The first three days of last week, Jonathan put our house on hold and we drove in to Mission, SD, to help the crew of youth from Indiana who had come to paint the chapel and build a handicap ramp.
By the time they left Friday, the ramp was up, although still needing rails. Not only will this enable handicapped folk to have a way to get into the church (which has several steep steps to climb to enter) but it will make a way for caskets to be brought in so that funerals can be held here.
Getting ready for work Monday morning. The young people are taping plastic over church windows, and Jonathan and team leader Mr. Canterbury are figuring out the first things to do to start the ramp.
Jonathan directing Danny how to cut straight at ends of boards for the ramp.
Nearly all morning, the crew filled in time while waiting for someone to bring a skid steer and auger.
Pres. Keith Lavery, who is also fire chief, was out on a call for a terrible accident that we passed on the way in,
and then on the heels of that was promptly called to a fire! A baler had caught fire in the field, and the first thing that had to be done was to get the grass fire out before it spread before putting out the fire on the baler.
Another fire happened later, on a second property owned by the same person. Arson was suspected.
The auger finally arrived, and Jonathan dug the holes while Danny tried to clean the dirt from the bottom with a shovel. This did not work completely, and Jonathan ended up literally vacuuming dirt out of the bottom of the 4 or 5 foot holes for the ramp posts. You have to dig deep, past where frost might affect the posts for the ramp.
Meanwhile, Keith had a local native boy digging up a bad piece of sidewalk, so that when we poured concrete for the ramp posts, we could replace that bad section.
Indoors, girls on the team helped Alanna stuff SIM newsletters.
How we appreciate a team of young people willing to come help, even through the misery of many hot afternoons!
No comments:
Post a Comment