Hi All -  What a ride out.  We left the Swanson home at 4:01am and drove West.  Lisle kept the breaks and driver changes to under 15 minutes, so we arrive at 5:30pm.  I'll figure out how to get some pictures up soon.  We experienced some of Indiana's partly cloudy.  Had a meet and greet with ice cream at the local Habitat facility.  Met with the families.  They are all so thankful that we (70 or so) are willing to do God's work in this way.  Karen is a mother of 3, and it just really fun to talk with.  She will be moving into the house that we are going to build.



Day 1 of real building - It had rained in the night.  So lots of mud.  Cement slab poured before we got to the site.  The local Habitat group had come in and marked wall locations and pre-built most of the door and window framing.  We hammered lots of nails at the 16" on center marks and started putting up exterior walls.  Once they were done, crews were set up to sheath the exterior walls and another to build the interior walls.  By the end of the day almost all of the walls were up and sheathed.  Sore and tired.  Meeting lots of people, new friends and some old ones.  Remember Shreavesport (spelling) or Atlantic City.  Great fun chatting and remembering.  Peace to you all.



Day 2 - It's raining when we first arrived.  So lots of mud.  The mud made things really fun to slip and slide around.  As these are the first 3 houses in the 115 house development we need to schlep around the development to get anywhere.  The roads are being being paved today, so it should be a little better from now on.  Roof trusses were the big objective.  Yup, it now looks like 3 houses.  Two are single floor and one is a two story affair.  Our house even has about 15% of the roof decking down.  Not as sore but still as tired.  We keep reminding ourselves of the fact that we are not in a race to be the first to get stuff completed, but that we are all in the trenches working hard for a wonderful cause.  Thank you for keeping us in your prayers.