you live in plastic pods

April fools

Today the teams returned to their projects and continued hard work. It was about 70 degrees and overcast today, so perfect working conditions made us feel at home. This evening we will be enjoying a feast provided by the local church folk. They made king ranch casserole and banana pudding for us to enjoy. Mmm mmm good!

At the big project house gypsum and fiberglass filled the air as hammers banged, ladders rattled, insulation flew, razors cut, Rotozips screamed and a multitude of screw drivers wirred to secure drywall to the ceiling and walls throughout the home. Insulation was spread in the attic between rafters. Unfortunately the attic rafters were not a normal spacing, so most of the insulation had to be cut and stuffed after the ceiling board was hung.

work is in the air

Brent stuffing insulation (Kurt is up there somewhere too)

hanging ceiling panels

cutting insulation

more ceiling board

the home owners (and Sarah)

It is beginning to look more like a home and less like a loose collection of 2x4s now that some of the walls are up. There were a couple ouches and ka-thumps but no one was seriously injured. Kevin came by with his parents to check things out as we were cleaning up for the day and they were very pleased to see how their home is coming together.

John and his team were able to finish their project today, completing the crown molding, flooring thresholds and the bathroom wall paneling and trim work. Then they took a side trip over to Paradise Island, one of the popular entertainment areas on Sabine Lake, that was completely destroyed in the storm.




Steve's pet project.

Tuesday report

Today most of us moved to a new project house. The owners had taken the opportunity to redesign some of their home to better suite the needs of their disabled teenage son. They installed wider doors and moved several walls since the interior had been completely stripped due to water damage. Their home had 4 feet of water inside. In the neighborhood were many FEMA trailers and all of the homes were significantly effected by high water damage and mold from hurricanes Katrina, Gustav, Rita and Ike. The home owners were living in a FEMA trailer park since a trailer would not fit on their lot, but came by to talk with us about their experiences with the storm. One home across the street had been completely demolished by the owner rather than try to repair it due to significant mold issues, even though they bought it just a few years before the most recent storm. Today we installed insulation in all the walls and started the installation in the ceiling and prepared for drywall installation.

John's team continued their work on their project house, installing wall paneling and crown molding.

Scott and Karen continued to work on projects in camp, and Kelsey is feeling much better today.

Their was a brief crisis when the hot water connection failed on one of the water heaters and some of us had to shower off with only cold water, but all were happy to wash off the sweat and fiberglass from a hard days work.


The home owner and her neighbor, who chose to demolished his home due to severe water damage.


Donna and Sandi working on insulation.


The back yard, the structures were finished just before Ike and survived the storm. They have a pool and sauna to help with their son's disabilities.


Delivering 6 pallets of drywall to be installed in the home.

Monday work teams

In-Camp Team:
Scott and Karen plumbed the hand washing sinks - which was a much harder job than you think.
Donna sorted and prepared first aid kits for all the teams to take to work sites.
Sarah cleaned up pod scraps, got bitten by a fire ant and located all the hospitals in the area (unrelated).
Theresa, Donna and Sarah cleaned and mopped out some of the unused pods.
Sandi cleaned and organized the camp kitchen
Gary, Donna and Theresa organized the wood pile. Gary also installed new locks on the job site trailers.
Tom installed mirrors on the wash stand, built a lumber rack and installed another light in camp.
Everybody helped to clean and organize camp to make it more organized for all of us to enjoy.
One extra excitement came when the lawn mover threw a rock and broke the window in the screen door of the dining tent.
Kelsey took a nap and worked on recovering from the crud.

Brent and Steve went to finish a couple small jobs at a home that needed some more flooring installed, replaced weather stripping on a door and some interior molding. Then went to help John's team.

John, Steve, Chris and Ka'Donna (newlyweds) worked on a home replacing interior paneling, base board molding, repairing some light fixture and a window replaced.

Christian, Audrey and Kurt retarped a roof in 20mph winds.

This is the home were Brent and Steve worked.

Brent installing some molding

Steve replaced several panes of glass in this antique door.



















This is the home were John, Ka'Donna & Chris worked














We taught Ka'Donna how to do the proper wife stance.

Sunday

Sunday we spent time getting ourselves settled (and warmed back up), we attended worship here at Trinity Presbyterian and then spent the day driving over to Galveston to see the town and some of the harder hit areas right along the gulf coast. We took a little ferry across Galveston Bay to get there, then looped back past Houston to get back to camp.

We made it!

Well, we're all here, except the Baileys and Karen, who plan to come on over today after spending time with local family. The weather was a bit colder than expected last night at around 40 degrees, so it was a bit chilly in the pods. The weather and mosquito forecast for the whole week looks great, and I don't think we could have asked for better. We're planning to spend today doing a little sight seeing and getting oriented, then it's off to work tomorrow.

The camp is quite nice, with plenty of pods, a shower trailer, two kitchen trailers and boardwalks all around since the ground gets quite wet any time it rains. There is no bathroom trailer, only porta-potties, but otherwise the camp couldn't be nicer. The sun was up early this morning, we had a nice breakfast and now I'm just waiting for the work to start.