RVing With a Purpose

Thursday, February 23, 2017

We haven’t given you a sunrise picture in several days and even though we are in the “city”we still have wonderful sunrises. Love to start the day with a beautiful sunrise. Just makes you feel so blessed.

Semper Gumby means always flexible, a take off from the Marine Corps motto Semper Fidelis – always faithful. When we lead a team one of the things we always cover at our opening meeting is Semper Gumby. NOMADS must always be flexible. Well, this week we have been so flexible that we have become contortionists. We are now on plan E, F, G, H….?? Who knows. Really, it’s fine. Just a little funny. Our home owner thought about it over night, and after discussing it with his family, left us a nice note telling us he decided it would be better to have his main bath on the first level and have a little half bath upstairs. That way if he were to become unable to go up the stairs he could just live downstairs. Fortunately, everything we have done this week needed to be done for any of the plans. We hadn’t started the new plumbing. We just removed the old so nothing changed except the drawings. So, guess we really didn’t have to be too flexible – just use a lot of eraser.

We got a lot done today but we were so busy we didn’t take very many pictures. We will try to get more next week. The Divas of Destruction completed the new subfloor for the upstairs bathroom. Gwen finished calking the outside siding. The guys removed the old kitchen wall and then started the new front porch, digging the holes and pouring concrete for the support poles for the 10’x10′ front porch. They also cut all the rafters for the new porch to be installed next week. The porch will have a pitch roof and should be a nice addition to the house. The Divas also learned to install windows and almost completed their first install. Trim, etc. will be added later.

The 2 VIM coordinators delivered all our supplies which they do daily and then stayed and worked with us, preparing the exterior for some new windows and began working on plumbing. It was nice to have them hang out with us today. It’s been another great week and now we will try to get some rest, get caught up on our laundry, work on taxes and maybe have some fun. We plan to meet for breakfast at the Badger Den in the morning and will then decide if we have enough energy left to do any touristy things.

Wednesday, February 22, 2017

Pat started our day with an excellent devotion reminding us of the Butterfly Effect – the concept that small causes can have large effects – the flap of a butterfly’s wings might ultimately cause a tornado. We talked about how everything we say and do, good and bad has effects that we may never know or see but the ripple effects can be huge. We need to be about being the hands and feet of God no matter how we are received. We also had a good time of sharing and prayer. We were all so thankful that Gary had listened to that still small voice and returned to visit with our homeowner last evening. We are all in agreement that we really want to make his home as close to the way he wants it as we can.

We started work on Plan D for our homeowner. It’s sort of a combination of Plan A and C. He doesn’t want us to move his bathroom down stairs for some very valid reasons. His case manager and we had hoped to limit his trips up and down the stairs but we will settle for making the steps safer and easier for him to navigate. He is very excited about the planned improvements and the work we have already done. We told you last night that Gary left the homeowner with the plan and a red pen to mark changes. He did mark up changes and left us a note on the floor plan “Very exciting, Awesome!” Those comments really energized us to get busy. So, today we patched some holes on the exterior to help protect the interior repairs from moisture and vermin. The demo divas sort of split up today to divide and conquer. We didn’t have as many laughs without our girl power trio though. The upstairs bathroom floor was patched and is almost ready for the final sub-floor installation. That should be completed first thing in the morning. The insulation installation was completed. Also, the new wall for the kitchen was installed and the old wall will be demoed in the morning. Doesn’t necessarily sound like a lot, but it was a day of hard work.

In case you are new to the blog, when we are working with NOMADS. Our schedule is to start the day with team devotion, usually at 8:00 but on this project because of the drive to Maysville it is at 7:40. We start work at 8:30, we have a break from 10:15-10:30, lunch is 12:-1:00, afternoon break at 2:15 and stop work at 4:00. Doesn’t sound like a bad schedule, right? However, we work really hard doing physical labor that some of the us geezers haven’t done in a while. You would be amazed at what our teams can accomplish with that schedule. God just takes our efforts and our hearts and uses his math to multiply our efforts. Hope we get lots done tomorrow as it is suppose to be another beautiful day. We are making some plans for the weekend so be sure to check back in. Thanks for stopping by.

Tuesday, February 21, 2017

Today was gorgeous day in Maysville, OK. We have really been blessed with wonderful weather. We spent a good deal of time this morning working on getting our master plan on paper so we would lay out the downstairs. We really wanted to make the steps to the second level safer for the home owner. Currently they are too steep and have minimal to no hand rails depending on the section of steps. He told us he has fallen down the steps 3 times. All we can say is he is a very fortunate man to not have had serious injury.

After a great deal of study, we gave up on trying to make the current steps safe and determined we will tear out the current steps in order to install steps with the appropriate tread and risers. We also drew up a plan to move the bathroom down stairs, install an efficiency kitchen and living area. This plan is about Plan C.

The real work began when we started removing the old plumbing and had to remove the main drain pipe. NASTY!! Actually we were pretty neat with it – all things considered.

After all the plumbing was removed, the demolition divas/darling destroyers completed the demolition of the upstairs bath removing all the rotten flooring down to the floor joist. The team also removed old windows on the back wall of the first level, and framed up the opening.

The alcove for the refrigerator was framed and some of the exterior walls were insulated.

The home owner was not available today to discuss the floor plan and arrived just as we were leaving. Our team leader discussed it with him briefly and the home owner requested a copy of our drawing. We really were not sure he was pleased with our plans so Gary went back this evening discussed it all with him in detail and left him the floor plan and a red pen to use to mark up the things he doesn’t like. So come back tomorrow. We may be drawing plan D, or returning to plan A or B. It’s all good. We want our sweet home owner to have safe steps and be happy. Anything else is a bonus.  By the way, click on the pictures to see them full size and remember we love comments.

Monday, February 20, 2017

Today Gwen did our devotion and introduced us to Wisdom Hunters, a daily devotion by Boyd Bailey of Atlanta. She often uses this devotion for her morning quiet time. She and Gary know Mr. Bailey. The one she used today is called “Love is Slow to Anger” and was very good. Check it out.

After devotion it was off to work. Today we started on a very nice 81 year old man’s home. He is such a sweet man who let his children, and then his grandchildren, move into his house next door while he moved into this converted (and unfinished) garage. He is staying in a camper trailer next door while we work on the house and he would go to the trailer and then in a little while he would be back to see what we were doing. Shortly he would go back to the trailer, but then you would look around and he would be walking back down the street toward the house. He is really excited that we are here. The guys today worked on the main entrance that formerly was a garage door and had been framed in with 2 windows and a walk thru door. They aren’t quite through yet and it will need caulking and painting, but looks better already.

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They also installed another door that leads to the back yard. With those two things done the home is already much more secure.

The ladies really rocked today. They had fun demolishing a bathroom. Everything had been leaking and the floor is rotten. The ladies first removed the shower, commode, and sink/vanity and then removed the old drywall from the walls and ceiling.

The only thing left to in there before starting to rebuild is to remove part of the floor. It was a very productive day for everyone and the home owner was very pleased with our progress.

Hope you had a great start to your week. Stay safe!