Move to St. Bernard Parish....

Drew visits NOLA for the first time..on Bourban
Alden, me, Jess, and Julie
Olivier House..where we stayed for the weekend, Americorps discount! $77 a night
Drew and I walking around the Quarter

So last weekend was awesome! We all had a three day weekend, three of my teammates went home, I spent the whole weekend downtown, as did Ben and Drew drove the lone 14 hours all the way from Kansas to visit! On Friday the Blitz houses were finally completed and those 7 were dedicated to the families and handed the keys! Amazing. The last two days were quite rainy, so our groups that were working on the dry-in houses were unable to work since whatever work we had to do required being on ladders or the roof. This past week we have been working in St. Bernard doing siding and adding shingles to the roof. We were switched from New Orleans Habitat to St. Bernard because there is still a ton of work that needs to be completed in this area. There are two teams working in the St. Bernard project and the other 3 or 4 are still with New Orleans finishing up the dry-ins we started last week. My latest house has been in a forest and near a Bayou. Lots of bugs and interesting animals. Big spiders, Hornet nests, Chameleons, bright green and blue dragon flies, green frogs, crickets, grass hoppers, tons of ant hills...you name it. This past week has been like a training week and then next week we are suppose to decided what we want to specialize in and do for the next month. I think I'd like to lead roofing because I really don't mind the height and I kind of think siding can be a big more pain in the butt doing it over and over again. Well there is a little update for you all! My parents are coming to visit today for the weekend! Ciao Ciao!

Jimmy Carter Blitz Week: the 25th year anniversary

Gina! My roomie from CTI
Manny comes to visit!
Leading volunteers building walls preparing for the Blitz houses
Our dry-in during Jimmy Carter's blitz week

Jess, Julie and I...our progress after our first day of Blitz week

So we leave at 5:30 am, arrive at 6, and begin working usually by 7. This week has been busy, but productive. We are now putting OSB on our roof and we have put up sheath along the entire exterior of the walls. I am working with a bunch of guys that know a lot about construction, so we have gotten pretty far: Stephen, Danny (our house leaders) as well as Stephen's roommate, Dave, Nate, Kenny, and Dan. We have had different volunteers working with us everyday including a bunch of frat boys from Canada. Ha...Today was rained out so we couldn't work, hence why I just cleaned my entire area of my bunk and am now blogging. It's nice to have a day off to do these sorts of things though. Back to work tomorrow and then I have a three-day weekend.

HOT, SUN, HAMMERS, LOVE BUGS, SWEAT, AND BLOOD

It really has been awhile since I've written, maybe because work has been stressful! I mean, well we're just all really tired and crabby, and storming a bit. It sure helps working with different people everyday. I mean it feels like my team isn't as close as we were last project, but I think once this Jimmy Carter build is over, things will kick back into gear and be normal. I think it's just the heat and the sun that really has been draining on us all. No lie, I love the work we do, just day by day sometimes things can be slow to get started or the fact that lots of us stand around sometimes and watch the volunteers making sure they're doing things right. Overall, it has been a loooooooong two weeks and thankfully it's Saturday. We have tomorrow off and then we have to be back at work by 6am sharp Monday morning and everyday that week. It will also be cool though because we will get free lunches, dinners...etc and lots of other cool stuff to do after work...i.e. live music, bbq's....etc...Manny has come in for the weekend so that has been great seeing him! We went out for dinner last night, walked down Bourbon together, and caught up. Hopefully I can see him tonight, but frankly I'm just exhausted. I have quite the nice boot tan! This week I have done a number of things from measuring, cutting, and laying down the top and bottom plates of the walls, building walls with volunteers, making partitions for the walls, moving lumber, building stands for air conditioners to rest on, hammering, using cat paws to take out nails, cutting with the circular saw....lots of stuff. I worked a lot with some of Water 2 this past week as well as one of our Americorps Direct people, Mike. One day, I literally measured, cut, nailed, and layed down all the top and bottom plates for one house. I felt pretty productive and busy that day. But that's the way I like it. I hate standing around. This definitely is a lot of word vomit as I like to call it...I'm really rambling...I'll write more later! Drew comes in a week! yaaay!

Leeves
My girls, Nick and Frank

Nick, me, Reg, Nell, Marge, Marah, Adriene
Reg and I
On our way out of the fest
Gettin' down and dirty! "Nasty Girls!"
Salute!

First full week of Habitat, Jazz Fest, and my Chi-town girls!

Habitat NOLA
FEMA...
The girls visit NOLA! Reg, Nell, Marah, Marge and Adriene (Nick's BFF)
Jazz Fest

My home girls!