North Beach Kurt

This is a Blog created for the junior high students at North Beach.

Thursday, July 03, 2008

Day 4 (My Feet are Burning)







Today our group worked on the roof and mulitple times I heard, "My feet are burning!" They claimed the high today was 92 degrees, but on that black roof, I'm pretty sure it was 110.




Hi mommy it is kayli for a couple of seconds! i miss alanna if you could tell her! I told her i would say hi... here is angela for the update!!! :) Hi everybody this is Angela :) ummm... hi mommy i will see you tomorrow and today was hard cuz we were on the roof and my feet hurt and so do my blisters! Yesterday was pretty fun though. Well that's it from Angela! See ya soon!! :)




Sorry about that, they wouldn't stop bugging me until I let them type.




Anyway, our last day of work was awesome. The teens worked so hard. I know it's hard for most of you to believe, but they really did. This week we had teens laying felt paper, nailing shingles, doing demolition, using power tools (scary), picking up trash, removing shrubs, and eating snow cones. Lot's and lot's of snow cones.




Here are some more pictures from our great trip. We'll see you all tomorrow.






Wednesday, July 02, 2008

Day o' Fun





Today we had a great time. We just got back from a Memphis Redbirds game. The kids really had a blast. They cheered more for the third base coach than they did for the team. I'm sure that Coach Maloney has never had such a big fan base.


Earlier today we went to the go kart tracks and played a lot of mini golf. The teens all seemed to have a great time today. I'm going to post some pictures so you can see all that happened.


The other really cool thing that happened today was that in our group, our construction manager told us that today was the most productive half day his team has ever had. Our kids were amazing. I'm really proud of their work ethic this week.

Tuesday, July 01, 2008

Day Three...





The second work day is coming to a close and it was even better than the first! Due to computer glitches you are probably wondering about the other few groups. Kristin and Megan lead the group of Cody, Josh V., Amanda, Maggie and Sydney. They are busy repairing the roof at their house. During some minor demolition they uncovered some of the homeowner’s pets, dozens of wasp nests! No worries, no one was stung. Gary leads the group of Robbie, Wyatt, Dylan, Katie, Angela and Emily. And surprise…they were working on a roof too! Some students conquered their fear of heights and they are working very hard and with great attitudes. Most teams are still plugging away at their roofs. Bryan and Brooke’s team finished their roof today and began some serious demolition. They removed carpet, flooring, cabinets, sinks, and windows! Charlie displayed great patience with his team when a hammer was dropped from the roof and found a landing on his head! He is fine, but was disappointed that it didn’t happen like it does on cartoons. We all worked hard and after talking with each leader, ya’ll (were picking up some southern accents) should be very proud of your son or daughter. Each leader has been impressed with the attitudes and joy that the students are serving with. It is our continued prayer that they would bring their servant hearts home with them and impact their families and community. We are off to a Sonic run before bed. I am sure we will have much more to tell you tomorrow.

Day 2

Sorry for the delay. The internet went down at SOS. I(Megan) spent the last hour driving all over town trying to find somewhere to connect and nothing was working. I'm now sitting outside a park (picking up some of my kids from helping with VBS) and it's working.

Day 2

Today was a great day down here in Memphis. It was only 90 degrees, so we had a really cool day. I wanted to give you some updates of what each of the teams are doing this week on their projects. In my team, Kurt, is Jacob Walsh, Jacob Sanburn, Caleb, Kayli, Caroline, and Kristen P.. Sorry if I botched the spelling of the names. It looks like our project for this week will be mostly roofing. We spent a lot of day putting tar paper on the roof and also clearing some trees and brush in the backyard. We also ate a lot of snow cones. Our homeowners mother is the local snow cone lady, so she brought over her supplies and we had an all you can eat snow cone buffet today. We left the worksite with a lot of dirty clothes, some sore bodies, and very blue stained mouths. The team is in high spirits and can’t wait to lay some shingles tomorrow. I’ll update more later.

This is Charlie and in my group are Josh, Kristin F., Lauren, Sam, Mason and Ibby. Our project for this week is to continue and possibly finish roofing a house that had to have the roof reconfigured to allow better drainage. We spent the day putting down tar paper. We expect to be finished with the tar paper by mid morning tomorrow and will be moving on to shingles. Our SOS team leader is Dave Vigness and he is hopeful, as are we, that we will be able to finish this roof this week. Our homeowners have two Rottweiller’s named Jade and R. Kelly. All the kids love to hang with them on our limited breaks. Talk to you tomorrow…

Bryan and Brooke here! Our group was so rowdy that they had to put two of us in charge. We have Heather P., Aaron C., Sarah W., Morgan P., Andrew D., and Jordan W. and to be quite honest our team ROCKS! Today we were on the roof (common theme among the groups) and are pretty certain that we will finish up tomorrow morning. After that we have windows to demolish and new ones to install. Our home is in pretty much disarray and there is a lot to be done. Today we had great attitudes and we expect the same, because our teens are amazing. Until tomorrow….


Hi, this is Joe. I had an unbelievable time getting to hang out and serve with your kids today. In my group are Cove, Alex, Blake, Riley, Lexie, and Mackenzie. They were great. It was funny at first. They were so nervous getting on the roof for the first time. But looking at them an hour later, it was like a whole new group of kids. They had their roof legs and were running around on the roof like it was their profession. Well, I better go. It looks like us leaders are getting ready to have a dance contest. Don’t worry, I’ll represent your kids well. Talk to you later.

This is Mark, I am the adult with the group of Ryan D., Jacob V, Brandon P , Aly S., Mellisa W., & Paige D. What a group it has been. This morning at chapel before we went to our home to work on, the devotion leader was talking about how 200 junior high kids were here and that we needed to work as one, get along, and cooperate. The only way this can happen is from God. I saw that happening today with your children. We walked onto the job site and Mrs McVey, who is the woman whose house we are repairing, immediately told our group that she was very disappointed with the high school group that was here last week. They goofed off and got very little done during the week. So our group went up on the roof (yes they all went on the roof and became very good at carefully moving around and removing the shingles). By 11 am they had already done more than the high schoolers did. When it was lunch time she praised and bragged on our kids. She could not believe how much work they had done. Our team leader from SOS was astonished how much work they accomplished and how well they worked together. In fact this is the first Jr High group he has ever worked with and to date he said this is the best cooperative and hard working group he had. He was comparing this to high schoolers. The important point is that your kids are taking to heart helping others and in that way demonstrating their Christian faith. As we left today exhausted (at least me) and all dirty, I heard Mrs. McVey tell our SOS leader that she wanted our group back tomorrow and even for the next 2 weeks. Your children’s faith and demonstration of God’s love is evident. You should be proud.