Hammers 4 NOLA: College Breaks

First and foremost:

Happy 23rd Birthday to my sister, Deonna! (Dec. 14)
Happy 29th (*wink*) to Becky (past vol) (Dec. 15)
Happy 13th Birthday to Miss Yolanda's son, Justin! (Dec. 15)

It's been QUITE the busy week!

We had 2 awesome crews at the site. 1/2 of them were from Olivet College in Michigan, and the other 1/2 were from Lindsay Wilson College in Kentucky.

Luanne, SBP Siding Queen, worked at my site all week, with a crew of 9-11 peeps. Unfortunately I hardly got to know any of them, though, obviously (cuz they're volunteeeeering!) they're cool. The siding on the house is nearly complete - just the front of the house and the upper 4" or so around the entire house needs a little work. Looks beautiful, thanks to Shauna, Justin, Marcie, Amber, Rafael, J.R., Austin, Jessica, and Shameka! :)

Shauna, Justin, and Marcie work on siding the house

I had somewhere between 4-6 volunteers inside the house with me all week. Hannah & Betsy spent a lot of time tiling the boys' shower, while Cristin & Alison were painting or working on tiling Miss Yolanda's shower. Lauren & Kyle had different jobs throughout the week, including laying hardee board in the girls' bathroom, helping me texture the walls, paint trim, cut out windowsills, and lay baseboards. Rafael helped us out on Thursday & Friday to tile a bathroom while Hannah & Betsy were pulled to another site to help finish a house by tiling their bathroom too (they were tile'd out by the end of the week!).

Hannah & Betsy tile the shower

Kyle, Lauren, Alison, and Cristin working on tiling the bathroom shower and laying hardee board to tile the floor.

Monday I broke the news to everyone that they would be meeting New Orleans Saints Football Player, Roman Harper, on our site Tuesday afternoon. Of course, everyone being from out-of-state, we all had to do a little bit of statistics research on Mr. Harper, and the girls made sure to look up his photos (we approve!).

Tuesday was a little crazy. We had nola Saints TV crews, the Times-Picayune newspaper, Miss Yolanda's friends & family, SBP reps, United Way representatives, and random neighbors begin trickling on site around 3pm. It's a little unnerving to be using a skilsaw with someone 1 ft from your face...but Kyle & Lauren still cut out some great pieces of hardee board for the floors! They all worked later than normal so that the documentary dudes could get video of them tiling, placing siding, and painting.

TV crews, Newspapers, SBP people, United Way Representatives, and Miss Yolandas Friends & Family come to meet Roman Harper, funder of Miss Yolanda's home rebuild

New Orleans Saint Football player, Roman Harper, & Miss Yolanda & family

Roman is a GREAT guy. Super down to earth, easy to talk to, smiley, and has his heart in the right place...not to mention he is a fantastic football player. He and his teammates are providing the funding to rebuild the homes of 3 different families this year with their "Hope for the Holidays" campaign run through the United Way. Janiel, Miss Yolanda's 8-yr-old daughter, gravitated to Harper and took charge of the whole night, showing him around and explaining to him that she wants a pink & purple room with a "justin beiber" & princesses theme.

Janiel helped get her room ready on saturday!

The volunteer crew stayed at the house til 6:00, a big thing to ask when you figure they arrive on site at 8:30 and on a typical day are gone by 4:30. Thanks guys for making that night a success!

Thursday the house transformed. The electrician crew came in - Elijah, Zack, & Sarah... and Wow!!! The light switches, outlets, lights, and ceiling fans were all installed... *sigh* so happy :)

Electrician Sarah hangin' Miss Yolanda's pretty fans! Thanks to Elijah & Zack too!

Friday was a half day (and the final day) for the Michiganians. Which left Friday afternoon and Saturday morning a little quieter than the rest of the week. On Saturday, Lauren made a beautiful "Saints" wreath to hang on their door. Lauren left before Miss Yolanda got to see it... which made Miss Y so sad! She loved the wreath Lauren, awesome job!

Lauren & the wreath she made for the family!

We were blessed to have Kelsey arrive on site Saturday morning as well, and was joined in the afternoon by Clark ( a past vol that helped on Mary's house!). The two of them worked diligently at laying our baseboard, and pointed out plenty of places where the walls and the floors are simply & sadly not the straightest in the world. Nothing that we can't deal with, but adding baseboard really opens your eyes to those sorts of things! Kelsey is originally from Wisconsin & moved to New Orleans about a month ago - she's super cool and hopefully she'll be back many days to come. Clark is a project manager for a construction company, and has lots of knowledge with building, and a great heart to be coming out and volunteering with SBP on his days off! He and I semi-shook-hands on him coming out one day for every house that I work on (2 down!).

Kelsey & Clark come by on Saturday to help out!

So... I told you guys long ago that the goal is to finish by Christmas. Well, I STILL haven't given up! ...but, things are really gonna have to go super smoothly with flooring, and I'll need a decent number of volunteers (which i'm expecting 10 tomorrow- yay!). Unfortunately (though i'm very excited) i'll be leaving to go home on Thursday afternoon and won't return to the house til the 29th. The office officially set our goal date as Dec. 31st. The vols have worked fantastically together, you all have gotten a TON done, and the office has done a great job stackin' me with lots of eager volunteers. Unfortunately, we did have 2 days of zero volunteers, and another week with very low numbers, which makes it difficult to try and hit goals like these...

...Which is a perfect segway to saying "Please come back & volunteer with us again! We can't do this without you! Tell your friends, get a group together, come get stuff done!!!"

Listening to Christmas tunes as I type. Happy Holidays to you all :)