Tuesday, we start the house

All night long it rained and poured with lots of lightning. It was pretty peaceful except for the visions of working on the house in the mud and rain.

We had decided to leave earlier today to beat the rain that we were sure would come sometinme in the day, and as you can imagine, it started to pour again as we headed to the people mover!

We arrived at the job site, and immediately set up a tarp to put our tools under to keep them out of the rain, and then we all huddled under the tarp also.

Even the local residents stood under their eve to stay out of the rain. About 30 minutes later the rain stopped and we went to work.

Kent Sapenfield jumped in, and laid jobs out for everybody to do. Mark set up the saw horses, and went to work marking and cutting the lumber into stud lengths. The rest of us stacked the lumber into organized piles and started layouing out the walls.

Tim Hagen left with a couple of the guys to go back to Ontario and try to finish the stage that we started on yesterday. I do not have any pictures of their work today, but they sid they had a great day. The got the stage frame up and leveled, and started laying the decking on top

Several of the local community showed up to help us frame the building. They have a group called the committee, who helps pick who gets the next new house, and so the put out the word to the committe to come help. And they did, so it went very well today.

Framing the first wall

Raising the first wall

Raising the second wall

Mark and Kenny

At lunch time, the lady that we are building the house for and her sister fixed kunch for us. Chicken and rice, tomatoes and avacodos. It was good.

This one escaped lunch

After lunch the girls started putting siding on the exterior. They did a great job, but the local men jumped in to help with the nailing, and sped it up.

Waiting to get started

Some of the girls went over and played jump rope with the kids that were hanging around, and some just set back and admired the guys who were doing such a fine job.

Jump rope

After raising all 4 walls, the interior partitions and siding 2 of the exterior walls, we were all exhausted, so we called it a day.

Raising the 3rd wall

Exterior siding

Raising the 4th wall

Last wall in place

Siding

OSHA approved scaffolding?

God is so good, it did not rain any more today, until we started to pick up our tools and then it was just a brief shower. Thanks for all of your prayers.

For prayer request, quite a few have insect bites, so pray for healing and no itching for them. Also pray that we will continue to develop relationships with the people we meet along our journey. Ron Allen made it at about 6:00 so thanks for prayers for his safety.

Monday, our first day at Work

Today was our first day to work on projects. Kent and Mark went off to the lumberyard to buy materials, and the rest of us headed to a Christian school at Ontario to do some work.

Notice the sign behind Brad

This school that we worked at, had been part of a larger church/school, and had split to branch out about 2 years ago. For a year they were on a rented space, but now have 10 acres of their own. They had built an outdoor stage at their rented facility, and when they moved to the new location, they disassembled the stage and moved it to this new facility. When they did this, they carefully marked each piece of wood, but nobody seems to remember what the numbers mean.

So we puzzled over it, and with the help of Kenny, the local Word at Work contractor, we were able to come up with a plan to put it together.

Kenny wondering what he got himnself into

We carried the deck framing over and bolted it together. Then with Kenny, we located it and squared it.

The stage framing

The pile of lumber pieces

Then we dug pier holes, cut piers and set them, tamping them into the gummy soil.

Ok, so we did not work all of the time.

While we were doing this some of the girls went in with battery powered screw guns and reattached some ceiling panels that were falling down.

By now it was lunchtime, and we loaded into the people mover, and headed for Rosa’s Restaurant. On the way to lunch, Kenny shared his testimony with us.

The food was great. A chicken and bean burrito cost about 2.50. However some of the girls were not quite so adventuresome, and ordered hamburgers.

After lunch we came back, set up the laser level, and marked the piers the correct height. Just as we started cutting these columns, it started to rain. We worked in the rain for a little while, but then as the rain got heavy, we went into the school to wait it out. The girls went off with Kenny to pick up some termite shielding for the building tomorrow.

After a couple of hours, we gave up, and came back to Banana Bank Lodge.

Kent loaded the last load of lumber on his trailer in the pouring rain, but he says he has all that he needs to frame the house.

After Dinner, we had evening devotions. Josh and Twylla Brassfield shared their testimony, and their ncall to missions with us. We prayed for them, and then we broke into small groups, discussing scriptures in 2 Peter 3:1-4, and Colosians 2:9-12. Being filled with the entire God-Head, Father, Son and Spirit is a lofty goal to be obtained.

It is raining as I post this. Pray for drying conditions tomorrow as we start on the house, and for Ron Allen to have a safe trip.

We are here

Well we all made it safe and sound to Belize today. Ron Allen was not able to leave with the rest of us to due to a family medical situation, but his plans are to meet us here on Tuesday

Checking In Praying for a safe trip Getting final details

On the first leg of the flight, from Amarillo to Houston, I had the pleasure of sitting next to Brad Ingram. The Stewards served coffee to Brad, and of coarse Dr. Pepper to me. As we were flying along, the captain decided to gain altitude to go over some thunder heads, and when he raised the nose of the plane up, Brad's cup of coffee just slid in slow motion right into his lap. It was rather embarasing for him, but he took it in stride.

All of our luggage made it without any complications. Kent Sapenfield picked us up at the airport in a 20 passenger people mover, and we began our journey to Banana Bank Lodge inland from the airport.

After about a 1 hour trip in the people mover, we made it to Banana Bank Lodge. it is really a pretty place. Boy is it humid though.

Handing out Keys_______The New Cafe_________ The Swimming Pool

The Office Building A Mural on the wall One of the Guest House

My Bathroom My Bathroom My Bedroom

My Bedroom

Parrott

Jaguar
Jaguar

Monkey

Monkey

After we were situated in our rooms, we were served a great Dinner of Rice and Cheese and Chicken Enchilada's at 6:00. They were really good. And Sweet tea, can you believe it? Then at 7:00 we met in the gazebo for a time of reflection on the word, with some personal applications to our lives. Our scripture was from Matthew 16: 21-26. Brad challenged us to not be so busy that we failed to make relationships with the people we meet along the way. We then broke into 2 small groups and discussed obstacles to meet Christ in our lives, and what we can do to overcome those challenges.

For Prayer requests, pray for Ron Allen that he will be able to meet up with us on tuesday. Also we have had some challenges come up with the house. It turns out that the container with the building will not make port until Wednesday, Probably clear customs on Thursday, and be at our site on Friday. That pretty much keeps us from putting up that building. So it has been decided that some of our group will go to the local lumber yard in the morning, and pick up the material to just stick frame a house. Kent already has the slab poured, so we should be able to start framing by tomorrow afternoon. While the material is being procurred, the rest of the group will go to a place called Ontario, and do some work there.

God has conrtrol of the shipping, we just need to join Him where he is working, so please pray that things will go smoothly.

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