Monday, July 31, 2006

Problem or Opportunity?

Well, Mondays usually have alot of twists and turns with it being the first day on the job for new teams. This one was "extra" twisting!

Remember the flooring in Barbara's house, refer to the photo----well, most of it had to be taken out today and replaced! This tile flooring is not ceramic tile. It actually snaps together sort of like hardwood flooring. It is called a "floating" floor. The grouting material that came with it comes in cans and looks like decorative cake icing coming out of the tube. It is VERY time consuming and difficult to use. After consulting with others we decided it would be best, and most cost effective, to use regular grout. WRONG!!!! We did use it in two rooms and when we got done it looked great. Looks can be deceiving. Today, when we thought we would make awesome progress and maybe get it close to being done we were "rechanneled" in our way of thinking. It seems the floating part of the floor caused the grout to crack and then crack some more. It just wasn't going to work. We had to go back to plan A with using the tube grout. This required the pulling up of all the grouted flooring and replacing it with new, ungrouted flooring. We thought about removing the grout and replacing it with the tube grout and again, NOT! The time invested in doing that, not to mention the mess, was not feasible. We have plenty of the tile itself and knew that was the way to go. One of those "three steps forward and two back" kind of things. The Indiana team took it very well, went to work, no complaints, just get it done! Bless them!!!! They were working well into the evening and are installing light fixtures, door hardware, electric details and every other kind of job you can imagine. They are even working on repairing the columns on the outside of her house that came down in the storm. They hold up a small roof section over the front of the house and really need to be repaired and put back in to protect the roof portion.

Just one of those days where things get a bit more than challenging and we just have to sit back and look at the challenge as another opportunity to learn something! That can be tough to do! Thanks to all of you and your prayers we were able to get it done today! :)

I was afraid that Monty might have been down for the count this morning. He was up all night not feeling well and didn't make devotions this morning. By mid morning he was up and around and doing okay, once again thanks to all of your prayers. Remember when I said that even if you don't know what to pray for when praying for us the Lord knows and He has it all covered! We ended up spending the most of our day back and forth from Barbara's and Lowes. Tomorrow will begin with a trip to Lowes as her back double patio doors must be replaced. There is a list to go along with those doors and hopefully more progress will be made once the list is checked off. We are so very blessed to have organizations such as Convoy of Hope and Camp Hope who believe in this relief effort and are such a help to us. Bless all of you for your serving hearts! Without you this would be impossible.

When I looked at the calendar and realized today was the last day of July I was shocked! I just don't know where the time goes! It seems like it was March just a couple of days ago! We are just so busy that days can go by and we don't even look to see what the date is! Must be another of those "God things".

It was also exciting to see all of the new children's bikes lining the front of the church this evening. They are donated to us to give away at our Outreach this Saturday. There will be some awfully happy children taking home those bikes! Those are just a small sample of the exciting things that will happen that day! God will be pouring out blessings all over the area and we are once again just so thankful to be a small part in the whole thing! What a blessing it is for us!

Thanks again to everyone for your prayers and support. May God bless all of you!

Until tomorrow....Susan and Monty

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