Our Building Week July 28-Aug 1

It was a fabulous week and we got SO much done on the church we're building!! We had a group of volunteers from Kansas City, KS and a group from Belmont, MI as well as a young man from WI -- so LOTS of extra hands! The week began by pouring concrete in the educational wing. Some of the men helped with that while others worked at preparing other parts of the floor for concrete. We had purposely left a small section of footings and foundations undone -- the rains have kept us so muddy that the concrete trucks would never be able to get to all the areas of the building. That small section allowed the trucks to get footings and foundations poured from inside the building. Now that everything is backfilled, and we've had a little dry spell, the trucks were able to access the building from the exterior and we could finish that last section of foundation. Some of the folks helped assemble the foam forms. Lots of little odd jobs were done, too, which was great. As the week progressed, the entire floor was poured and walls were assembled.

One Wednesday the first wall went up!! It's always an exciting moment -- up to now all the work has been in the ground and, while incredibly important, isn't visible. That first wall is the obvious sign of progress! We got a second section of wall up on Wednesday too.

B y Friday, most of the walls were up and we look like a building site (not a trailer park!).

We are so thankful for the great help! They were all a blessing and encouragement to us in so many ways! We are also grateful to the Lord for His care -- there were a couple small injuries and a little sunburn and quite a few achy muscles -- but no one was seriously hurt!

The site is quiet today. The volunteers have all left for home. Our guys have worked 11 days in a row with only Sunday off so today they are all getting some much-needed rest and spending time with their families.

It's been a GREAT week!!!

Catching Up

It's been some time since I've been here -- we've been bopping around, spending weeks and weeks in internet neverland. So for today, I'll try to bring everyone up to speed.

We spent over 2 months living in someone's yard -- this sounds odd, but our trailer was parked on the lawn of a church family. It was really quite pleasant -- the place was in the country and we were in the shade, with an open field across the road so we always had a light breeze. The people were VERY nice ... and very respectful of our privacy, yet invited us for meals and visiting ... and when the weather was threatening, we were made very welcome in their house. The view out our front window was their little home orchard, which was in a constant state of bloom for 3 or 4 of our weeks there.
On the project, we finally got our permits in late May and began working to get utilities onto the building site. In June, 3 other families arrived with their trailers and joined us to work on the church. Our efforts have been somewhat hampered by the weather -- it rains and rains and rains here. We thought we were in Wisconsin, not an equatorial rainforest! In June, those terrible storms that flooded through Iowa, and then into Wisconsin, came dangerously close to us. On more than one occasion, we've had reports of tornadoes and funnel clouds sighted in nearby areas -- one night, 5 reports within 6 miles of us. For we, who live in tornado magnets, that's exciting enough! Several severe storms have taken the same path across the midwest -- we've come to call it "the chute" -- and we live in the chute, having as much as 14 inches of rain in just a few hours. It's been quiet now ... for about 5 days. And, we've gotten a lot of work done!

Two weeks ago, we had a volunteer group from Shelby MI come to help us for the week -- they got SO much done! This week, we've had a group of teens from Kansas City MO here to help and they've done a lot too! The foundations and stem walls have been poured and backfilled, the plumbing is done that goes under the floor, and if all goes well on Monday, we'll be pouring part of the floor. Materials are here to go up with walls later in the week. We are expecting another group from Kansas this coming week, as well as a group from Michigan -- many hands make light work!!


Keith had a rough start to July -- in late June, something bit him just above the eye (we think it was a spider). For the first few days, it was similar to a mosquito bite, but then it was as though it exploded! It got quite inflamed and swelling began to spread around his eye (it was awful). We ended up heading to the doctor and it had already developed into cellulitis. The first antibiotics he tried didn't work, so it was even worse the next day. Back to the doctor, got a new Rx. While there, we also found that his sodium was low. With new meds and plenty of Gatorade in hand, we went home where he spent the day resting. His sodium came back up, the antibiotic worked and it all ended well, but he was pretty tired for several weeks.

I've been working on jewelry ... but we'll save that for another day!!