Thursday at Gautier April 13, 2006

This has been quite a week. I didn't have much office help but we already had lined up jobs for the groups so that helped me a lot. Everyday I was training someone how to answer the phones, get into the computer, etc. It is a great help to have a couple people all week so it frees me up for some other things. Tues we had a meeting with the Presbytery of MS Disaster Force and making some plans and changes as we continue to work together. Many churches down here under Presbytery of MS host volunteers and assign them to worksites, too. My village is one of 6 that is under PDA and we both do the same things but in different ways.


I had a large group from near Richmond VA, half of them youth. The other morning a few cows came up to the fence and many of these kids had never seen a real cow. They were even able to touch them or pet them. Then we have our mascot Sir Francis Drake who usually shows up about dinner time. He is allowed to have a half of a bagel or bread. Then we are near a couple sandhill crane wildlife refuges but I've only seen and heard them fly over us twice.

A couple groups were combined and shingled a large hip roof. The kids are excited to learn how to do some of these things as we had several supervisors or skilled workers in that area. They finished the roof Wed and then helped put up sheetrock in another house which they helped complete, also. This lady was so excited to see it becoming a house. We have some resources to help people who had no insurance.


Wed night our MI group cooked dinner. They bought 2 charcoal grills and donated them to the village. They were the Yellow Dog River cook shack and served "road kill" chicken, corn on the cob, sink trap cole slaw, lumberjack baked beans, grilled yams, strawberry shortcake. We eat well but the volunteers need it as they work out in the hot sun somedays. We go thru a lot of lemonade and iced tea which are kept cold in large water coolers in the dining area.

Tis enough for one day. Will add my pictures later. Phyllis