rving – RVing With a Purpose

Catching Up Again

Saturday, December 13, 2025

Hello everyone. Seems it’s been over a month since we last gave you an update. We have been here, there and everywhere and kept thinking we would get a post uploaded but it just hasn’t happened. Sorry. What follows is a synopsis of what’s been going on with us.

We left our work in Ashville and spent five days in Lexington, KY with some Impact Maker friends at the Kentucky Horse Park. We met some new friends, human and animal (beautiful horses) in a beautiful setting.

The horse drawn trolley ride at the park

From Kentucky, we went to a Switch Crew Founders Club (SCFC) event at Talona Ridge RV Resort in Elijay, Georgia. We love Talona Ridge and enjoyed more time with friends. It was more than just fun as we spent a good deal of time planning the next 12-18 months for the organization.

Sunday moring worship is always a highlight of the Switch It Up events.

Some of our friends dressed up for Halloween

One night we were treated to a 1920’s style mystery play.

Sunset at Talona Ridge with some of the Christmas lights.

From there we returned to Alabama for a little time at our home church and Camp Sumatanga and doctor and dental appointments. We finally got to meet our new pastor, Mark Puckett, in person. So thankful for him and always thankful for time with our Lester Memorial family.

In between our two events at Talona Ridge, we made a quick trip back to Alabama for medical appointments. While there we took time to hike to the top of the mountain at Sumatanga with Donna and Barry.

After a brief week in Alabama we were back at Talona for a gathering of other friends and YouTube influencers, Cindy and Harold Strange and family. It was another fun time of renewing friendships packed in three days.

This was our second year to attend the 1 Strange Adventure Gathering.

Then it was time to return to Randy and Debra’s home in Johnston, SC. We went to Gaffney, SC for two days for Fred’s annual checkup. Thankfully, no problems were found and we spent the remainder of our time enjoying catching up with our family. Debra and Anne enjoy preparing lots of good food for the family Thanksgiving and Max and Randy always have projects to complete. It was nice to have some time to just relax.

Of course, we had another great Thanksgiving week with family in South Carolina.

We spent a few days clearing out a few more trees around the house.

Randy’s new grapple sure makes cleaning up trees easier.

We are so very thankful for the time we have had with friends and family over the last several months. We still have more of you to see and we will be working on that in 2026. We are currently in Gulf Shores, AL and will try to keep things more up to date. May God Bless You All and keep you safe!

Asheville, NC Disaster Rebuild – Week 3

November 3, 2025

Week Three of the NOMADS Asheville Disaster Rebuild had us welcoming Les to the team after we said goodbye to Anne, Dale, Cliff and Ann, leaving us with 5 hard working NOMADS for this week. Angela and Jake continued to be big assets to our team but we will miss Anne and Ann and Cliff and Dale.

We returned to Kim and Nick’s home Monday and worked the entire week there. They have been a joy to work with. They are both hard working. It’s always so nice to have the homeowners working alongside. On Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, Jake and Angela completed the installation of all the flooring and most of the baseboard while the rest of the team worked on drywall and other tasks.

Jake and Angela were our Fantastic Flooring Team this week.

Les getting the last corner ready for drywall

Anne spent most of the week finishing drywall, yet still had time to help everyone else with their tasks and visit with the homeowners.

On Thursday, we began the installation of the new windows, completing two of them. Since there was very little window casing on site, Jake and Les used what was available to make one example trim setup for the other windows. Les spent some time preparing to lead the team for the next few weeks. We made sure he met Jordan, UMC construction coordinator, and Danielle, the construction coordinator for Rebuild Haywood, the county where we are working, and our contacts at the church. We and Angela and Jake completed our services in Asheville and departed Friday. We pray that Wes and the incoming team members have a wonderful time of service and most importantly that they stay safe.

Kitchen window removed (The homeowner took this picture and sent it to us.)

The opening for the living room window had to be enlarged to fit the new window.

Jake and Les installing new kitchen window

Inside of the new living room window. We didn’t have the window casing trim, so Jake and Les installed sample trim for next week’s crew.

Asheville, NC Disaster Rebuild – Week 2

October 25, 2025

Saturday had us welcoming one more couple, Cliff and Ann, to our team and no one departed. Great team, all experienced in DR work. We all attended church at Covenant Community Church and again we were warmly welcomed. We use one of the upstairs rooms of the church for our Sunday afternoon meetings and with eight of us we also had our morning meetings in that room. Monday we all headed back to Sandy’s house to continue work. By Wednesday afternoon, we had completed the walls, ceiling, baseboards, and flooring in both the living room and office. We had also installed baseboards in two other bedrooms. Now with the addition of Ann and Cliff, we had two Anne’s, one Ann and one Angela. Sandy named us the “A” team. She liked it because she just needed to remember the guys names. Anyone who called out for Anne got a lot of responses, or maybe no answer at all. We completed our work for Sandy Wednesday afternoon and had her Bible presentation.

Dale and Anne A painting the living room

Jake and Angela had to do a lot of custom detail work installing the flooring

Ann W and Max painting the living room ceiling

Anne A painting and Angela caulking the living room

Thursday, we split into two teams with Cliff and Ann and Dale and Anne going to Jessica’s home that is close to completion. It needed DryLock painted in the basement, basement steps replaced, trim installed in one bathroom. They got the steps and most of the painting completed Thursday.

Ann W painting waterproofing on the basement wall

MIldred the emu lives at Jessica’s house.

Max and Anne and Jake and Angela went to Kim’s home. We will be taking care of all the drywall, and flooring in the front of the house and demolition and rebuild in the back portion of the house. We will probably be working there for another week.

Jake and Angela did a great job on the bedroom floor.

Angela and Jake installing bathroom flooring

The weather was beautiful with near perfect temperatures for working and we are hoping that continues. It’s peak leaf peeping season and driving the Blue Ridge Parkway is a great way to leaf peep.

Asheville, NC Disaster Rebuild – Week 1

Tuesday October 14, 2025

When we last posted, we had just arrived at the Covenant Community Church RV Village in Asheville, NC. Due to tremendous shortage of affordable housing after Hurricane Helene struck, the church has installed 36 RV sites on their property. Six of the sites were designated for volunteer relief workers such as NOMADS. The remainder of the sites are for displaced residents. Most of the people in the village lost everything, home, cars, and often their land. It all washed away. We were very impressed by the loving assistance the church has showered on the community. The RVs, mostly travel trailers have been donated to the church or furnished by the UMC conference. Some of the sites saved for volunteers had electrical problems when we first arrived so we spent the next two days running our generator when needed. The site manager was a great help and we determined the problem but then had to wait for the electrician to come change out the GFCI breakers in those sites. After that was done, all has been great.

The RV Village at Covenant Community Church

Sunday service the Covenant Community Church. There were no seats that Sunday because the local high school had their homecoming dance the night before. Also, it was a special “the church has left the building” Sunday where the pastor holds a brief worship service and then sends the congregation out to do service projects in the community;

Most of you have probably seen news stories of all the damage that has occurred in North Carolina as a result of Hurricane Helene in September of 2024. It was and is worse than we saw on TV. There was over 14 inches of rain which caused catastrophic flooding and loss of life. It will take many more years for this part of NC to recover. Hopefully NOMADS will be able to help with the healing process for some of the people.

Saturday, we welcomed Anne and Dale to the RV Village at the Covenant Community Church. Angela and Jake arrived Sunday afternoon. The six of us began work on Sandy’s home in the Waynesville area on Monday morning. Sandy had a lot of roof damage which was repaired prior to our arrival. We are now working to repair the interior of her home – drywall work, and flooring. We returned to work on her house on Thursday. It will take several more days to complete all of the work. We have enjoyed getting to know Sandy. She has chickens in her backyard and has given the team two dozen eggs this week.

Jake, Anne and Angela installing flooring in the living room.

There were several transition strips required

It’s nice to have taller NOMADS that can finish the ceiling drywall without a ladder.

Some of the drywall had been partially mudded, but it all needed a second coat.

Annette, and most of the rest of the team, did a lot of drywall sanding.

Tuesday and part of Wednesday we were tasked with installing the insulation in a home in the Swannanoa area. A number of homes in this area have interesting patches in the roofs. We were told that the families in these homes climbed into their attic, cut their way out, and climbed onto their roof to await a water rescue. There are visible water lines above the tops of windows on numerous homes. There is so very much work to be done. We are just beginning.

Our first job at Swannanoa was to move some bundles of siding for one of the affected residents.

We are very grateful that Jake handled the insulation of the firewall in the attic.

In one area of the ceiling Angela and Jake had to add some extra framing for the insulation and drywall.

The patch on this roof was to repair the hole made to rescue the people trapped in the attic.

Our team is great! We are accomplishing a lot of work. Covenant Community Church could not have been more welcoming and helpful. Our teams will enjoy their time here at the RV Village. In our off time some are enjoying the sites around Asheville, fly fishing, and the beautiful fall leaves on the Blue Ridge Parkway. Please remember our teams and all the families struggling to recover from the storm in your prayers.