Second work week in Wisconsin

On our second week, Harry, Jodi and I head back to Nate's house to get it ready for the electrician and the plumber.  The rest of the group go back to Ronda's house and to one more house to work on repairing a floor.  Unfortunately, we weren't able to get pictures there but we have plenty for you at Nate's house.

 We return to leveling the floor by installing shims to each floor joist and then we are ready to cut and secure new plywood subfloor.

 Max was able to break away from his leader duties to help us here ......

 and here.

 It takes a little creativity to install the opposite corner.

 Then  we move the floor registers so that we can install a new wall to seperate the bathroom from the hallway.

 Installing that aluminum duct tape is a two person project.

 We construct only a section of the hallway wall because that's all the room we have for work.

 Most of the wall is up and we look for pieces to frame the doorway.

 The outside wall has a 3 inch vent pipe so they have asked us to frame the entire outside wall with    2 x 6's to hide the pipe so we again build it in sections that will fit in our work space.

 We need to replace the windows and so we remove the old ones and begin the framework for the new windows.

 One new window didn't work so we board up the hole for the night.

 Next day we finish all the window framing inside and

 outside.

 Max came back once again so he helps build the new wall for the shower/bathtub and surround.

A little friendly persuasion and the wall is set in place.

 At the end of the week , everything is finished awaiting the electrician 

and the plumber.

After dinner Thursday, our group got together for a picture.  We had 2 new folks this week and will be loosing  Norman and Harry on Friday.  The group from the left are:  Gary and Nancy (new this week), Harry, Jodi, Stel, Norman, Anne and Max.

Weekend tourist travel in Wisconsin

Last weekend we took a drive about 15 miles northwest of our campground to investigate the unusual rock outcroppings we were seeing daily on our way to work.  We went to Mill Bluff State Park where you can climb up to the top of one of these rock structures.  Yes, there are steps but it's still a very long climb.

These "Hills" are solid sandstone rock formed by glacial activity and flooding over time.

 We make it to the top, finally and it is a terrific view of other rock outcroppings

 and of the interstate running at the base.

 When we are ready, we face the trek back down which is also daunting.

 But we made it.

So now we'll go find something to eat.

Arrival in New Lisbon, Wisconsin

We left Lancaster area on Monday, August 5, and stopped in northwestern PA to visit Stel's sister-in-law for a couple of days.  We then headed westward and arrived in New Lisbon, Wisconsin on Friday, August 9.  We are hosted by the Winding Rivers United Methodist Church which is a start up church created just a few years ago by joining a couple of congregations in the area.

The church is an old gun store which they have remodeled into a sanctuary with a kitchen and dining area, restrooms and offices.

To the left is another building which they are currently using as a dorm for volunteers and tool and supply storage.    

With the help of NOMADS on their off hours, they are adding restrooms and showers to the back of the building for volunteers to aid in the flood recovery project.

On down the road they hope to turn this building into their main sanctuary.

The white trailer to the left provides three showers for use by volunteers. 

To the left of the showers are the hook ups for NOMADS RV's.  NOMADS are scheduled already into 2020 to help with flood recovery in this area.  

Our crew for this past week are:

from the left, Harry, Tom, Jenny, Norman, Jodi, Stel, Ann and Max.

On Monday, the team went to two homes about 15 miles away to continue the work of previous groups.  Both houses are replacement homes for ones that were condemned after the flood.  There is limited affordable housing in the area so these replacement homes need a lot of work.

The one group is continuing work on Rhonda's house.  The goal is to get two bedrooms and a bathroom completed by Thursday so the owners can move into the house while other work continues.

The other group went to a new house a few miles away.  The rear of the house is an old mobile home that was incorporated into the main house many years ago.  The bathroom and laundry  are in this area with the shower wall separating the laundry from the bathroom.  There is also a toilet on the laundry side of this room.  The owner wants the toilet in the laundry room removed, and the shower and wall removed to make this into one room.  A new tub/shower combination is to be added and the vanity and other toilet moved.  They also want the hallway widened so we will need to tear out the hallway wall in the bath & laundry and move the hallway wall all the way past the next bedroom.

So the tear out begins and then we move that bedroom wall to the right to enlarge the hallway. 

We are going to reuse a lot of the lumber from the walls so Jodi is removing nails and screws for salvage of some and disposal of others.

Harry is salvaging and moving that bedroom wall about 8 inches.

When we tear out the shower, we find the floor rotten or missing altogether .

The floor joist are also rotted and/or cut so we are repairing the joist.

The floor also slopes toward the outside about an inch and a half in the last 2 feet so we are installing shims to attempt to level the floor.

One small section is now level. 

We will deal with the rest next week.