2009 Build-a-thon, Day 4 -- ending with a bang

It was hot again for the final day of the build-a-thon, but not quite as bad as Monday was. We had another good turn out, and while the heat slowed down overall progress, a lot got done on all 20 houses. On house 13, we worked with future homeowner Sergio Navarro. We had a number of first time volunteers who did great. We got the exterior walls on the 2nd floor sheathed, raised and plumbed, and several of the interior walls raised, too.

Check out the TV coverage from CBS 5, and of course, coverage on Habitat East Bay's website.





After some group photos, many of the volunteers and staff headed off to a post build-a-thon party, where we compared our experiences (and scrapes and bruises) and relaxed after a tiring four days. But the build-a-thon was a big success. Over $200,000 was raised to help fund the building of the houses, and a lot of progress was made. Thanks to all who gave of their time and money, and I hope to see you out at the work site sometime soon!

2009 Build-a-thon, Day 3 -- heat

Today at the build-a-thon was a scorcher. Temperatures were in the 90s, and with just the framing of the houses up, there isn't much shade to cool off in. We also had a lot fewer volunteers since it's a work day. So we worked a lot slower, but we still made good progress. The Habitat staff did lots to try to help people keep cool. Besides frequent water breaks, there was a popsicle break, and they set up a mister system under a canopy for us to go cool off in. The lunchtime events involved getting people wet. Tomorrow should be little cooler, but it'll still be hot.

2009 Build-a-thon, Day 2 -- a wedding!

Today was another great day at the Habitat worksite, but it was hot, and tomorrow is supposed to be even hotter. All the houses made good progress, but today we had something special -- a wedding celebration! Kim and Jim met at a Habitat build in New Orleans, and were married yesterday. As part of their wedding celebration, the wedding party came out to the build-a-thon to work. Besides being Habitat supporters, Kim is also a Thrivent member, so Habitat East Bay presented the newlyweds with matching Thrivent Builds hardhats. Kim's sported a veil which she cheerfully wore all afternoon.

2009 Build-a-thon, Day 1

Today was day 1 of the build-a-thon. We had hundreds of volunteers working on 20 houses, and from what I saw, good progress was made on all of them. The Thrivent Builds sponsored house had at least 4 Lutherans volunteering on it from Resurrection Lutheran in Dublin.

I wish I had more to blog, but I'm tired! There are three more days of this to go.