Progress

Progress on all the Habitat houses is slower than during the build-a-thon, but it continues apace. The Thrivent Builds house is coming along nicely. It has fascia, roof sheathing, some rough plumbing, a front porch, and has scaffolding set up to prepare for installing windows and siding.

Go in Peace, and Serve the Lord

Habitat East Bay surpassed their fund-raising goal for the build-a-thon, with over $105,000 raised for the 4 day event. Lutheran participation was great, both for volunteer hours and donating.

But we need to keep at it. It takes a lot of work to build a house (over 500 volunteer days), and the requirement for Thrivent Builds is that at least half the work has to be from Lutherans. So go volunteer with a couple of friends, or organize a work day for your church. Go in peace, and serve the Lord!

Build-A-Thon Pictures 3

The build-a-thon was a big success. Over $95,000 was raised (still counting) and 420 volunteer days amassed in just 4 days. Over 300 hours were volunteered by Lutherans -- more than 7% of the volunteered hours of the whole build-a-thon!

Habitat East Bay has more pictures of the build-a-thon on their website and photo gallery. I've included some of the pictures on the Thrivent Builds house here.

Homeowner Profile

Sometimes it's easy to lose track of why we donate our money and volunteer our time, and in so doing become discouraged. But it's important to remember that the house that Thrivent Builds is sponsoring is for real people. The future homeowner of the Thrivent Builds house is Sonnie Dae, who is raising 5 children (4 of her own and a niece). Read more about her and the children here.

More Build-A-Thon Pictures

Some more Build-A-Thon pictures, courtesy of Pat Krohn-Pope (Thrivent board member and Build-A-Thon volunteer).

Build-a-Thon Pictures

Thursday:

Friday:

Saturday:

Sunday:

Build-a-Thon

Habitat for Humanity East Bay's annual Earth Day Build-A-Thon finished yesterday, and was a huge success. Hundreds of people came together to frame 8 houses at the Edes Avenue building site in Oakland. Local Lutherans were there to represent Prince of Peace, Fremont; Resurrection Lutheran, Dublin; Trinity Lutheran, Pleasanton; Our Savior, Livermore; and even the Thrivent Financial office in Fremont. (If I didn't list your church and you were there, let me know by posting a comment. Also let me know if you have pictures to share.)

All 8 houses rose from the foundation slab up to the roof trusses in just 4 short days. There were a lot of little cuts and bruises (I got my share), but fortunately it was a safe event with no serious injuries. People worked hard and had a great time supporting a great cause and getting a lot of work done.

The Build-a-Thon is also a fund-raising event. They won't have the final numbers for a while as pledges continue to come in, but by all accounts it was successful in that regard, too.

A special thanks to the house leaders for the Thrivent Builds house, Gary and Juan, and the construction assistant, Laurie. The three of them made a great team and made sure the work got done right while keeping people busy with different tasks all over the house. Gary is also the architect for this project, and donated his design time to Habitat.