Home Sweet Home!

Thanks so much for reading our posts and keeping up on our trip! We arrived home on Saturday night, March 17, about 9 pm. It was a long ride home, but we were still all a little sad to get off the bus and return to the life of classes and work that is our normal, everyday existence. Our trip was truly a success in every way - great friendships built, meaningful work done, and lots of fun had by all. Personally, it was hard work being a cook, grocery shopper, clothes washer, and mom to 24 college students (and a couple adults too!) but it was one of the most rewarding things I have done in a long time!

As I close out my reflections on this year's trip and start looking forward to next year's (that's right, you better clear your Spring Break '08 calendar right now!) I'd just like to say that it seems to me that we are never more fully alive than when we are serving others. As Gandhi said, "The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others" and I guess that makes sense if loving God and lovings others is what we were created to do. My hope and prayer is that whether you were able to travel to New Orleans with us or not, the stories and pictures chronicled in this blog will remind you once again of the great beauty and joy found in fulfilling the call that God extends to each and every one of us to love and serve one another.

Until Next Time,

Rebecca
Posted on March 19, 2007

Fun Pictures

News From the Last Team

Hi friends! Sorry we missed blogging last night, but due to some unexpected bus trouble (easily fixed) and a late night exploring the French Quarter, the blogging had to wait. Today, Taylor and Andrew will be sharing with you about the adventures of our third work team:

Our team started off the week by deciding on a sweet name. "Team Sheetrock Your Mom" consists of Noah, Ben Babcock, Andrew, Taylor, Holly, Glenise, Tim, and Denny. Tim narrowly escaped being tossed in the site dumpster because he forgot his Tyvek flight suit.

Aside from dumpsters and pigeon-baiting, we sheetrocked a house for a woman named Ann. Her house was gutted a year ago after it was flooded to the ceiling, and was just now being restored. Ann and her family had lived in the house for 15 years, and she told us about how God had always provided for them, and how excited she was to redesign the house - she sees every disaster as a possibility for blessing.

When we arrived at the house the plumbing and electrical work had been mostly completed and sheetrock had been started. We had much to do in this one week at hand. As we started working we realized that we would be hanging sheetrock on the ceiling first, but we quickly found that toolboxes and folding chairs would have to take the place of ladders. Two teams out of our group sheetrocked while Glenise and Taylor got started puttying the finished walls and ceilings. Over the course of the week, Ali joined us to take some shots for the Minnesota Daily. By the end of the week, all the sheetrock had been hung and a first coat of putty was well underway for another team to continue.

Yesterday, we worked a half day so we could go on a swamp tour and then to the French Quarter. The swamp tour was amazing: we saw a bazillion alligators which were all named Boudreaux by the tour guide, who also passed around a baby alligator and an alligator snapping turtle, and shot marshmallows to the myriad Boudreaux with a wrist rocket. Afterwards, we stood around while our broken-down bus was fixed. Then, we ventured to the French Quarter and Bourbon Street. Favorite features of the French Quarter were Cafe du Monde and the beignets, which are like puffy clumps of funnel cake with a metric ton of powdered sugar, and the live music pouring out of cafes and clubs into the streets- to which we danced the electric slide... and other people actually joined in. That was pretty much the whole day. Regards, Taylor and Andrew.

Thanks so much for reading our blog - our work is over for this trip and we're just finishing up a celebratory turkey dinner and are getting ready to climb on our bus for at least 24 straight hours. Minnesota here we come!

(posted by Rebecca, Taylor & Andrew on Friday, March 16, 2007)

Pictures of Taylor & Andrew's Team

More From New Orleans

Today was another hard day of work. Listen in as Lindsay and Melinda share a little about their experiences on the roofing team:

The roofing team is currently working on a house owned by an 81 year old retired nurse named Montreal Farve. Her husband bought the house with his GI bill and they have lived there for 54 years. Her son Andre is currently taking care of her in their FEMA trailer due to a recent broken arm, and he has been telling us many stories about his life growing up in that neighborhood. Their home is one of among 80,000 that had at least eight feet of water. Seeing the water lines on the home that we have been working on was a great reminder of the true devastation that this city has endured. It's been eye-opening to hear of their difficulties in recieving aid and the stories of their moment during Katrina's arrival. Their departure got off to a late start because they were waiting to hear the path Katrina would take. They ended up at the Hyatt hotel in downtown New Orleans, which itself took a great beating.

After witnessing several people throughout the community express their gratitude towards our team for all of our work, it has become very clear that these wonderful people down here are a great example of how we should live our lives. After everything that they have been through and everything they have lost, they have maintained the most amazing spirits. We expected to come down and help raise the spirits of the home owners that we were working with, but in fact they have encouraged us through their willingness to move forward and have a positive outlook on life.
While working on the roof we have heard many car horns and thank yous from neighbors and people in the community which has shown us that after almost two years, they appreciate everything that people are doing for them and don't let a single job go unnoticed.

God has granted us safe travels throughout the trip, despite a few mishaps on the bus. Our bus driver Corey has been a very good guide and he has even taken it upon himself to become involved in the teams' work.

Since St. Patrick's Day is upon arrival, the church planned a themed dinner for all of the groups that they are housing this evening, but our late arrival forced us to opt for Papa John's pizza instead. At the end of the evening, everyone was satisfied. During the service work, the Lord has provided great fellowhip opportunities for us to get to know each other and grow in our relationships with each other and God. We have also gotten to know other groups who have taken their spring breaks to come down and serve here as well.

Our roofing team is led by Bennis the Menace who is a professional roofer. Our team is composed of Ben, Melinda, Ross, Devin, Emmy, Zeb, Sarah, Lindsay and Jena. He has successfully led a group of people who have no experience or knowledge as of how to do anything on a roof to de-shingle, and re-roof a house in three days. Many laughs have been shared while getting abused by the sun and are sure to be continued throughout the rest of this trip. Everyone always has a job and is more than willing to get it done with a good attitude. Every bit of work that gets done on the roof is recognized and becomes a great motivator to get this house done for Montreal.

Check back tomorrow for details about our last team and to hear about our adventures touring New Orleans!

(posted by Rebecca, Lindsay, and Melinda on Wednesday, March 14, 2007)

Pictures of Lindsay & Melinda's Team

Our Rebuilding Experiences

Our time here in New Orleans is flying by! We just finished up our second day of work and our teams are doing a great job. I thought you might like to hear a little about what each of our three teams are doing and the homeowners they are working with. Today Amy & Katie are going to tell you a little about their experience drywalling:

We're working on a house in a neighborhood that was hit pretty hard and sustained quite a bit of damage. Our homeowners are Angie and Richard who are engaged, and her 12 year old son Dennis. Before the storm the house was one story with 2 bedrooms and 1 and a half bathrooms. When the storm hit the water reached 8 feet, nearly to the ceiling, and remained at 4 feet for several weeks afterwards. As you can imagine everything inside and outside the house was pretty much destroyed. When they came back after about 4 months they decided to rebuild. Now there is going to be 2 stories with 4 bedrooms and 2 and a half baths. Angie inherited the house 8 years ago from her mother, who had always wanted to expand to 2 stories. The couple has lost $17,000 due to crooked contractors. After the first rain since being re-roofed, the ceiling leaked and ruined the brand-new sheet rock. So here we find ourselves with the privilege to be the drywall crew for these amazing people.

Our team consists of our fearless leader Ben S. who is so good that other team leaders feel they need to call him for further instruction. He is assisted by the peons: Brad, Anja, Erin, Amanda, Nick, Amy, Katie and our bus driver/construction guru, Cory. Our days consist of the installation of insulation, the meticulous science of measuring and cutting, holding slabs of sheet rock above our heads for minutes on end, drilling in screws like there's no tomorrow and visiting the local hardware store to use the bathroom. Our progress is rockin'! With 2 and a half rooms down, the forecast for the rest of the week is looking pretty good. Although talent does make up for the hang-ups, we have encountered faulty framing, a lack of supplies and being too short - well, for some of us... We're having a blast though, and Angie promised to send pictures of the final product.

Today we got to meet Angie's neighbor Miss Janette, and her husband Mr. Roosevelt, who live down the street and graciously lend us the use of their trailer's toilet. They recently moved back into their house and were excited to show off their new floors and counter-tops to us. Miss Janette told us stories of some of the aftermath of the hurricane and showed us pictures of the damage it left behind. We couldn't believe the difference in the before and after, you wouldn't be able to tell it's the same house. Even though the neighborhood as a whole sustained some severe damage, most of the neighbors are planning to come home.

Even though we've only been working for a few days, it's already starting to look like a house again, and we're hoping to finish as much as we can so that Angie and Richard can move in as soon as possible. And with a kickin' team like this it looks very doable. Boo ya!

Check back tomorrow for updates about the other teams!

(posted by Rebecca, Amy & Katie on Tuesday, March 13, 2007)

Amy & Katie's Team Working Hard!

We've Arrived!

We've had a couple long days on the road, but we've finally arrived at Aurora United Methodist Church in New Orleans and are getting settled in! We ended up pulling out from St. Paul about 7:15 Friday night and spend a grueling 16 hours straight on the bus, pulling into Memphis about 11 am on Saturday morning.

Saturday was our day to be tourists, and we listened to some music at the Rock-n-Soul Museum, ate lunch and did a little shopping on Beale Street, spent some time at Graceland and ended up at our favorite BBQ place (a local restaurant we stumbled upon during last year's spring break Katrina trip), where we ate some awesome BBQ ribs, sandwiches, and turkey legs. We were all pretty tired out by that point in time, so we headed to the suburbs to Collierville Presbyterian Church, where an amazing group of people welcomed us to their church and showed us lots of southern hospitality!

After spending the night in the church and convincing a local YMCA to open up to let us shower (we were all pretty smelly by this point in time) we went to church with our new friends at CPC and then hit the road again. Supper was at Sonic, a drive-in restaurant (with the BEST cherry limeades) that many of us Midwesterners had never experienced before. We finally pulled into New Orleans about 9:15 pm and it never felt better to reach our final destination!

Today is our first day on the job site, so check back soon for more details about what our work teams are doing and hopefully even some pictures to prove we are actually working! For now, you can check out the pics below of some of our adventures on the road.

(posted by Rebecca on Monday, March 12, 2007)

Traveling Pictures

Getting Ready to Go

It's almost time! In just 5 short days 28 students and CSF staff will be piling into a coach bus and starting the long drive down to our final destination of Algiers, Louisiana. We're in the midst of a flurry of filling out forms, gathering tools, and packing our bags and we are all so very excited for D-day on Friday (March 9). As we finish our final preparations, we would appreciate your prayers for:

1) safe travel, especially since we are doing a lot of our driving during the middle of the night
2) new friendships to be developed, as many people who are going on this trip don't know each other very well, if at all!
3) our team to bring hope and encouragement to the families that we are able to work with

Check back soon for more updates - we'll do our best to post lots of pictures and stories during our trip!