Monday, June 13, 2005

Please scroll down to view photos from today!

Today we worked on the house most of the day.   We met June, the woman who owns the house today, and learned more about her and the story behind what happened to her and the house.  Briefly, in the hurricane a huge tree fell on June’s house and did extensive damage to her roof.  Then for weeks she and her adult son were unable to get anyone to remove the tree from the top of their home, and so were unable to get a tarp on it to protect their home and belongings.  During that time the rains continued to come in and ruin her house and possessions.   It has now been more than 10 months since Hurricane Ivan, and still rain comes into her home.

Unfortunately, her son Rodney (age 50) died suddenly and unexpectedly this past March.  His only son (Josh) is stationed in Iraq in the National Guard.  We have all been talking to June a lot and this is obviously a time a great grief and stress in her life; please join us in keeping her in our prayers.

I think the kids descended on the house like a “youth hurricane,” except that they were the opposite of a hurricane; they did an amazing amount of cleanup in and around the house.  Besides getting all kinds of stuff out of the way, ripping up floors and walls, with Brent’s expertise we were able to build a new ceiling and rafters for the new portion of the roof.  We filled a huge dumpster by noon and created two big burn piles too; now we are halfway through filling a new dumpster.  We had lunch in Citronelle at the United Methodist Church, and we had supper back in Mobile at the Lutheran Church where we are staying.  Then we went to the YMCA for showers and a brief swim, and back to “hit the hay!”