Week 2 In Lake Charles, LA

Well first off I want to give an update on one of my "rep roles" for the team. I am a POL (project outreach liason) for the team along with Shannon McCoy. This round we have to put together a Community Work Day and get the whole community involved in a day of service. So far we have the organization to work with in mind. We've contacted them and now they have to contact us back to let us know whether or not they want to do it. So keep your fingers crossed. This organization is called Friend Ships here in Lake Charles, LA and basicly we would set up a day for the community to come together and spend the day helping them get their ship ready to set sail for Haiti packaging and loading supplies. Shannon & I jumped on this opportunity the moment we heard they need help because our team wants to go to Haiti sooo bad to help out. And since we can't, this is the closest thing we could do to help out. Every little bit helps right? Well we are working hard to make this happen so I just ask for all your prayers that this will come together like we are picturing it.

Alright, now to the work week. Wow, this week has been some gooooood work. Monday was MLK Day and so the organization that we are teamed with had the day off. We, however, did not. "Day on, not a day off" is what we say. Instead, we spent the day working with this thrift store in Sulphur, LA which is about a 30 minute or so drive from Lake Charles. We tagged items, arranged the floor, took items from the back to the floor, and helped unload trucks from people who came to donate items. Half way through the day a few of us guys headed over to a different building owned by the same store and helped move boxes from that location to our original location.

 Patty also found himself a nice vest....cool eh? haha get things done for AMERICA!!

One day we went to this trailer park and went to this one lady's trailor and put a tarp over her roof to keep the water from leaking through.

For the rest of the week we were working on this lady's house. We call her Mrs. Mary.

We did pretty much anything you could think of to this house. We first took everything out of her room. Then we pulled all the walls off.

Put up some new insulation

We then started pulling up alll of the floor

And in the midst of all this "destruction" that we are doing......God still seems to find a way to remind me exactly why i'm doing this program and why i'm dedicating my life to service in the first place.....remind you, I didn't touch or tamper with this at all...I found it this way:

I just couldn't help but smile and take a picture. Isn't He amazing?? :) I think for a moment there I got soo caught up in the day to day work aspect of this program that I lost focus of the big picture and the real reason why i'm here. God decided to toss in a little reminder for me there. I think many of us do the same thing I did in our everyday lives. We get so caught up in our daily routines and schedules that we lose focus of the bigger picture and the plans that God has for our lives. Who knows, maybe God is trying to throw in "little reminders" to help you get back on track. So just keep your eyes open and be willing to listen. Maybe you'll get your own "cross reminder" :) .....well, I have to get going. Thanks for reading and i'll try my hardest to post again next weekend. "My time is up, I thank you for yours." God bless!!! :)

First Week In Lake Charles, LA

Well, we left campus in Iowa on Monday and drove to Memphis, TN where we stayed in a hotel for the night. Once we got there we got our rooms and headed out to Beale Street for dinner. It was nice. We found this really cool place that had a live band and had a great time!

The next day, Tuesday, we drove the rest of the way to Lake Charles, LA. We are staying at University Methodist Church. It's pretty nice. We have an upstairs place where we are staying and it has one room for beds and one room for living room (tv, couches, etc.) Its pretty cool. Our showers, however, are a different story. The Church was suppose to have an outdoor trailor-ish shower thing but its not working. So we've been going to Trinity Baptist Church to work out at their gym everyday after work and then we get our showers there. It's kinda frustrating but at the same time the showers at Trinity are better and it gives us that push to work out everyday. So it's nice.

So far this week from Wednesday-Friday we have raked leaves, fixed a broken shower trailor at a DIFFERENT Church, painted and hung shutters, mudded, sanded, and hung dry wall. The weather here is CRAAAAZY....one day its cold, the next day it's raining and storming, and then the next it's nice and sunny. It was fun the other day when Griff and I had to hang shutters up in the pouring rain haha.

Today we went to the lake and walked around. One of the really cool things we found was this memorial thing from the WTC of 9-11

And a piece that came straight from the Pentagon

Overall so far its been an ok week. We haven't done too much work yet, but it's only been 3 work days. Tomorrow (Monday) is MLK day and the organization we work with is closed. So we are working with a different organization in Sulfur, LA which is about a 20 minute drive from here. They are feeding us pizza for lunch...and then that night for dinner our site supervisor here in Lake Charles invited us to his house for gator gumbo!! mmmmm!! haha. That will be an adventure all in itself. Well guys, until next week, "My time is up, I thank you for yours." God bless!!!

My Mailing Address

Hey guys! Just thought I would post my mailing address just in case there were anyone who wanted to send me anything. Mail, package, postcard....whatever floats your boat! Hope all is well! "My time is up, I thank you for yours." God bless!

Tim Hubbard
AmeriCorps NCCC Cedar 7
1004 G Ave.
Vinton, Iowa 52349