RVing With a Purpose

Sunday, October 13, 2019

After three weeks we finally adjusted to the nightly trains and Anne slept right through all the commotion Thursday (our last night) night. It was probably because she was so tired. Anyway, we were up by 6:30 Friday morning so we go begin saying good bye to our team. First on the road at 7:00 was Hilary and Michael. They were headed home and had a long drive through what could be some bad weather. Suzanne was next out about 8:00 and then it was Jenny and Tom who changed their travel plans because of the early snow storms coming across Colorado. Bruce and Jackie left a short time later. We left next headed south, leaving Reid doing some work and cleaning on his RV before his short drive back home. We really enjoyed working with this team and are praying for safe travels for them all and all the other NOMADS traveling this weekend.

We saw some really nice fall color on the drive from Sebewaing to I-75 in Saginaw. Much prettier than the foliage a few miles north where we were working.

We drove about 4 hours to a rest area on I-75 near Bowling Green, Ohio,  Friday afternoon. It was a fairly large rest area next to a busy interstate but we still slept pretty well. Saturday we drove 9 hours and made is just inside the Alabama state line and spent the night at the welcome center. It was a very quiet and restful night before we drove on home this morning. This afternoon we have been opening up our and Aunt Helen’s house and getting organized again. Tomorrow morning we will be at the nursing home checking on the ladies. We will be very busy during our time at home the next few weeks. Hope you all had a great weekend.

Thursday, October 10, 2019

We finished the Sebewaing project with another day of glorious weather. Perfect for working outside, and we had a lot of outside work today.

Reid started our day with devotion. He shared an excerpt from “This Far By Faith” by Faith Fowler an intercity Detroit pastor. Through her leadership, impoverished urban areas are being transformed. Reid has been involved in building some tiny homes for the homeless as part of the ministry there.

Today we all worked very hard to get as much done as possible for Bay Shore Camp. We have all grown to love the staff here and appreciate their passion for ministry. There are so many young people who come to summer camps and have their first introduction to a life with Christ while here. It is joy to be a small part of this ministry. We are blessed to be a blessing.

So how was our little cottage at the end of our last day in this beautiful place? The siding on both side walls is complete. The siding on the front of the cottage is complete (except the little bit at the peak) and we even got the French door lock installed today. The siding on the back is complete to the level of the special trim for the eave. Max and Tom and Hilary got that area ready and David, the facilities manager, plans to have some of his guys complete that area soon. Inside, the bedroom is painted. The walls need a second coat of paint but the room looks good. The living room and kitchen walls have been primed. The bathroom drywall has been completed and needs a final light sanding and then primer and paint. The cottage is not complete but the camp is very pleased with the amount of work we completed. They feel that with all we have done, they can finish it up themselves. We will be anxiously awaiting pictures of the completed project.

The team went out to dinner tonight at the Lamplighter and Jeff and his wife Cindy joined us. It was another wonderful time of fellowship and sharing. We said our goodbyes and thank yous to Jeff and Cindy and hope we can return here sometime to work with them again. We will wait and say our goodbyes to the team tomorrow. Put it off as long as possible. This has been a wonderful team. Tomorrow we all head back south.

Wednesday, October 9, 2019

We are still loving our weather. For all the rain and yuck we had last week, we are having beautiful skies and temperatures this week. Jackets in the morning and t-shirts in the afternoon. Great!

Jenny and Tom shared with us during our devotional time. We all talked about what all of us thought we would be doing in retirement and how we ended up in NOMADS. How God brought us all to this place. We all have different backgrounds and experiences but Jesus brought us here to be His hands and feet and He is here with us.

We were all anxious to get started today. Tom and Reid and Suzanne returned to the inside work sanding drywall, and cleaning up from sanding drywall. Later in the day Jackie joined in and worked on priming the living room and kitchen. She got everything cut in today. Otherwise everyone was outside working on siding. The outside is really looking good. Bruce and Max, Jackie and Michael completed the front of the house today. It looks great! Now it just needs a front deck. Anne, Jenny and Hilary worked on siding on the back and side of the cottage. We are hoping it can be at least close to completed tomorrow. We will see how it goes. We will be pushing to the end.

Tuesday, October 8, 2019

It was another wonderful day in Sebewaing. We are so blessed to have great weather this last week. It is allowing us to accomplish more than we thought possible.

Of course we started our day with devotion after which we headed straight to work. Today Anne, Jenny and Jackie started with sanding drywall. After that was done they went outside to join Hilary and Bruce working on siding. Suzanne inspected the front bedroom and decided it was ready for paint and before the day was over the bedroom ceiling and walls had a coat of primer. Max and Tom completed the drywall installation in the bathroom. Max and Micheal then insulated the back door and installed the brick mold, while Tom worked on the tape and mud in the bathroom. Tom completed the first coat just before our work day was over. Max worked with Bruce part of the afternoon on siding on the front and also with Michael on the siding on the back. Anne, Hilary and Jenny completed the siding on the north side of the house. With the plumbing complete Reid put another coat of mud in the drywall in the living room and kitchen. Hopefully that area will be ready for primer tomorrow. Only two more days but things are coming together. After work there was another short session of pickle ball and then we all watched the space station pass over our area. Nice end to a nice day.

(If you want to find out when the space station is visible in your area click here.)

Monday, October 07, 1019

Gorgeous fall day in Sebewaing! No working in the rain today. It was great. We of course started the day with devotion which today was led by Suzanne who used John 2:1-11. She talked about the extraordinary things Jesus did and then reminded us that each of us is extraordinary. The love of Jesus makes each one of us extraordinary.

After devotion we talked about all that has been accomplished thus far and what we want to try to get done this week and then headed back to work. Max, with Tom and Mike went back to work on hanging the drywall. At the end of the day they have 2 sheets remaining. They had to wait for the electrical to be completed before hanging the last pieces. The plumbing rough-in is complete, tested and there were NO leaks. Don’t know if we are doing the final plumbing. Anne and Jenny went to work on doing the second coat of mudding on the bedroom and got that completed. Jackie and Hillary were also working on mudding in the living room and kitchen until Hillary started priming the loft area. Anne and Jenny joined Jackie and we think at the end of the day we had all but one outside corner with either one or two coats of mud. We are making good progress. The camp is very pleased. They were afraid we would not have time to get the drywall completed and none of them were looking forward to mudding and taping and sanding. Continuing to pray that we remain safe and accomplish what God wants us to do.

Sunday, October 6, 2019

First let us ask for prayers again for our friend Carol. She has her first chemo tomorrow.

So what did we do this weekend? Thursday night was another noisy night with train traffic and we got a slow start to our day on Friday as a result. It was cold and blustery, cloudy and scattered rain. We decided to stay home and do laundry and catch up on some business. In between showers we walked back downtown to the post office with mail and since the rain ended for a while we walked back to the marina and some other areas of town we had not visited before. The camp had Fall Family Fun Days beginning at 3:00 Friday afternoon and we were surprised at the number of RV’s and even tent campers that arrived in spite of the cold temperatures expected. There was a large crowd with lots of children and youth. All the events were free including zip line, mini-golf, laser/arrow tag, archery, hayrides, pumpkin painting, camp fires, donuts, roasted marshmallows and s’mores. Even the food was free. This is a weekend to introduce kids and their families to the camp in hopes of getting the kids back for summer camp. It was a very good weekend for the camp.

Saturday the weather improved and by mid-morning we were seeing some sunshine. We went to Bay City State Park and Tobico Marsh Nature Trail to hike. There was a well done museum at the visitor’s center and the ranger who greeted us was very knowledgeable about the area and the trails. There was a box turtle in a terrarium at the desk so we of course included Aunt Jean’s box turtle Newdul in our conversations. We hiked about 6 miles on the nature trail and the loop around the lagoon. We also walked down to the beach before heading back to Sebewaing. The trees are finally beginning the show some nice colors and with the sun and calmer winds, it was a wonderful day to be out in the woods.

Today we went to the early service at Trinity UMC, which is their more contemporary service. We were again warmly welcomed by the pastor and congregation. We have enjoyed our time of worship with this small group of believers. After worship, most of the team returned to the Lamplighter for brunch before returning to the camp. We had a pot luck tonight so some time was spent preparing our contribution to dinner. This afternoon, Bruce and Jackie set up a portable pickleball court for us in the youth center. They were the only ones who had played before. They were great teachers and soon we were all having a great time and getting some great cardio exercise even if we were just beginners at the game. Hopefully we will get some additional playing time in the afternoons this week. Thanks, Bruce and Jackie! It was a great weekend. Hope you all had a great weekend too. We have four more days to accomplish as much as possible for the camp. It will be a busy week.

Thursday, October 3, 2019

Trains and rain overnight last night. What is usually a single train was multiples last night with what sounded like multiple track switches. We usually aren’t really bothered by the trains but last night they were going back and forth for way too long. It was the first topic of conversation at morning devotion. The second was the continuing rain. The forecast indicates today was our last rainy day and we will be glad to see some sun. Tonight we are getting lots of wind.

Bruce and Jackie led devotion this morning with Bruce talking to us about patience and his lack of patience. He shared several scriptures on the subject and the group discussed how we don’t want to pray for patience because God just might let us learn some patience in a not so fun way. Bruce and Jackie also gave each of us a really nice cross necklace that Bruce made. The nails that make the cross are race horse horseshoe nails. The black represents sin, the red the blood of Jesus and the white, salvation. Thanks, Bruce and Jackie.

Back to work, Anne went back to taping and mudding drywall. Max and Tom and Mike completed installing all the drywall they can do until the bathroom plumbing is completed. Reid continued to work on that plumbing today. Bruce, Hillary, Jackie and Jenny all began the day working in the cold mist installing the siding. They made great progress – finishing all but the top row on the south side and starting the two remaining sides. The drywall in the bedroom was not dry today. It’s just been too humid, so Dave, the maintenance manager, brought a fan and then later a couple of heaters for the cottage. That seemed to help and by this afternoon at least a portion of the bedroom could be sanded by Suzanne. Jackie also worked on finishing drywall this afternoon. We have all worked very hard this week and are looking forward to getting some rest this weekend.

Tonight, Tom and Jenny walked into town with us. It is “Moonlight Madness” in downtown Sebewaing. They closed some of the streets and had various activities. There were inflatables for the kids. Music in the park. Several food vendors and craft vendors. There were also specials/sales at the downtown businesses. The Rotary gave away bean soup which was very good. There was popcorn and apple cider at the library. We all, of course, had ice cream from the antique store. Tried the root beer float tonight and it very good. We also ran into Hillary, Mike, Jackie and Bruce while strolling downtown. We were interested in seeing the fires on the river and waited until they lit the floating fire rings before we called it a night. As we were leaving we had a really nice sunset and stopped on the board walk to get some pictures before returning home . It was another good day.