Branson Update Feb.

The project here in Branson is moving along. The curved front platform is now complete. Took a lot of time an work,  especially the two steps along the front but I think it turned out pretty nice.

We’ve also insulated some of the interior walls.

The steps to the back door were poured.

Now the ceiling and exterior walls are being insulated with spray foam.

This job is going to take four days and then we will be ready to trim the excess foam on the walls and start the drywall.

We couldn’t be in the building while they spraying so yesterday we took a daytrip to Eureka Springs, AR. Enjoyed seeing some of the old houses and other sites. Visited the of Christ of the Ozarks statue.

Also one Saturday we went to the Top of the Rock and toured the grounds and spent a couple of hours in the Ancient Ozark Natural History Museum. One of the best displays I’ve seen. Its displays cover everything from Ancient History right up through the Civil War. Could spend all day there and not cover it all.

One day I got a call from the Pastor of Celebrate Church in Rogers, AR, a church that we helped build in 2013. He was in Springfield, Mo and had seen on Facebook that we were working in Branson and wanted to drop by. He came by the church were we were working and got the grand tour. It was a joy to see him and his wife. We really enjoyed the project there.

Pastor Phil Haste

Not a whole lot of things to do in Branson during January and February as a lot of things close down. That not only includes the shows but some stores and many restaurants.

Well that about covers it for now. Still a lot of work to do but the building is progressing great. There is one major problem and that is with the water department. It’s been one thing after another for the past several months and there is still no agreement on getting water to the church. Please pray that this gets ironed out in the near future.

Please feel free to leave a comment or ask a question. I’ll try to respond with a comment of my own or in my net update.

Until next time God Bless

 

Branson update

I guess it’s time I make an update from here in Branson. Marge and I spent Christmas here in Branson alone. We skyped with some of our kids and grandkids and phone calls with the others. The other couples had either moved on or went away for the Holidays.

As we were here alone the week after Christmas not as much got done on the building. I did have help from one of the men from the church most days and we did accomplish a few things. After New Years two of the couples that were here came back and we got some more of the framing done but then the weather turned cold and we didn’t work several days. Even some of the days we worked it was quite cold as you can tell from our dress while on break. This is where we take break and eat lunch.

Our little break room

Rooms on either side of platform framed all the way to roof.

Framing Soffit

Soffit framing done.

Marge was my helper one day.

Starting to frame sound booth

Sound booth framing

There were a lot of other various little thing that we’ve got done including putting in four outside doors.

Some items are being contracted out. The rough in plumbing has been completed. The electrical rough in should be finished this week. The HVAC in underway. The windows are all in.

We will begin framing the platform this week as we were waiting until the electrical rough in was done in the ceiling.

The weather has been up and down. last weekend it got down to 6 degrees overnight and wind chill below zero, then by Wednesday it was in the 70’s. Now it’s in the low 30’s and raining. At least we’re not getting ice like it is a little north of here. We’ve done quite well keeping warm and comfortable in our RV. We did have one problem. I forget about the water filter I added in the back of the refrigerator and it froze and cracked. When it thawed our it let water ran on the floor and got some of the carpet a wet.

We have had a couple of game nights and had the Pastor over for dinner one night.

Game night

Thing are progressing well and it won’t be long before the insulation goes in followed by drywall.

Still a lot to be done so we will be busy over the next several week. Continue to pray for us as we work for not only our safety but that the weather will allow us to work.

Until next time God Bless

 

Merry Christmas from Branson

Here it is almost Christmas. My how how time flies. We are still working on a new church build in Branson, Mo. Even though it is not as warm here as we would like we feel that this is where we are supposed to spend our winter. Last nights temps were down near zero with wind chill well below that but we managed to keep warm and did not have any problems with the RV freezing up. We also had a little lite snow, just enough to cover the ground Hope this is the coldest we will experience all winter but at least I know we can keep cozy in our RV.

We are working on the inside framing while the company doing the building completed the outside. They finished up the outside this week and the building is now closed in except for windows and doors. This is how the building looked when we got here and how it looks now.

We’ve completed most of the interior framing of the classrooms, offices, restrooms, kitchen, and storage room and now we are working on the sanctuary. Hopefully by the end of the year we will have completed framing all of the rooms. As it is almost Christmas some of the RVers have left for the holidays and another couple leaves this week so not too much help the next couple of weeks. We do have a couple of guys from the church that have helped on their days off and hopefully they will be able to help a couple of day the net two weeks.

There hasn’t been a lot on the job for the women to do but they have been busy fixing a hot lunches and delivering it to the site. Since it’s been cool (or should I say cold) a hot meal helps warm up up. Also the church has provided lunches.

The church gave hats and scarves to every kid in one of the grade school in a poorer area near here. All of the hat were made by the women of the church and they needed a lot more scarves so the women have been busy making scarves. Marge has crocheted about 20 scarves that were given to the kids.

We’ve also had some time to take in some of the sites around Branson. Christmas in Branson is a big deal and begins around November 1st. We have been to see the Christmas show at Dixie Stampede and see Moses at the Site and Sound Theater. Both were very good show. We also went to Silver Dollar City to see all the decorations two shows, “It’s a Wounderful Life” and “Scrooge”. They really do it up right with the decorations. This is just a few, and I do mean few, of the lights.

While there Marge sat on Santa’s lap and we found some mistletoe.

As you can see from the pictures it was quite cold that night.

One Saturday we got a guided tour the campus of College of the Ozarks bu one of the former professors. It’s called “Hard Work U“. Students are required to work in one of the many programs the school has and that along with scholarships and grants all students graduate debt free. This is a picture of their Chapel outside and inside.

They also have a replica of the Vietnam Memorial Wall.

There are many other things to see and if you ever visit Branson visiting this college campus is something worth doing.

One weekend my youngest sister and her family came up to Branson and while here they met us for breakfast. For some reason I didn’t get any pictures but we enjoyed our visit and I hadn’t seen some of her family for several years.

The following picture is for all of our friends from the Chicago area. This is the old Ferris Wheel that used to be on Navy Pier. It is now an attraction on the strip in Branson.

One more Week until Christmas Day when we celebrate the birth of our Savior Jesus Christ. Let not forget that real reason and share it with our friends and family.

Merry Christmas to everyone who has read this far. Until next time God Bless.

Branson

Here we are in the hill of Southern Missouri and I do mean hills. It’s been 4 weeks since we came. We are staying at a Jellystone campground in Forsyth which is about 12 miles East of Branson.  The first couple of weeks there wasn’t much to do as the metal building was not to the point where we could do anything inside. There were a couple of problems which further delayed getting the roof on the building. We were about to spend a few day building a shed where we could store our tools and have them locked up at the site. We also spent one day in Springfield at the old Central Bible College campus do some clean up for the campus to be sold.

The roof finally got on the building and we began framing some of the internal walls. Since there weren’t any exterior walls all we could do is build them and wait for the outside walls to be framed in. The outside wall finally got framed in and we were able to start putting up the wall we had built and several more.

Sheeting went on the outside of the building and this is what the building looked like by the end of the day Wednesday.

The sofits have to be framed in and the siding will go on. A company is doing the outside of the building we are doing the inside.

We’ve only worked on the building for 8 days and there will be months more of work to finish the inside.

We’ve also had time to take in some of the sites around Branson. We’ve had the opportunity to attend a couple of shows. We went to see the China Acrobats

and the Presley’s show.

Also one day we went to Dogwood Canyon.

One night after church we went to Shepard of The Hills to take a trolley ride to see all the Christmas decorations. Couldn’t get many pictures but the ride lasted over an hour. In Branson Christmas starts in early November.

For Thanksgiving we went with one of the other couples to Branson Landing and had a traditional Thanksgiving dinner on the Landing Princess as we traveled up and down the lake. The meal was good, the company was good, and the scenery was good. Turned into a bright sunny day after a cloudy morning.

For those of you who made it this far thanks for stopping by. Until next time God Bless and I pray that you had a Great Thanksgiving and took time to be thankful for all the blessings of the past year.

Sedalia, Mo.

As I said in my last post that we were going to Sedalia, MO. for a couple of weeks. Well it turned out to be a little longer but we got a lot accomplished. The project was to make some changes to the platform and the rear wall of the auditorium. We got there on a Friday, Saturday we went for a quick overlook of the project, got the plans, and on Monday we started. This is what the platform looked like before we started and the team we had along with the Pastor.

The first things was to start the demolition. The back wall of the platform and baptistry was removed. Marge and the women helped by cleaning up.

then we started building back in. Where the wall was removed the platform was built back in and a little over four feet added to the front.

Corner walls were added at the back of the platform and this is what it looked like after that was done.

Another part of the project was to extend the rear wall of the auditorium all the way to the roof.

Some of the ceiling tile had to be removed and the wall extended all the way to the underside of the roof. On the left side was the stairway that had to go all the way up. The was was insulated and the hall side had to have double drywall. As the lift wouldn’t go into the stairway a scaffold had to be build so we can get up there to add the drywall and tape.

Marge cleaning up some of our mess on the stairway.

At the top of the stairs the hall was closed in and the to make a closet. These are some of the finished pictures as it looked when we left after 3 weeks.

The platform was carpeted when we left and the front walls painted.

We got this picture after we left and the auditorium was carpeted.

We have now moved to a another project in Branson, Mo. It has been delayed a little so we haven’t done much this week. We are staying at a Jellystone campground in Forsyth, Mo. The park is supposedly closed but will stay open all winter but no one is in the office and everything is closed. This is our site.This is where we will be working.

That’s all for now so until next time God Bless. Please feel free to leave a comment or ask a question.

I’m Back

No, We didn’t get lost I just found it hard to keep writing. A lot has happened since the last post.

We left Eagle Lake Florida the end of March and headed over to Hudson, Fl to have some of our dual pane windows repaired. After spending most of the week there we left and went to Holt, Fl to visit some friends and spend Easter with them. From there we started our trip north to Wisconsin to do some work on a rental house one of our sons had that they were trying to sell. Along the way we stopped by another one of our son and visited his family for a few day. Early April is not the warmest time to be going to Waukesha, WI. We parked in their drive way and drove to the house every day. While there we remodeled the bathroom, installed new counters in the kitchen, installed a laminate flooring throughout the first floor, and painted the entire house inside.

In early May we left Wisconsin and Went to The King’s Camp near Chana, IL. This is the park were we spend some of our summer time. While there I help with the mowing and help around the camp. Our son from Moldova came back to the states for a visit the end of June. We took them to the Airport to fly out on July 5^th and then on July 6 we went to Sartell, MN to work at a rather large church addition. A lot was accomplished during our time there and we had a great time with the other RV Volunteers who were there also. These are just a few of the pictures from there.

Bar Joist being installed

Bar Joist all installed

Rubber roof down on one roof

rubber covered with rock

Some of the framing inside.

More of the framing

We left MN in late August and went back to King’s Camp for Labor Day and also we both had Dr. appointments to attend too.

The end of Sept. the Royal Ranger Fall Roundup was held at the camp which we helped with and then on Monday after that we hooked up and headed south to Lake Williamson Christian Center in Carlinville, IL and the MAPS RV Volunteer Convention. We came a few days early just to relax and have some time to visit.

Fish fry that we had the week before Convention started.

Convention service

My sister and her husband came one day to visit and took us out for lunch. We had a great visit. Plan to see her again this fall while working at a project in southern Missouri. As usual I forgot to take any pictures.

Convention has now come to an end. What a great time, lot of fun, great services, classes, and seeing old friends and making new ones. We have now moved on to a project in Sedalia, MO which we will start on Monday. This is a small remodel project and we only plan to be here a couple of week.

I’ll try to not wait so long before checking in again so until next time God Bless!

Eagle Lake, FL

Well, here four weeks have passed since I posted anything.  Not a lot to report other than painting, painting, and more painting. We did finish painting the outside of both the church and the school building  then we began painting the inside.

So far all the hallways have been painted and many of the rooms. There is still more to go.  So far we have used more than 250 gallons of paint.

Also done many miscellaneous maintenance items from patching tile, repairing walls, replacing ceiling tile, repairing roof leaks and many others.

One of the bigger projects was remodeling the women’s restroom to update it and make it Handicap accessible. First it was completely gutted and then the rebuilding began.

We’re not quite finished but it was close enough to be usable on Sunday.

We attended the Southeastern MAPS RV convention in Plant City, Fl the first weekend of February. Enjoyed our time there and visiting with friends we have worked with at various projects.

Seems that we are always eating. I guess that one thing that RV Volunteers seem to always do. Once a month the church has a connection night where they have to Gym set up for volleyball, have a meal and a devotion. Also they had a Valentines dinner.

Also once a week we all go out together for dinner.

This is a picture I took one evening of the sun set across the street from the church. Not the best sun set picture but I like the picture of the three crosses. On the left side of the picture you can see just a little sliver of Eagle Lake.

The weather here has been up and down but the last week have been almost perfect. Temperatures in the mid 70’s and mostly sunny.  Expecting rain and a little cool down in a couple of days but then warms back up next week. We have one more month here and then we will be leaving. We’re going to get some of our windows repaired and them around the first of April we will begin our journey back north. We still have a lot of work to be done here so we will keep busy.

Thanks for stopping by. Hopefully it won’t be so long before my next post so until next time. God Bless

 

Eagle Lake

 

My how time flies. We left Cincinnati the morning of Jan 1 and took three day to drive to our next project in Eagle Lake, Fl. The project here is to perform some much needed maintenance on the church building.  The building is a rather large building built in 1975 which at one time also had a school. The church had once been a church of several hundred but had dwindled to were there were only about 25 people attending. The building was neglected maintenance wise is outdated. A church in a neighboring town needed more room so the two churches combined.

That’s a brief description of where we enter the picture. There are 4 couples with us and another one coming in a couple of days. We have been here three weeks and have been very busy.

First thing we did was began power washing the entire building.

After power washing and some other repairs painting began.

This is a picture of the front of the church before we began painting and after most of the painting is done.

Before

After

This is just the front of the church and the school building is behind the church. There is still more painting to be done and a lot of touch up.

We’ve also done some other work on the inside fixing up a couple of rooms. One of the rooms was this room which was painted purple. They wanted it turned into a nice room for a hospitality suite.

It was primed to cover the purple a set of French doors installed, nice trim added and now it looks like this.

Still a lot to be done over the next several weeks that we will be here.

This is where we will be spending the next couple of months in our little campground behind the church.

As with most of the projects we are working hard but really enjoying the wonderful people we are working with and the people in the church.  Also the weather here is a lot better than what others are experiencing up north. Thanks for following us in our travels and for praying for us as we continue or work for the Lord.

Until next time God Bless.

 

 

 

New Years 2016

I know the last time I updated our journal we were headed north. We went north for a Dr. appointment to have a followup test done. Thankfully everything looked good and nothing more is required.  Since we were there we spent Christmas Eve with our son in Sycamore and then Christmas day we all headed north to Waukesha, WI to visit another one of our sons and his family and have Christmas again.

We returned back to Sycamore on Sunday evening only to wake up Monday morning to freezing rain and sleet. By Monday night we had about 3 inches of sloppy wet slush on everything including our RV. Since we were planing to leave on Tuesday morning I had to scrape the slush off the slideouts before it froze. If I didn’t get it off it might have been spring before it all melted.

We did get out Tuesday morning and headed toward Cincinnati, OH. It is a little warmer here but not enough that after two days the ice is still melting off the truck and RV.

We came here to Cincinnati to see another one of our sons and his family but really to see the newest member of his family who was born the morning of Saturday, Dec. 26th.

This was the best Christmas present we got this year.

Here it is New Years Eve 2015, Marge and I are sitting here in our RV in a RV park in Cincinnati, OH. enjoying a quite evening alone. As I look back over 2015 we have a had a blessed year and I’m looking forward to what God has in store for us in 2016. Tomorrow morning we begin the trip south to Florida for our next project.

I pray that each of our friends and family have a Blessed 2016.

 

Leaving Richland

We got a little break over Thanksgiving weekend. It started to rain on Thanksgiving night and continues to rain for the next four day.  The rest of the team all went home for the holiday but since we are fulltimers our RV is our home so we stayed here and enjoyed our time off. Marge used the time to bake cookies, work on a quilt, and we worked a puzzle

The missing piece was found after the picture.

Back to work we had a lot to do and since the church was paying for the crane and operator we wanted to make as much progress as we could so we worked some longer days and we worked on Saturday.  We were also hampered by all the mud from the days of rain. First thing to do was get the remaining panels on the back wall up. These needed to be completed before the roof panels could go on.

Panels on rear of building going up.

Last panel on rear of building.

Rear wall complete.

That last panel gave us a lot of trouble getting it fitted into place but we were really glad when it went into place.

On to the roof panels of which there were 30 panels which were 8 ft. wide and almost 22 ft. long and 8 ins. thick. They don’t just lay there they fit together with splines and are screwed down with 12″screws and nailed every 6″ along the splines.

Took about a week to get all the roof panels in and on Tuesday of our last week the last panel went up.

Last roof panel going up

Last panel in place and screwed down

We still had some soffet to put on, cover the uper roof with felt paper,  house wrap to put on and 20 windows to installed.

This is how the building looked on Friday

We were scheduled to leave this project on Saturday Dec. 12th and this is how it looked when we left. The building is closed in and now work can be done on the inside over the winter.

This was the team that was there on that last Friday along with the pastor and his wife.

Even with all the work we’ve really enjoyed our time here and the great people that we’ve worked with. Before we came we didn’t know any of this group and now they have become good friends.  Friday evening we said our goodbyes and Saturday morning we hooked up and headed to northern Illinois. I know that’s the wrong direction for this time of year, but I have a Dr. apointment next Monday so here we are in northern Illinois parked at our son’s house.  This will be the first time since we started traveling that we will be with any of our family for Christmas. Some time after Christmas we will be heading to Florida for a winter project.

We pray that everyone has a Blessed Christmas and a Happy New Year. Until next time God Bless.