Back to work after culture day for Pella Christian! A busy Saturday of painting, landscaping, and meeting new people.
Read past blogs from this team and others at Team Updates – Many Hands Impact
For breakfast, we had french toast, eggs, and ham. Lula and Doreen, the cooks, have kept us fed with amazing food all week.
At the former library, we hung drywall. Camden, Eli, Toby, and Keegan took turns cutting 2x4s so that they could fix the bows in the rafters. Then Camden and Eli cut the drywall to a specific size and used the drywall jack to raise it up to the ceiling so that it could be drilled in. There were lots of drills dropped but at the end of the day, we got it done. We completed the ceiling in the main room, which went a lot faster than we had thought.
This morning one of the things that happened is that Logan and Grant stayed on campus to cement 6 4x4s into holes so that later on in the year Sam could create a building around the water pressure tanks. It was really fun talking to Sam and Grant about baseball and other cool things about the island.
Another group of us painted the first layer of light blue on the outside of the former library. We listened to Christian music while we worked, which made the time fly by a lot faster. Then we had to get on ladders and paint the trim along the top. Once we finished the trim, we started the second layer of blue on the exterior. The second layer went on a lot smoother than the first layer. It was hard to reach the top of the front of the building, so some people are going back to finish it up on Monday. Once we got what we could outside, we went into the back of the former library and worked on priming the rooms behind the one being worked on. It was really difficult because the walls were dirty and they were not textured yet.
There was also a group of people at Mrs. Nicole’s family’s house. After being left alone for 3+ years, her yard was really overgrown with weeds and grass that were knee-high. We also cut down some small trees. We worked to cut them all down, and then by the end of the day, we had removed almost all of the weeds and overgrown grass and put them in a garbage trailer. We took two large loads to the dump with more still to be done. While we were doing yard work, a Bahamian crew was starting to get the house ready for a new roof. Mrs. Nicole and her whole family were really happy to see her house get transformed, and it was really cool to see the expressions on their faces when we were done.
Justin talked to us about how he has dropped everything, and for the next 10 years, he hopes to be sailing around the world with doctors to help others with their medical needs. Currently he is still researching the areas to see what the needs are of the areas he goes to. He is an example of how we should serve others and put others’ needs before our own. This trip is an example of how we stepped away from our everyday lives to follow our calling of serving others with their needs.
