1st Week in Taft, TX

We have traveled from Canyon Lake to Odem, TX and are staying at the Odem First United Methodist Church.

The team from the left are Duane, Wilma, Carol, Mike, Jodi, Stel, Sharon, Dave and Gene (our leader)

The campsites are directly across the street from the church.

Odem is near Corpus Christi in the Gulf Shore area of Texas.  We will be working out of the Methodist church in Taft, TX and we travel through this "blackland" area for @ 13 miles every day.

It has been raining so this Texas cactus is in full bloom.

The work base is First United Methodist Church, Taft, TX..  Cleaning and painting this wrought iron sign will be one of the objectives of our work

Wilma removing paint and rust from handrails in prep for painting

with help from Carol

and Mike.

Dave and Sharon are cleaning sidewalks

and painting warning signs on those areas where the sidewalks are raised or sunken.

There are a lot of handrails on this building and

most need attention 

so Wilma gets additional assistance from Duane.

There is a Thrift shop on the property and Sharon is making a new sign with "drop off instructions" for those making donations.

Stel is removing kickplates and other hardware from the door to the preschool so that Jodi can scrape off the peeling paint and repaint the doors.

Taft UMC has an outreach program and as a part of that we have been asked to build handicapped ramps at a couple of residences in the area.  At this farm, Duane and Dave have begun the construction process

which will be quite long to get the wheelchair bound resident to rhe driveway.

Wilma, Gene and Duane are encountering heavy roots to remove as they pass this tree.  And they are under a lot of pressure to perform as they have a large audience ...

of interested sheep and goats watching the whole process.

At another location in a nearby town, Mike and Stel are working on building another ramp on top of this cement slab for the wheelchair bound resident here.

Not much to attach to but we'll level it and make it work

Jodi helps Stel cut the deckboards for the ramp.

Mike installs the deckboards

While Stel cuts the posts to support the handrails.

Almost done with the deck

and the handrails

and end supports.

Another problem.  We were going to lay block here to bridge the 4 inch gap to the slab but what is underneath Mike's feet is another cement slab.  Guess we'll work on a small ramp for this next week.

The Odem UMC honored us with a brisket dinner one evening

which gave us an opportunity to rest and

visit with our campground hosts.

On Friday night, a terrific storn came through and we lost power at about 12:30 AM.  The next morning we still had no power so we all drove about 7 miles south and had breakfast at Dennys.  Better than running 5 generators.  See you next week.