Work Week 34

 We started with our safety meeting on fire.  Facio then gave the assignments out.  We are working on getting some houses ready for trusses.  Debbie, Deena, and I were given a new job.  Our new job is tacking in the sheer walls.  Mauro, a student of Toby's, came out to help us.  We started on lot 6 Alfredo and Naty's house.  John, Michael, and Paul were given the job of preparing the front porches for pouring.  Brandon and Steve continued on adding the headers to the garages.  Maria, Jackie, Naty, Leticia, Evelyn, Delilah, Robert, Tony, Luisa, Andy, Lupe, Jacob, David, and Patricia continued with the framing.  We have a few more house to frame.  Pat, Alfredo, and Miguel worked on the last walls on lot 6.  Carlos came later and they worked on pluming the walls.   Dave worked on getting the nuts and straps on the houses. Leticia's family and Hailee came out to help frame.

Lot 6 was a very busy house. We were hanging sheer wall, the front porch forms were installed, and the last walls were going up. Both Facio and Toby were around to answer questions.  Boy, did we have a lot of questions.  Facio explained that for our hammering to be productive on the sheer wall, we needed to be in the right position. We were able to get lot 6 finished and most of Deena's garage done. 

Debbie's house inside walls being framed.

Toby helping John and Paul with the front porch on Alfredo and Naty's house.

Deena, Mauro, and I working on sheer wall.

Brandon and Steve working on garage door header.

Inside walls going up in Debbie's house.

John and Paul working on leveling the front porch on lot 6.

Mauro, Toby's student, came out to help us.

Alfredo and Naty's house with sheer wall up.

Header up in Deena's garage and sheer wall going up.

Debbie's house being framed.

Trying to finish up the garage before it is time to stop for the night.

Debbie's house with framing done.  YEAH!

 Sunday morning, we got there earlier and Debbie gave us a tour of her home.  It is so exciting when your walls go up.  We all started with where we left off on Saturday night.  The only changes were Lupe, Jacob, and Patricia came to help us.  After we taught them how to do the sheer wall, we divided into 3 groups.  Doing the sheer wall is very physical.  We did a lot of lifting, adjusting, climbing, carrying, nailing and cutting a 4' X 8' X 3/8" OSB board.  Toby explained to us that we needed to do better job on our layout, so we are cutting less. By the time we finished Deena's house, we know more how to put the sheer wall up and were discussing ways that would speed us up.

 Leticia's house being framed.

 Walls going up.

Jessenya and Leticia waiting to left the walls on their house.

 The frame crew went back to framing more walls. Everyone else headed back to their jobs.

Sheer wall going in on Deena's house.

Sheer wall going up on Lupe's house (lot 8).

more walls ready to be raised soon.

We were blessed again by many volunteers that came out to help us this weekend.  Thank you.

At the end of the day, Toby and Facio had a meeting to discuss our work speed and what is ahead if we don't speed up.  The conclusions of the meeting were: (1) we need to find people that have experience working in the areas we are in right now and in the future and ask them to volunteer, (2) we need to learn our task and work quickly , (3) if you have a question go find one of them, and (4) if we are missing tools we need to get them.

Our friend Tim came out to help us for a few hours on Saturday and was talking with us about how we are doing and managing everything. It is tough some days. Each of the families have their own struggles and challenges. We have to balance our families, our work, our friends, and working 40 hours a week per family on the houses.

I thought I would share more about my family to help you get a better understanding of what this experience for us has been like.  This last eight months has been very hard on our family.  We have given up our weekends and time during the week to work on the homes.  We given up time with our kids and friends. We have had to make tough decisions. I have had to go to work part-time, because John has take a pay cut.  My mom has been in the hospital twice and I could not go to help take care of her. Both our boys have had health issues were they have need to be referred to different doctors.  (They are fine now.) I was diagnosed this past week with nodules (cysts) through out my thyroid.  I see an endocrinologist on Tuesday. No matter what is going on, we still have to come out every weekend to work on the homes. So how are we managing? Deena said it best to Tim on Sunday. By the grace of God we are able to do what we are doing.  We are blesssed to have our family, our friends, and our church that support us. They watch our kids, come out to help us, cook meals for us, and pray for us.

Here are some verses that have helped me this week: 

The Lord, the Psalmist’s Shepherd.

A Psalm of David.

23 The Lord is my shepherd,
I shall not want.
² He makes me lie down in green pastures;
He leads me beside quiet waters.
³ He restores my soul;
He guides me in the paths of righteousness
For His name’s sake.
 4 Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I fear no evil, for You are with me;
Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.
5 You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies;
You have anointed my head with oil;
My cup overflows.
6 Surely goodness and lovingkindness will follow me all the days of my life,
And I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

Philippians 4:4-8

⁴ Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice! ⁵ Let your gentle spirit be known to all men. The Lord is near. ⁶ Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. ⁷ And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

⁸ Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.

Prayer Requests:

1) People with experience will come volunteer to help us.

2) We will learn our tasks and complete the work in a timely fashion.

3) Wisdom to Facio and Toby as they lead and teach our group

4) Health and safety of the families.
5) Tonight is the 1st HOA with all the families.  3 new board members will be appointed tonight. Please be praying that people will want to step and join the board from group 2 and it will be a great time to meet our neighbors.