Friday morning saw us say good bye to Mary Beth, Charlotte and Barb as they headed to the airport to return home. The rest of us headed off for a final day of work at our sites. Friday afternoon we said good bye to Rachael who headed home to work on Saturday.

Jerry’s team arrived at Kentucky St. and set to work on repairing termite infested wood on the left side of the house. Dave Bastine finished his repair of the former kitchen. This included replacing floor supports, pouring a new concrete support and putting down a new plywood floor. Don, Lucille, Carol and Maxine finished repairing the floors in both of the former bathrooms. Mel, Jerry and Bob started putting up particle board on the left side of the house. In the end everyone pitched in to complete this up to eight feet. This will provide more security for the material left in the house. This seemed more important as the neighbor said that his dog had scared away a couple people at 4 am that morning. By 3pm we were all tired but felt good about the progress we had made during the week.

Most of the team headed to New Orleans for a Cajun meal.

Fletcher’s team worked a slightly abbreviated day, but still managed to finish several projects and leave others at a good stopping place to be turned over to the next group to work at Painter Street.  Charles and Ed finished tiling the entire floor of the right-hand duplex unit, while Fletcher made significant progress on the tiling of the left-hand unit while supervising the rest of us.  George and Marjorie completed as much grouting as was possible while still leaving walk paths for the other workers.  Fred completed the framing of all fourteen windows in both duplex units with John’s assistance.  Fred and John both began filling in some gaps at the bottom of drywall to stabilize future baseboard installation.  Mary Beth and Barb were missed!  Cleanup was more extensive than most days, but we still left the work site in time for some to tour the devastation of the lower ninth ward and still join the Brown team for the trek into the French Quarter for a special parting meal.

We were blessed on our trip with several ‘friends of GPC’. Mel Reid(a friend of the Browns), Fred Hebdon and Dave Bastine(friend and cousin of the Wasiks) and Charles and Marjorie Tanner(friends of the Travises). Below are thoughts about this week from the Tanners.

“For all the saints, who from their labors rest…”
While we were busy last week laying tile, framing windows, putting up plywood sheeting, and doing various other jobs at our work sites, the little-observed holy-day called “All Saints Day” slipped by us.  We did take note of Halloween, though, which  owes its existence to All Saints Day.  The familiar hymn quote above refers of course to the saints who have departed this earthly existence, but this year I find it easy to reinterpret these words.  George Buchanan confirms that the apostle Paul referred to all church members as “saints”, and Marjorie and I certainly believe that this past week we have indeed labored with some of the saints from Gaithersburg Presbyterian Church.  And now our mission work there has ended, and no matter what we will be doing from this point on, we all will be resting from the labors of the past week.  It’s always bitter-sweet when labors of this sort come to a close.  We began with such enthusiasm and high expectations, and although our enthusiasm might have remained strong, it was inevitable that we would not achieve all our goals.   Even though our muscles were begging for a rest, our bodies were pleading for sleep, and our travel plans seemed unalterable, part of us really wanted to stay longer, to finish what we set out to do, because it pains us to leave so much unfinished. There is so much need, and not enough resources to meet all the need, and this saddens us.  But there is also the sweet part: We have made a difference at our work sites.  We have merged our skills and talents into vibrant servant teams who accomplished great tasks, and have greatly contributed to the progress toward completion of the houses.  One will almost certainly be occupied before Christmas, and we have helped make that goal a distinct probability.  And Marjorie and I have worked side by side with a friend of 40 years, and with many very new friends.  We always hear that the Presbyterian Church is connectional, but this week we have experienced this connectionalism in a new way.  We have become connected with brothers and sisters in Christ who belong to GPC, and some of their friends and relatives, who have all enriched our lives, and for that we give thanks.  We look forward to the new paths down which these new connections will lead us.  Thanks, GPC, for welcoming us so warmly into your fellowship. (Charles and Marjorie Tanner—Christian Community Presbyterian Church, Bowie, MD.)

Please join us on  Sunday, November 18 for a celebration of our trip.

Luling Work Day 4… Jerry’s Team

There are good days and then there are even better days.  Most of us felt a little mid-week slump yesterday.  Two days of hard manual work took some getting used to, so by day 3 we were really feeling it.  I am pleased to say that we are a resilient bunch and rebounded nicely today.  It was a beautiful day today.  And just what did we do with our beautiful day you may ask?  We wrapped one side of our house with Tyvek and secured it with swing staplers.  Charlotte and Lucille were specially trained on how to load the staplers, poor Bob had the difficult task of holding the 9-foot roll vertically and Jerry and Mel rolled it out perched on ladders.  Jerry and Mel then got to use the swing staplers up high and Lucille and Charlotte got to use them on the bottom half of the house.  Let me tell you there is no finer way to lose your pent up stress than by beating the side of a house with a swing stapler.  One of Carol’s dreams came true today when she was officially trained on and used the circular power saw.  Dave is working to the back and under the house.  The rest of us don’t really know what he is doing, but we know he is doing a great job.  (He has real construction skills,).  I must mention that the kind gentlemen at the fire house continue to allow us to use their facilities.  Today however they committed the politically incorrect faux pas of asking Charlotte and Maxine if they were planting flowers at our house.  Anyone who knows Maxine will appreciate that she quickly set them straight and said no, they were doing the same things as the men.  And speaking of the outspoken Maxine, the house next door to ours has a dog outside.  That dogs barks constantly while we are having our al fresco lunches.  This afternoon Maxine barked back at it and it was the first time all week that the dog was silent.  We don’t want Barb Woodward to worry, but Don who has been expertly sawing floor boards in what will become bathrooms, stepped on an unsecured board was quickly dropped down to the ground below.  He bounced back up and continued his work with no injury.  Rachel Simko deserted Jerry’s Team today and learned how to apply Venetian plaster.  We missed her youthful enthusiasm; we’re getting her back tomorrow.

I am writing this blog before our 7:30 p.m. devotional.  I did want to mention that Barb North did an excellent job leading it on Halloween night.  She compared making jack-o’lantern pumpkins with God’s work “carving us into Christians”.  Afterwards some of us had a wild night at Wal Mart and some of us went to Sonic’s (for those not in the know, a local branch of the chain fast food and ice cream drink spot).  And of course, Mary Beth made it to both hot spots.  We are sorry to see her leave tomorrow. Who will be the cheerful one in the morning? There are larks and there are doves, and Mary Beth is definitely a lark!

Work Day 4 - Fletcher’s Team

Well, call me (Mary Beth) a prophet. I believe I prophesied that we would be tiling all week, and so we have! We have continued to grow in our skills and confidence, thanks to Fletcher’s expert teaching, coaching, and encouragement. Ed Travis knows how to re-tile his bathroom at home, thanks to all that he has learned from Fletcher and Charles and Marjorie Tanner. Fred Hebdon and John Travis have installed trim around most of the windows and will undoubtedly complete their project tomorrow. George Buchanan, the senior member of our group, has grouted tile floors all week long. He is a true inspiration to us all. Our team has been adopted by a stray dog in the neighborhood, and Mary Beth is trying to figure out how to get him on Fletcher’s truck for the return trip.

After lunch, Barb North and Mary Beth took a short road trip to the three homes on which GPC teams worked in April 2006. They look about the same - we didn’t find the homeowners, so we don’t know if they are planning to rebuild eventually. We also visited the Lakeview Presbyterian Church, where GPC members worshipped on the spring trip earlier this year. The Lakeview Church received some of the funds from GPC’s Beyond These Walls mission tithe, and they have certainly put them to good use. GPC members who worshipped at Lakeview in April 2007 will be surprised to see how absolutely beautiful the sanctuary is becoming. The floor is tiled (after a week of tiling at our homeowner’s house, I am sensitive to these matters) with beautiful stone tiles. While we were there today, the solid oak pews were being lowered and fitted into place.

I’m leaving the trip early (in order to attend Saturday’s Session retreat), but I know that GPC members will make us all proud. With their cheerful attitudes and dedication to their work, they have been beautiful witnesses to Jesus Christ, and the hope and joy we have in him. I’ll miss the gang and look forward to hearing all the stories when everyone returns!

Greetings from New Orleans!!  This is Carol Anderson blogging today and I am on the team that is working on a house on Kentucky St.  We have a great team and are getting lots done.  Our job today started with destruction!  I never knew how much fun it is to take a sledge-hammer and hit a wall as hard as you can.  Does wonders for stress!  We took the whole side of our house off down to the studs.  It makes for a very airy feeling in the house is all I will say.  After taking all the clapboards off we had to pull all the nails out that had held it on.  That was a lot of nails.  Some of us worked on replacing the floor in one of the bathrooms and Dave made concrete and built a new post for the back half of the house because the foundation is very tenuous.  I got to help mix and shovel the concrete into the form and carry buckets of water from across the street to help make the concrete.  Our house has no plumbing or electricity at all.  Our need for a bathroom has us walking several block to the local firehouse so we have created a new phrase for having to go to the bathroom  “going to the firehouse”.  I assure you it is funnier here than it sounds. The highlight of the day was when our owner,”Laura” came by with beignets from Cafe Du Mond , coffee, and homemade pralines. They were great.  We’ll bring you more news tomorrow.

When our youth group was in South Africa, there was a leader from the missionary group called Leadership Experience named Bruce who really mentored me quite a bit.  When our group bought a large amount of fruit to distribute in the townships there, Bruce said “Ah, this is the gospel”.  That concept has stuck with me here in New Orleans this week.  When we think about the gospel, we normally think pretty theologically…Jesus died, took our sins, rose from the dead, and beat back sin, opening the door to eternal life.  But I’ve been trying to see Jesus, and his gospel, in places more potent than a theology lesson.  Today as I was sawing some tile (which is very noisy) Mary Beth just caught my eye and smiled a big smile at me.  There was nothing to say, because the saw is too loud.  But, I thought to myself, that is the gospel.  A gospel of kindness for no other reason than that we learned it from Jesus.  Today as I was utilizing the corner store for lunch, I discovered that the owners were Palestinian.  When I thanked him for my lunch by saying “shukran” or “thank you” in Arabic, his demeanor towards me changed.   He reached out to shake my hand, and began asking me questions about what our group was doing.  That was the gospel.  That man has first given to our group, by letting us utilize his store for its plumbing.  When we give back to him, by buying, or just by thanking, we promote respect, love, and the kingdom of God.  That is the gospel.  As we drive down the roads on this trip, we have noticed the pulse of the city returning.  We have noticed work crews and finished houses once again lived in.  When we see the bumper stickers that say “RENEW ORLEANS” we believe that God is doing just that.  He is rebuilding His kingdom here in New Orleans.  That is the gospel.

Luling Work Day 2…

Jerry’s Team

Up and at ‘em again at 6:00 a,m., but today we were greeted by rain. So much for the week-ahead sunny every day forecast. Our moods improved considerably with a breakfast of French toast and specially-seasoned scrambled eggs. Today we were joined by 9 members of a Presbyterian church north of Charlotte, NC, and one of their male members has volunteered to cook both breakfast and dinner through Friday. Guess who wins the Most Popular prize? We were off to our work sites by 7:40, and this was a busy day for Jerry’s Team. The men were still attaching plywood to the side of the house where we had removed siding yesterday. Today the guys toughed it out with water dripping down their backs from the overhanging eaves. The women smartly found work indoors with measuring and sawing the boards the men nailed in place. Today they had the assistance of a nail gun. Yesterday it was done the old fashioned way with hammers. Charlotte has gained proficiency with the power saw. Today we were also joined by Rachel Simko who isn’t afraid to climb up high or go down below the house. We all wrestled with floor joists for a good part of the day to try to add stability to our termite-depleted house. The sun did come out in the afternoon to save the working day. We’ve made great friends with members of Engine Company Number 29. They are allowing us to use their restroom. Back at the camp site some of us treated ourselves to a trip to the Winn Dixie. Yes, we really are a mad-cap group. Everyone’s ready for our veal parmesan dinner. This writer will stop now and douse myself with bug spray so I can eat with slapping away the mosquitoes who think we are gathering in this dining tent so that they can dine on us.

Fletcher’s Team

It was chicken parmesan, Lucille, not veal, but I (Mary Beth) agree with you that the dinner was delicious, including the surprise birthday cake for Charles Tanner, one of our team members from Bowie Pres. Along with John and Ed Travis, Charles and Margaret Tanner, Fred Hebdon, Barb North, George Buchanan, I am a proud member of Team Tukes, led by our own Fletcher Tukes. We continued the good work begun yesterday with tiling and guess what we will do tomorrow? You guessed it! More tiling. Plus, today Fred and John began trimming the windows and doors, measuring three or four times to be absolutely precise before cutting. All of us (with the exception of Fletcher, who does this for a living) are learning new skills (and discovering new muscles) and having a good time doing so. For example, Ed Travis jumped at the chance to use the tile saw. I am learning to caulk windows, and devoutly hope that not a single drop of rain ever comes into Earlene’s home.

Luling… Work Day 1 

Jerry’s Team

Monday morning and 6:00 a.m. arrived awfully early, but we woke to a beautiful day, we just didn’t know it because it was dark.  Mary Beth and Charlotte got up even earlier to prepare Mary Beth’s special egg casserole.  We were supposed to also have muffins but we won’t go into what happened there.  Our team split up into two vehicles, with Jerry at the helm of Charlotte’s van and Bob driving his rental SUV.  Fortunately Bob’s cousin Dave is an excellent navigator. Unfortunately no one in Charlotte’s van was.  Bob’s SUV made it to our work site in record time.  Then Bob served as tower control to bring Jerry’s van in for a successful landing at Kentucky Street in the Upper 9th Ward.  The area has really seen hard times, but it is encouraging to see that many of the houses are being worked on.  Our baby is a duplex in need of a lot of love and attention.  Thank goodness we’ve got some first string talent in Jerry, Mel, Dave, Don, and Bob.  Then we’ve got the girls with lots of heart and spunk…Lucille, Maxine, Charlotte, and Carol.  Don’t let me under rate the ladies, Carol can hammer and crow bar with the best of them.  Charlotte wielded a pretty mean shovel as we filled up a dumpster and a half with debris.  Maxine and Lucille broke old wooden siding with a frightening gusto.  Mel now refers to Luling as his Louisiana timeshare.  What a great line.  We all put in a full day of really hard work and we are rewarding ourselves by going out to dinner.  Those who read yesterday’s arrival day blog will want to know that yes, Ed Travis was up bright and shining this morning for breakfast.  This writer hasn’t checked on Mary Beth’s nails, and Fletcher will reserve his team evaluation until after he’s had a good dinner.  Look for us tomorrow faithful readers, who knows what will happen next.  Out photos today show our house and how we redid one side of it.  Hooray! We are underway.

Fletchers Team…

Our team included Charles and Marjorie, Ed and John (Travis), George, Mary-beth, Barb North, Fletcher, Rachel (that’s me), and Fred. We found ourselves at Madrid and Painter street- a quiet suburb that was an even mix of abandoned houses, houses that had been gutted, were in the process, and a select few that have been successfully born again so to speak. Our house was a duplex bungalow type house, right on the corner. It has an unfortunate looking front porch- with railings that have been so eaten by rust and water damage that they hardly touch the ground and sway like tall grass under the slightest bit of pressure. The house was, and soon again will be- home to a mother on one side and her daughter on the other. Everyone split up and set to work tiling the floors. On the one side Fletcher and Fred worked tirelessly side by side with their mutual expertise- mixing batches of quick set right on the floor and meticulously laying each tile just so. Barb took charge of the tile cutter outside- a frightening mix of electric power tool and water. Where every other sort of electric tool trembles with fear- this one laughs- throwing both water, smoke, and sparks- all at the same time. With Barb at the helm of the tile cutter- no corner was left un-tiled. On the other half of the duplex George bent down on hands and knees to grout the already lain tile from a previous volunteer group, grouting and scrubbing until his knees couldn’t take anymore. Charles and Marjorie, John and Ed- all worked together to un-tile and re-tile some sadly misshapen tiling jobs, also left behind by a previous volunteer group. After successfully scraping away the concrete like glue they laid the tiles again- this time beautifully. Marybeth (after picking me up from the air port - THANK YOU MARYBETH!!!) ran between the two houses cleaning up behind, around, and out from under everyone making sure that as they worked everything ran smoothly and that nothing was held up because of accumulated mess. As for me- I did a little bit of everything- I helped Marybeth sweep, I helped George clean up grout, I helped Ed lay some tile- and I took lots of pictures to prove everyone was working hard (except me)… and that we took a break for lunch during which we met a sweet, but sadly flea-bitten, stray dog. Whew! And now we’re tired- time for food and sleep!

Luling Fish Camp…Arrival Day!

Eighteen intrepid souls made their way here today.  For some this was the final destination of a several day drive.  Others came together from National, Dulles, and BWI flights in Atlanta.  Our camp host Ken welcomed us with a great dinner of jambalaya,  bean soup, three types of salads and bread.  Food is always a high priority, so I would be remiss if I didn’t mention there were cake and ice cream bars for dessert.

Biggest surprise….mosquitoes!  Somehow we thought they’d be gone by now.  Otherwise the fresh pods were a sight for sore eyes.  Those who came here in the spring, our handcrafted blue GPC sign still looks as fresh as the day we installed it.  We’ve had our orientation and broken up into two work groups captained by Fletcher and Jerry (though we know the real Jerry team leader is Maxine).  

So we’ve been amply fed, sprayed for mosquitoes, and now we’re ready for bed.  We all need our beauty sleep for the work assignments that await us on Painter Street and Kentucky Street.  Tune in tomorrow to find out…will Mary Beth break a nail, will Fletcher be able to whip his team’s raw talent into shape, and will “I don’t get up before noon Ed Travis” make it for breakfast.  All this and more as Luling Part 3 begins to unfold.