My trip home

I know it's been way too long since i've posted. I will try to keep up better, it just requires sitting down and taking the time to do it. I've been struggling to get into some sort of routine where I take my own quiet time with God and to do things like type on my blog.
I went home on Wednesday, Nov 23rd. I still had stuff at my house to get out before the closing and Jamie Waugh had also planned to go home from Birmingham, Al for the holiday. Thursday I spent the day helping cook and eating and just relaxing with my family. Friday, mom and I spent from 1:30 to 10 or later cleaning out my house and bringing stuff to her house. Saturday we went to my grandma's house, and Sunday after church and lunch, I began my trip back. It was quite a whirlwind trip, but a good one nonetheless. It was good to spend time with my family and friends, but at the same time, the trip reconfirmed the fact that I know I am supposed to be here in Louisiana and not in Wv.
Friday, when I was in Wv, I talked to Carla, my real estate agent, and she told me that she had forgotten I needed to sign the deed; she said it wasn't something that could be faxed. She called the agency the closing was with, and the woman who answered the phone said I could come in and sign it even though the office was not open that day. The lady said the office had been closed but she decided to come in to get some work done since no one else would be there. At the closing today, Carla said that lady said the phone had rang several times on Friday, but the only call she ended up answering was Carla's, and she said she does not usually have the deed written up until the actual day of closing, but for some reason, she had mine ready that day.
Carla also told me that the girl buying my home said that she had tried to buy another home, but nothing would go through and that it was a terrible experience. She talked about how excited she was to buy my home and that she couldn't believe how easy things went.
These things are just more confirmation to me and hopefully to all who were involved in the process that God's hand guided this process.

Some of my experiences

Friday Nov 11

Today was very rewarding. This morning I was sad to say goodbye to my good friends Mary Ann and Claudia, who began this journey with me a week ago tomorrow. Several work crews arrived here last night, and as the job assignments were being handed out this morning after chapel, I decided I didn't want to go on a truck today. A crew of 6 from the Cookville church of christ in Tennessee was headed out to demuck. I decided to go with them.

We headed to New Orleans and arrived at the home of Barbara. She is a single woman around 64 years whose home had at least 12 inches of water. A canal is situated directly behind her home. She exlained that the mayor of New Orleans ordered the canal workers to evacuate before Katrina; she says that if they had not shut down the canal and had been closer to the city after the storm hit that her neighborhood would not have flooded.

Barbara's home had already had some carpet and other things removed and piled on the curb in front of her home. She told us that she had a stroke last week, but did not have any side effects now. She was not suppose to help us as we worked, but she probably did not sit down for 10 minutes the whole 8 or nine hours we were there. We tore out all of the sheet rock halfway up the walls, tore up all the tile that had been under the carpet, we also had to pull out her kitchen cabinets and removed every item that she had in her garage to pull out the sheetrock in there as well. I think I must have removed 200 nails today!

Today was definitely the most tiring day so far, but also the most rewarding. Barbara blessed us with her kindness, and she was so very thankful for what we did. She wants me to send her the pictures of her home that we took. She gave us all mardis gras beeds as a thank you before we left. I pray that she felt and saw Jesus in out labor today.

I would also like to say I had a great time with the group from Cookville; they made me feel like part of their group and invited me to work with them again tomorrow.

God Bless

Wednesday, Nov 9

Wednesday began after breakfast and devo, by heading out to 3 different schools to deliver school supplies and other items. I made a contact with one of the teachers at the elementary school. She said she and her family were living at their church; she has a six and twelve year old. She said they have a hard time saying goodbye at the end of each week when different volunteers leave. She told me the bottom floor of their home was flooded, but the rest of the home was ok. They plan to live in the upstairs soon, as they begin to rebuild the downstairs.

When i returned back to the church, I went out on a scouting mission to pick up generators the church had loaned out, and we went to several homes that had requested help, some as long as a month ago. Tammany Oaks has been so short on volunteers, they have not been able to get out to the git r done jobs. One home we visited had a tarped roof, and had a soggy and sagging floor in the back of her home. Her home had been added onto about 6 or 7 yrs ago, and this complicated the damage to the floor from the strong winds. We really can't do anything to assist her except retarping her roof if necessary.

Another home we visited was in a very devastated area in New Orleans. There was no electricity, and the neigborhood had been flooded horribly. It is located with bodies of water on either side. Cars were all over the place, debris that had been cleaned out of the homes was piled everywhere. It was tedious finding the specific home we were looking for because there were no lights and most homes no longer had mailboxes. A note had been left in their door from the government, stating they had the right to enter their home and remove anything that was a threat to the area. This again was a home that was not within the scope of what we do as volunteers. The national guard stopped us and said the curfew was 8pm in that area.

Tammany Oaks is supposed to get around 100 volunteers this weekend. We have only had 12 all week. This will be quite a change.

Please pray about coming to volunteer. There is so much to be done and we need more bodies to get these things accomplished.
God Bless.

School Experience

Today we took 2 Penske trucks to Bay St. Louis, Mississippi to deliver supplies to two schools. We first delivered to the highschool. As we drove towards the school, i noticed some workers to my right, and i also noticed a sign that said church of christ relief workers. Just past this was a van that said Kanawha City church of christ! I couldn't believe they were here.
I began looking back at the workers outside and i noticed Debbie Derenberger's red hair. It was awesome how God allowed us to run into them at the right time.

After delivering to the high school, we went to the elementary school a few miles away. Both schools we delivered to were badly damaged and many classes were being held in portable classrooms that Fema had set up. Hundereds of desks and chairs were stacked outside of the schools. The teachers watched as we unloaded the trucks and were soooo thankful to us for bringing the things we did. They said this was the best delivery they had recieved so far and that the school and the children desperately needed them. I spoke with two second graders while they were eating their lunches. One said that his home had no 'water or mud," but his roof was damaged. The other said he was living in a camper because his home was flooded. A teacher said she was living in a trailer at her mother's because she had lived right along the beach.

The devastation in this part of Ms was some of the worst I have seen. Every business and home I saw was almost or completely destroyed. Please pray for this area.

God Bless!

my journey begins

So i am so excited to finally have a blog! It was very simple to set up, with the help of a good friend. Maryann, Claudia, and myself left Huntington, Wv on Nov 5th at 7:15am. We arrived in Birmingham, Al around 6 or 7 after getting turned around for a little while. We dropped some of my belongings off at Craig and Jennifer Kelley's and headed back down the road a few more hours. We stayed in a hotel about 3 hours from Mandeville, La.
We arrived here at Tammany Oaks Church of Christ around 10:45 am, just a few minutes after church services began.

We spent a leisure day eating out after church and then visiting a family that i helped in the Orleans Parish. We left backpacks for the kids and gave them food and toiletry boxes. We then began driving looking for people to give the rest of our food boxes to. There were some ladies on the street talking and the driver of my van rolled down the window and asked if they needed anything. One lady said she just got back into town and didn't have anything. We got out and this opened up doors for us to talk to several people on the street that were affected by the storms.
Later we walked around the city of New Orleans and visited a cafe called Cafe du Monde. We had coffee(even though i don' t like coffee) and beignets, which are kind like fat small funnel cakes with lots of powdered sugar. They were wonderful.

Several Indiana volunteers that were with us had their volunteer shirts on which brought several opportunities for conversations with new found friends at the cafe. One lady in particular shared with me that she is a counselor at a nereby school where she knows of a 16 year old girl who is living in a moldy house with her parents who are deaf, and a father who is disabled. We took down her info and hope to get to them soon.

God is good and I am so excited to be back in La to see what He would have me do!