Back To School

As everyone knows, the end of August brings back to school time. One of the programs that we do here at the mission is an annual backpack distributon. These backpacs are filled with all the necessary school supplies that a child would need and of course a backpack to carry them in. As an added bonus, this year, the computer company Dell donated 1200 backpacks to us. You will see from some of the photos that these are very large, nice backpacks. Makes me happy that I have a Dell computer. Let's hope that they think of us again next year if they have another surplus.

This morning we passed out around 500 backpacks full of supplies, and Elvira says she has to put together another 650 for the missions across the border in Juarez. That sure is a lot of pencils and paper. As soon as she gets done with the backpacks, it is time to start thinking about the jacket, blanket, and Christmas toy distribution. Never a dull moment here, and it is so amazing to see how we can help all our brothers and sisters in Christ everyday. If you run across some extra school supplies, or Christmas toys, please don't hesitate to send them to us at the mission. I promise they will be put to good use. Have a great Labor Day holiday, if you are in town, maybe I will do a barbecue. God's blessings on your week.

The line that started forming around 7 AM (Distribution started at 9:30)

The mountain of backpacks donated by Dell, all filled up and ready to go.

Other backpacks. The students were divided into Elementary and Jr/Sr High and that determined which backpack they would receive.

Another pile of packs, each backpack also came with a health kit.

Elvira checking off those who registered.

Passing some across.

Happy "customer" with the packs provided by Dell

More of the Dell packs

This young man is ready for class.

Help Wanted, and Needed

So I am sitting here at my desk going over the projects that we have completed this year. Truly amazing how many families and people we have been able to help. You may have read in previous blogs of mine, or Erin's, or Krysia's or whomever about how many people tend to stop by our sites and ask how they can get help as well. This happened with a group from my home church when we were building a house in Juarez, it happens every day when working in Sparks or Horizon City, and now people are even asking those we help about us. They get our nunber and call us telling us about the needs of their dilapadated homes that are leaking water into the baby's room or full of mold spores and falling drywall. I must get at least 2 or 3 phone messages per week from people looking for assistance.

As much as I, and everyone else at the mission would love to rebuild all these wonderful people's homes and lives, we can not do it on our own. After putting together a list of those projects that still need a little finish work, as well as the ones of people who have called for help, also remembering those who came by the sites that haven't called yet, and adding in the one from across the street who called about her leaking roof, and the one from a young man who was on the verge of tears when telling me about his mother's house that burned down, we are looking at 14 projects. This doesn't even include all the needs of the mission congregations, or the mission campus itself, these are just people who have spoke to Erin or myself.

I encourage everyone who reads this blog, I don't know if it is 3 people or 300, but if you have never been on a construction servant event, I pray that you will look for a group to join, and if you have been on an event, I pray you will think about putting together another. Even if it isn't to come to YLM, there are so many people out there with such a great need. Just look at the previous blog pictures, they don't even begin to show how much need there is in the world. Please consider giving a week of your time and a few of your dollars to help so many in need.

If you are intersted in more information, please contact Erin, our servant event coordinator at service@ylm.org.

God's blessings on your fall.

Chris

The great white north

Even thought it is probably not all white right now, it is a nickname for Canada. Last week brought a group from Edmonton Alberta Canada to the mission to spend a week working in Sparks.

All week was spent finishing up the home of Concepcion Guzman. The frame had already been built, and some drywall done, but there was still much to be completed. They jumped after it. All the drywall was hung, taped, mudded, sanded and almost completely painted, the stucco outside was done (sorry mom, you missed it on this one), floor was put down, a ramp was built for a child in a wheelchair, and the porch between the old trailer and new house was made much more sturdy. That was a lot of stuff for a week, especially considering it was over 100 each day and they never see that up north. Part of the group also spent a few days at the home of Rosa Chavez. We had tried a couple times to stop the roof from leaking and didn't have much luck, so we built a new section of roof over the area we found the leak to be. Also they hung new insulation and paneling again, and also fixed some electric and stability problems.

One of the guys from the group made me a carrot cake for my birthday, but I didn't get over there right away, Erin hid me a piece in the other fridge, but when I went to get it, it was gone, so I missed out on the carrot cake. Sad.

Well, I am back in the office now, getting caught up and ready to rock. Working on some fire and fundraising stuff for now. Have a great week.

Hanging the stucco netting. Some people call it chicken wire, but it said stucco netting on the label so that is what we are going with.

Hanging the gyp rock (that's what they call it up north)

More stucco netting.

Not sure if you can see it or not, but there is a huge pit bull or rotweiler or something at the end of the water stream. It was huge and mean, but it absolutely loved the water.

Most of the drywall is done.

Staining the ramp

Sanding the joint compound creates a lot of dust, that or they brought their own snow from Canada because we don't get any here.

Finished

They claimed 400 square feet for Canada :)

The group with some of the family.

God's Country

Some people will tell you that Texas is God's country, but after living in both Texas and Colorado, I can definitely say that Colorado wins hands down. The following pictures are from a morning trip to Garden of the Gods park in Colorado Springs the week Erin and I were in Colorado for Stefanie's wedding. This is just one small area of Colorado that has such beautiful landscape and scenery. So I don't know why hot, dry, brown grass having, green tree wanting Texas is God's country to some, when clearly it is just a few hundred miles to the northwest to truly appreciate his beauty.

Garden of the Gods park got it's name from 2 cowboys who stumbled across it, one said it would be a great place for a beer garden and another said it was fit for the gods. Oh, and another testament to Colorado's beauty: Question: How can you tell God is a Denver Broncos Fan? Answer: Because sunsets are blue and orange. :)

Kissing camel rock formation. Pretty good name for this one. My only complaint about the park was that the trails were not well marked with signs about which formation was which, so you had to kind of guess. We probably walked about 4ish miles total on 3 trails.

I think this is called 3 graces, but it might be Cathedral as well.

Three graces with some other cool ones in the shot.

You are supposed to have a permit for rock climbing, but I cheated.

I dont know what this rock is called, but you can see pikes peak through it. There is a picture like this in the deck of Colorado cards, only Pikes Peak has snow on it.

Balanced rock was leaning a little, so I pushed it back into place.

Then the other side got messed up, so I had to hold it up until the engineering guys came to fix it.

This was like the only rock that wasn't reddish in color in the park.

This trail kinda took you up into the rocks, so you could feel more part of it. It was cool, but we almost lost the trail on the way down cause it wasn't really obvious, but it was worth it.

Here comes the bride

This is the first of a few blogs that will be posted over the next few days, I am not going to post them all at once, because I want the readers to be able to see each of them and enjoy them, so keep checking back this week for a couple more.

As the title of this blog may suggest, this one covers the wedding of my sister Stefanie that was held on August 15th. We actually spent a week in Colorado for wedding events, and a little free time. I'll talk about the non wedding stuff in the next blog.

So, Stef has been planning her wedding for the better part of 20 years, so everyone in our family tried our best to do our part to make sure her special day was completely awesome. The week started a little rough because our home church was unable to get a temporary occupancy permit. The building has been undergoing an expansion and remolding, and although all plans were to have everything done and the wedding there, the city was unable to grant a permit to hold the service there, so it was moved downtown to a beautiful church near the reception site. This required notifying 250 people about the change and as I like to say, put some people "in the weeds" trying to get all the other things done.

Of course everything wound up getting done on time, Stef and Mike were married in a wonderful ceremony and now Princess Stef becomes Princess DeMonbrun and they will live happily ever after. Pastor Hinchey had gave a message on always having a plan B basically because of the location switch, however in an oversight, Mike's ring did not make it to the ceremony, so just minutes after the message of always having a plan B, we went to it. Perfect.

As some of the pictures will show, I stood on my sister's side, however I was not a bridesmaid. :) The program showed that I was "THE MAN", which I will accept. I'm not sure how I ended up on her side, maybe she really wanted me there, maybe Mike had too many to choose for his side, who knows, but I was honored to stand on her side. Why not break down the gender barriers of weddings? Who says it has to be all females or males, plus I was the lucky one, I got to stand with all the pretty ladies as opposed to the sweaty guys? Who do you think got the best of that deal?

Enjoy the pics and look for more blogs soon.

There I am, on Stef's side. Say something. :)

Stef and I at the rehersal luau.

Me and the rest of the bridal party.

Erin took this picture of our family. I bet the one the photographer took will probably be the Christmas card picture this year. Any bets?

The bridesmaids and THE MAN outside the reception

Stef and I outside the hotel.

The photographer wanted to get one of Erin and I as well, so here it is.

YLM staff and mom and dad.

Cutting the cake. You can't really tell from this picture, but the dark circles are edible pictures of Mike and Stef.

Father and Daughter dance. I danced with Cinderella. Such a fitting song.

Brother and Sister. Congrats again Stef.

Mom, a couple of her sisters, cousins, niece, sister in law all dancing together.

Stef and Mike at the rather elaborate ice carving.

2 weeks in 1 blog

Once again I find myself a little behind on the blog writing. The summer season is winding down, tomorrow I am heading to Colorado for my sister's wedding and a little telecommuting. (I think that is what they call it, when you work, but not at the office.) This past week was spent with some youth and adults from Fondulac (I don't know if that is one word or three), doing repairs on a severely worn down and damged trailer in Sparks.

Last week, was kind of a family theme. Erin's parents and sister traveled from Missouri to spend a week at the mission. They were originally going to be part of a group from their church, but that fell through, so they came and spent time drywalling and painting in Horizon City. My mom and dad also came down for the board meeting, but they were here a few days early, so they spent a couple days working with us in Horizon. Overall, it was a good week.

Enjoy the pics and pray for the safe travels of all attending Stef's wedding.

Old ceiling in Sparks, the hole is from someone stepping where they shouldn't.

New ceiling, no hole anymore. :)

Old roof shingles, almost can't even tell they were ever there.

New roof shingles being layed.

Shadow of Erin working in Horizon City.

Erin and I preparing drywall to be hung.

Focused ont the drywall.

Trying to nail some wood from outside the house, and almost lost the ladder right when kara was taking this picture. (I was only like 2 feet up though)

Ok, so the two videos below you have to watch. I got a new screw gun for drywall, and Erin loves it. She always struggled a little sinking the screw, and this one works like everytime, so she did some happy dances. Sorry the videos are sideways, but I couldn't figure out how to rotate them.

This one should have the sound of the drill with the happy dance too.