Thursday misc.

Just some shots of the day.

Cooks & meals

Doug, Jim & Julie keep us much more than just fed. The meals are first rate, plentiful and snacks are always available. Wednesday was family dinner night & NOBODY WENT AWAY HUNGRY!

Tarpons - Thursday

Today we were able to put in the last 3 windows, lay down the new tile floor, re-attached the old linoleum. Siding was being put up. We had another great lunch with prayer and devotion with Ms. Lacey.

SASHA - Thursday

Great progress was made today. The main landing area of the wheelchair ramp and the side steps were completed. Jimmy now has a sturdy & safe entrance to his home and a place to sit and enjoy the day.
Scott & Camden are becoming experts with the circular saw - their building skills amaze me! Laura and Nicole did some premium hammering at getting the deck nailed down. All the thumbs are still in the right place! Their patience and eagerness to learn shows that they have a heart to serve. The decking and the floor joists all came out right, with Keri's master precision of measuring & marking the posts and seting the first stringer for the stairs. Ian keeps us reminded that Christ comes first and leads us in prayer and devotion. He is always smiling and ready to do anything that you ask him.
We celebrated today's success with the girls dancing on the new deck, and it's still standing! We gave Jimmie the mosiac cross that MUMC made for the residents. It was a moving moment for all the crew and Jimmy.

Thursday - Day Camp

Our last full day of Sonshine Camp started with singing and dancing some of our favorite songs. Pauley joined us and quickly picked up the motions while catching the enthusiasm of the children.

We enjoyed playing a water relay with severqal hot and sweaty children choosing to douse themselves with buckets and buckets of water.

Indoor activities included Bible stories, more games and crafts. The boys and girls at the camp dearly love spending time with the youth, and the feeling is mutual! It has been difficult for the youth to split their time between the worksite and the daycamp opportunities.

Friday will be a fun morning as we take the campers to a city park for fun and games. "Mr. B" and "Miss Marylin" will share their face painting talents while "Miss Laurie will help the children make mosiac cross necklaces. It will be difficult to say goodby to our new friends, but we will cherish our memories for a lifetime.

Justice League - Thursday

Today was an awesome day for the Justice League. We went back to Tommie's home and completed her deck and stairs off the back door. Tommie did not want to see the new stairs until completion. When we were done, some of the crew went in and brought Tommie out the back door. She was overwhelmed! We had lunch with her and gave her the cement and stained glass cross that MUMC made for each family. We all signed tha back of it..

After that we moved on to build yet another set of stairs. The group had to deal with wasps, bees, fire ants and soft septage beds while building the stairs. They worked through without complaint, and the job is done!. June Bug, the gentleman who lives there, was very happy to have a safe way out of the back of his house now.

We all are a little sad that tomorrow (Friday) is our last work day together. We have become so close over this week. Tomorrow's job - reframe the back door at JUne Bug's house - Look Out Wasps, We Are Coming Back!

Alabanjo's - Thursday

Yesterday Katy dodged and outran many wasps, but alas, one clever wasp came after her at the water cooler and stung her ear! But she toughed it out, and is now back to work. We've all signed our boards we've been replacing on the house. and Jon-Anthony's Lowes's apron has come in handy, since he's carrying all the nails and screws of every kind that we could need. Everyone has been taking turns at the power saw, with Neil giving us words of wisdom and encouragement. Caelyn has mad skills pounding nails, and scraping ceiling paint that needs to be redone. Meghan and Jon-Anthony were our roofing experts, tarring in patches that needed sealing. Madi, who says "Hi Mom!", was our painting queen, only stopping to help me re-screen some screen windows. We did a team effort devotion this morning with EVERYONE contributing - It was Amazing! Lauren.....

Thursday - Spudnuts

Holly- Went to the day camp today and had fun getting her hair done. The little kids love braiding the girl’s hair and it is adorable. While she was gone she had two little puppies crying over her being missing. It’s going to be really hard to leave those little cuties tomorrow.

Mike- Mike-ism of the day “We’re burning daylight!” Add that to the list along with “Measure once, cut it till it fits” and “Lord give me patience!” We found that will modern day tools, a job goes amazingly fast. A fun day ended with a trip to Sonic for shakes and then a little dance to the song Bulletproof.

Cindy- Due to Holly’s absence we all had to really look after the puppies. It was difficult to keep them out of the road. Even though the puppies made it difficult to focus we got a lot done. It was incredible how when it comes down to it, we all came together to get so many jobs done. The Mike-ism “Measure once, cut it till it fits,” really came into play while using the circular saw, but with James’ help it eventually worked.

.James- Found out that fuzzy foam + fuzzy beard = pain for his chin but giggles for the rest of the group. He also found his calling by making “earrings” for Cindy out of left over foam. Unfortunately he burned his fingers after finding out that the foam can go through gloves. Even though he went through a lot of pain today, he still loved all the fun to be had with the staple gun and foam.

Sami- Unavailable at the time due to Mr. Sandman giving her an extra dose of sand.

Sabrina- Unfortunately the rest of the work group found out how ticklish I was today. Even though I’m being poked in the side till I’m rolling on the floor giggling it’s still been a productive day. A lot of jobs finished at the job site yet it still seems like there are many to get done. I couldn’t ask for a better (or funnier) work group.

Thursday - Quiet Riot

Day 4 was AMAZING! Team Quiet Riot primed, painted the walls and leveled & preped the floor in the mastur bedroom. Tiling of the shower walls is complete and dry walling is moving forward.
After a maazing devotion time with our host family - the YellowHammer Chain Gang showed up with energy and tools! Next thing we knew, a window was installed & the rotten floor of the entryway was cut out and replaced. We were blessed with their help!

The McBama Jamas and the Holy Spudnuts (Wednesday - Work Day 3)

We are so thankful that June Bug joined us for dinner.
Cindy discovered self confidence as she operated the circular saw without mikes supervision. The finger will remain on ice until we find a worthy hospital to reattach it.

God granted Mike all the patience in the world today now he just needs the hands of a carpenter, I'm sure Cindy can help with that. The floor was a challenge but we knocked it out, literally, and ended up on top.

Holly insisted on feeding the adorable puppies, so we stopped by the local IGA and bought a Huge bag of puppy chow. She made sure they would like it by tasting it herself. The bowls were quite full for two little puppies.

Sami (Lee) is so happy the screen is finally finished after 3 days hard work. She never wants to see another staple or nail again and she's finished her last finishing nail
.
Sabrina had a heart wrenching experience at the day camp. Even though her heart is broken for all the pain the kids have been through and the fact that she will never see them again, she feels so blessed to have had the experience. If those little children are the future than the world will be in wonderful, loving hands.

James has a special saying when cutting a piece of wood, "measure once, cut until it fits. He also discovered that the Droid does do. And hatchets (even dull ones) are excellent tool to take out bad floors. Now only if Mike knew how to sharpen such tools it might have taken half the time!

SASHA (Wednesday)

Today on the SASHA work site we got a lot of work done. We finished cementing posts in the ground for a wheel chair ramp. We also had to use many different types of saws to cut out stairs for the new porch. Our homeowner Jimmy took the time to walk with us and tell us about his life. This soon came to an end wen it started to pour. Tonight at dinner Jimmy joined us for and amazing meal. Today was a wonderful day and we all can't wait to go back tomorrow and do more work.
-Kari Trivisonno

Alabanjos - Wednesday

Today was a very interesting day for the Alabanjos. To start off, both Jon-Anthony and Katy got attacked my insects - horse fly and wasp. But then Jon-Anthony and Caelyn put up new siding while Katy and Lauren put up some facia boards and Madi, along with Neil, worked on the drain. After lunch we were blessed with our homeowner Johnnie coming outside to check up on us. For the past 2 days Johnnie has been in her wheelchair unable to interact with us. So the visit from her today was truly a blessing. After we packed up and said our closing prayer, Neil decided to take a short cut through Mississippi home.

Oh, and Madi says, "Hi Mommy!"

Team Quiet Riot (Wednesday)

What can we say- More mudding, more sanding and more tiling. Today we stopped by God's Fighting Tarpons work site at lunch to see their handy work and were blessed with a beautiful prayer and song by their homeowner Lily. I think both teams wish we could accomplish more but we give thanks for the work we have done thus far.

Quiet Riot ( Tuesday)

Team Quiet Riot made great progress today. All of the walls in the master bedroom are up, mudded and waiting to be sanded. In the bathroom, the tile is going up and the sink is put together and waiting to be installed. Katy layed tiling from Jim, Kevin Megan and Nick hung drywall like pros and Cori followed behind with the tape mud and putty. I (SHERRY) had the honor of working with them.

Justice League (wednesday)

Today, the Justice League arrived at Miss Tommie's house to build a new, safe deck and steps for her back yard. It was cloudy so the day didn't seem too hot. We ate lunch with Miss Tommie and heard a fabulous Godly woman give us her testimony. After, we continued working on the steps and learned "there are lots of steps to building stairs." Tommie's granddaughter suprised us with a visit. Ajasia then painted the girls' nails and chatted about church, food, and of course, Hannah Montana. Our new butterfly friend, Jubbo also stopped by. We are excited to finish the stairs tomorrow, but sad to say good bye. God has truly blessed the Justice LEague

Wednesday - Tarpons

The crew hustled amazingly! We finished installing a window, ALMOST finished the front door completely (minor delay for rain).

We were truly blessed with Mrs. Lacey's prayers & singing. Amen!

Wednesday happenings - Daycamp -

(editor's note - each day the daycamp crew consists of a new group of youth/students from MUMC - 1 from each of the work crews, as well as Laurie Babcock, Marylin Young and Chuck Barton) - the daily blog update is written by the youths/students.

Today was a amazing day. My group went to Sonshine Day Camp, and it was so hard to leave at the end of the day. We studied the transformation from Saul to Paul - how he went from mean to sharing God's love. All of us bonded with the kids, and they just clung to our sides. I honestly don't know who had a harder time accepting that we (this crew of youth/students) wouldn't be back again - the daycamp kids or the students. The kids each wrote a worry on a piece of paper and we tied them to balloons and let our worries go to God. These kids are amazing, they have so much faith and so much love at such a young age. I really want to go see them one more time. This group was truly blessed by these kids today!

The McJamas Bamas and the Holy Spudnuts - Day 2

(Rambling thoughts from Sabrina Kanaga, Cindy Sega, James Post, Sami LaTona, Holly Nystum, Michael Fournier)

Holly has bonded with the puppies. They love her. They think she is their mom. The puppies helped on the work site today by grabbing the brush and running away with it.
Sami (Jamie) found Eula’s couch was very comfortable. This was her second time on a trip falling asleep on the job site. No power tools for her.
James says he likes the staple hammer. We had to come up with some “Tool Creativity” today. James and Cindy (95% James brain power and 5% Cindy’s sweat and muscle) created a new tool. We cut a hexagonal wrench into a bit for a power drill. Only to find out after all done, that Mike had a bit that would fit the whole time. James also found the way to paradise – and it is through the walk in cooler. Cold, food and quite. What else could you ask for?
Sabrina conquered one of her fears and climbed up a ladder. James supported the ladder and gave her constant encouragement. He was amazing and really helped her. The entire group really bonded today and we all feel so much closer.
Cindy was touched by Miss Eula’s joy when we took a group picture. The group picture was taken with a timer on three different cameras. We were running back and forth to get the pictures before the timer went off. Miss Eula was laughing and smiling. She loved it.
Mike said it was great to start using power tools (queue the ooh, ooh, oooh from Home Improvement) and to teach the young adults the correct way by doing it totally wrong the first time. Cut twice measure once slap head three times and redo the job. God gave him lots of patience today and most of it he spent on himself. Better day tomorrow.
New word for today – waction!
Gods love and blessing from w’all to y’all.

The McJamas Bamas and the Holy Spudnuts

The McJamas Bamas and the Holy Spudnuts (Rambling thoughts from Sabrina Kanaga, Cindy Sega, James Post, Sami LaTona, Holly Nystum, Michael Fournier)

Meeting Eula (the family matriarch) and Junebug this morning. The heart of God and the light of Christ shown in there faces. She had a very positive and upbeat attitude about life. That morning she had to go for a doctor’s yet she greeted us with warmth an love proclaiming my house is your house
Junebug’s (Eula’s son) was awesome. He had a big smile and a soft manner and showed us around the place and all the work they would like to have us accomplish
The first impression of the work sight – flabbergasted – the state of the property and the type work to be done seemed to be overwhelming and our hearts went out to the owners. We are so blessed and we do not know it.
The Puppies – The owner's grandson (Rudy) is raising tow Rottweiler puppies named Cocoa and Kira. The roam the lot and try to steal bags and food. And they eat the pieces of wood that are on the site. We love them
Porches with screens – Tore down all the old screen and staples and started to put up a new screen but we had technical difficulties when the stable gun jammed. So we moved on itno the house for two minor repairs
The bugs (cockroaches, wasps and spiders!) – Mike had to kill many wasps that were big as James (OK there is nothing bigger then James!) James) but they were pretty nasty looking and hard to kill.
Butterflies and the birds – the natural beauty was one of the trade off for this site. We saw many different butterflies and two mocking birds in the trees. They did not like our whistling too much
While not on the list, Sammy cleaned up the area by picking up trash strewn around the site. We will leave it better then we found it.

Work Day 2 continued Justice League

Justice League - Completed Job #1 - The stairs are installed and the decking & railing is repaired (you can even walk on them safely). The team situations. Dana, Dom, Emily, Sara N., Sara P., Josh and Evan had fun while working thru many challenging situations. The team is great at problem solving. Tomorrow we are off to meet a family and start some badly needed repairs at their home. Theymereally worked hard in the VERY HOT & HUMID weather.

Work Day 3

Family and friends,
We, the YSPers, would all like to take this opternunity to tell you that we miss all of you guys and that we are havng more fun than you could imagine. As we continue to do more good work, we will keep you posted with more pictures and stories. Today, im going to try to keep them short because my team stayed at the work site a little longer today so i dont have as much time to blog.


So, lets start off with Sasha. Laura Ely took some awsome pictures from the day camp.


as for the yellowhammer Chain Gang, we finished up at elsies house and left the stepping stone cross with her. She was so grateful for it and everything else that she cried and then some of us cried because of that. The house we moved onto is a little more work than we expected. This includes replacing spongy floorboards, toilets and hot water heaters all in the middle of a territorial battle with a hornets nest and several lizzards (Watch out Pauley!). More on this later though.

Today the fighting tarpons met with their home owners mom miss lacy. She opened up to us and helped us realize our own blessings.Everyone learned how to use power tools in good ways. Today made us realize that without one another the laughs and smiles wouldnt be possible and al we would be left with is mosquito bites.


Alabanjos didnt feel it was necessisary to submit a blog entry =P , so i will make one up! We put up siding, finished fascia bording in the back yard, put up siding, used power tools and repaired a roof. We fed the dog, and left our contact info for the next group to find.

Cooks !!!!!

All the great work that he crew's do is through the GRAT MEALS that the Doug Kepp, Jim Post and Julie Kanaga prepare for us. We really are fortunate. While the crews hammer & nail, the cooks deal with things like the van battery going dead TWICE today, as well as getting up extra early to keep us on time. Breakfast, lunch (with fruit & snacks), dinner (with desert) and an evening snack !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 70 people - THANK YOU!

ALABANJOS

Today my group traveled to Cuba, Alabama to help a family. We replaced the boards under the roof and replaced much of the rotting wood. Our group got close between huddling in vans for AC, giving Jon Anthony his awesome nick name, or running away from wasps. It was a great day.


Madi White, Caelyn Eppler, Jeff eippert, J-A LoConti, Katy Goetz, Megan Gallagher, Neil Nystrom, and Lauren Gregory.

Quiet Riot!

Drywalling 101 was the order of the day for the Quite Riot. We learned how to cut, measure, hang, mud and sand. The master bedroom is slowly moving forward to painting-ready status. We mixed & poured a floor for a handicapped accessable shower. Our homeowner is confined to a wheel chair and is really looking forward to having access to a real shower & we aim to please & make that happen by week's end. We truly enjoyed a great time of devotions & lunch with Ms. Emma, Ms. Vivian and Emmanual, sharing their thoughts on Christian charity. - Shari Gallagher, Jim Ruschman, Melisa Sechnick, Katie Calvert, Meghan Calvert, Cori abcock, Nick Blasko,Kevin Brock!

Justice League

Team Justice League took on the job of tearing out a 2 story set of stairs and deck walkway at the lodge we are staying at. Evan, Josh, and Dana used circular saws and a Sawzall to notch out the stringers for the stairs. They made 4-16 stair stringers. Emily and Sarah N. Demolished the decking and hand rails. We Rebuilt the deck and hand rails and then removed the old stairs, cut them up, and hauled away the wood. While trying to attach the stringers we discovered they are about 1 foot shorter than the concrete footer (we used the template we were given). So that meant that we needed to move the 700lb. concrete block 1 foot. Thank you Dan Gallagher and Ted for helping us in this effort. tomorrow we will tackle the stairs.

Lord Loving' Jesus Kangaroos

Thw Kangaroos headed north to the farthest job site into rural Alabama. We arrived at the house of Hazel, to tear down old shaky stairs at the back door of the trailer, and rebuilt beautiful new & strudy stairs. We also added a rail stiffener to a handicapped ramp for her wheelchair bound brother. She was very happy and couldn't believe that people would come this far to help her! She was very very thankful and shared with the team that her church was having a week lomg revival this week! We prayed over her new sairs and headed to Glynda's next. Glynda and her elderly mother were waiting on the porch for us in the 90-degree heat eating popcorn. The home has a leak within the shower walls that was damaging the adjacent walls. We tore out the deck on the back of the house as well. We'll be continuing in the morning. Great Kangaroos who worked in the heat and humidity witout anything but smiles on their faces & very warm hearts. - Dan Gallagher, Sean O'Neill, Shane Kallay, Madi Young, Grace Sheppard, Ted Babcock, Erin Walsh !

YellowHammer Chain Gang

Yellowhammer Chain Gang.
"We arrived at Elsie's house where we had many things to do. First, we put out topsoil and put rocks around a drainage pipe. Others were installing door bells and a toilet seat. We finished installing a frame and door for a bathroom that the last team started."

Mike Gallagher, Sam Smith, Lauren Fross, Garrett Pool, Christine Silvestro, Kathy Dickriedy, Aj Ruschman

Day 1 - Fighting Tarpons & SASHA

The crew calling themselve's the Fighting Tarpons (as written by the crew):

Today we started working on Wayne's trailer, we will be puting on a new front door, 3 windows and building new steps for the front door. Also we cleaned off the roof of the trailer, and will be seal-coating it tomorrow, if the rains hold off. We met his 70-year old mother who lives in the trailer next to him. She invited us to sit with her on her deck, and at the end of the day she wanted to pray for us.. The students all worked hard,everyone taking turns using power tools. We can hardly wait for tomorrow to meet Wayne and get his home all fixed up for him (Fighting Tarpons are Rob Lewis, Lynda Otte, Steve Silvestro, Jimmy Ferko, Julia Ludwig, Amy Cilensek, and Nicole Alponet.



Team SASHA - the group of Laura Ely, Shawn HArris, Ian Kallay, Camden Bays, Nicole Silvestro, Nancy Leyden and Scott McKown - ventured out to Jimmy's house to build a handicapped ramp for him. The day was mainly spent digging footer holes in the hard Alabama clay for the posts and preparing the wood to ramp construction. It was blisteringly hot - 97 degrees. We love water! We look forward to going back tomorrow to begin the actual building of the ramp - it's about 40 feet long!

First Work Day (Monday)

Hi All, here's AJ again bringing home a little taste of what we are up to here in Alabama. What we will be doing from now on is every group will submit a brief recap of their day and I will post word for word what they give me. Thy are in no particular order, except for the order they gave them to me.

Soo... lets start things off with the day camp group.

Day Camp:
"It was a wonderful day for all at camp sonshine. Seeing each child's smiling face really proved that we are here in hot Alabama for a reason. We all played games, danced to worship songs, and had bible study. We decorated hackysacks, made volcanoes that erupted, and learned all about Guatemalan culture. The kids were all so talented at dance, basketball, and so much more. We had many stories of hardships, these stories made us work even harder, to put smiles on their faces. God was seen in their eyes today. Student helpers were Sarah Perry, Kyle Nutter, Madi Young, James Post, Megan Calvert, Caelyn Eppler, and Kai Trivisonno. We really had a great day! It showed how we can teach others about God's love. <3

DAY 2

HI ALL!

AJ here today to let you all in on what we have been up to for the last 24 hours. Several awesome things happened: One group went to the Country Music Hall of Fame and saw all kinds of interesting things including THE Studio B where many people have recorded albums (including Elvis!) This is about all I can tell you about this one, but im sure someone would love to talk about it with you when we get back.
The second group went to Adventureworks where we did Zip lining! There were 8 different lines which ranged from less than 50 feet long and only a couple of feet off the ground to 800 plus feet long and way too far away from the ground! Flying through the trees at 3 billion feet per second and who knows how high off the ground wasn't the first thing many of us wanted to do, but we faced our fears and did it anyways!





This is a video clip from one of my runs from my point of view (Sorry its shaky, cant help that =) )

and here is us all suiting up to take the jump of faith.


Last but not least, we had the amazing chance to go and watch a Nashville Sounds "AAA" Baseball game. Even though a nasty thunderstorm ruined the game, it did not ruin our night! I think we had just as much fun hiding from the rain as we would have had watching the game! Getting everyone back into the vans was chaotic, but with some awsome leadership and someone watching out from above, we all got back to the church with no one left behind.
Thats all for today friends and family, but I promise we will post again soon.

"I can do everything through him who gives me strength"

Day 1 - Arriving in Nashville, TN

We're part way there - 566 miles so far, 3 States, 68 people accounted for (and no airbag deployments)!

Tonite's activity was the Wildhorse Saloon - including private line dancing lesson. Not all of it was pretty - but we all had a GREAT Time!!!!!!!

Photo scavenger hunt was a success (it's a great way to ask to see tattoo's!) we'll explain later!

Driver's & travelers are tired, so we'll keep this one short.

Thank you for keeping us in your prayers - the week looks to be AWESOME and HOT (mid-90's) Tomorrow is either Zip-Lining (hint - gravity wins everytime) or the Country Music Hall of Fame, followed by a AAA Baseball game & fireworks (root for Ryan Garko to get a hit).

Just for Today - Lord, Thank You for this opportunity to be your stewards - we try hard.

Just about ready to go

It's that time .... almost. 68 students, young adults and adults working as 8 - work crews, 1 - day camp crew and 3 dedicated cooks heading down to Sumter County, Livingston, AL. Our host agency this year is Alabama Rural Ministry (http://www.arm-al.org/)

A few fundraisers! (Yeah for the Big Event!) A few 15-passenger vans, cargo vans, mini-vans, pickup truck & trailer. A few broken feet & hip replacements & wedding plans (OK - you get a free pass for this year). A few technical issues (say a prayer for my infected pc).

We'll be heading out from Mentor Friday June 25th, stopping in Nashville, Tn and arriving in Livingston, AL on Sunday June 27th to start this year's service mission.

Say a prayer for us (we could use a few cool days - forecast is mid-90's every day).

Follow the crew's exploits - we'll try to post our progress each day (is the techno-geeks do their thing).

Just For Today - Life is to short not to do something that matters, thank you Lord.