Michael and Ashley's Group:

Our homeowner has lived in her house for aobut 30 years. For the last 9 years, she has lived as a widow without aide for upkeep or restoration of her home. The previous SOS crews have recreated the back of her house and have fixed the roof--and the work they did was amazing! However, the remaining walls of the home and interior still need to be fixed.

Outfitted in Haz-Mat suits, we tore down the existing siding and were horrifed to discover that her house was without any insulation. We have now installed insulation, put up OSB board, replaced her window, and will begin tomorrow putting up the next layer of boards.

On the inside, we are completely reconstructing her kitchen floor from the ground up! Upon arrival, her fridge and water heater were close to falling through the floor; you could feel the floor give beneath your feet as you walked. By the end of the week, she'll have a new, safe floor!

Our homeowner continues to hug us, thank us, tell us that she prayed for us, and that we are angels. In truth, she is our blessing and angel, and we thank God for the opportunity to glorify Him through serving her.


Josh Polkow's Group:

Hey, this is Josh! My group is Patrick Maloney, Alex B, Phillip O, Johnny, Noah E, Olivia C, and Hannah H. We are working on the home of the Johnson family. The Johnson family has four kids; one of them is an eleven-year-old named Josh who the boys in our group have really attached to.

Monday we worked on the roof of the house; Tuesday and Wednesday we worked on their fence, built garden beds, and did clean-up work around the interior of the house. The kids have worked really hard, but the majority of the time has been spent in relational ministry, spending time with the kids and their friends. Tomorrow we hope to finish tarpapering the roof and doing more shingling!


Ed and Dean's Group:

Team Dean and Ed are off to a great start to our week. Eric, Matt, Pat, Jason, Audry, Sarah, Matty and Lexie along with Dean and I have made a great team thus far.

We are working at a home in Bing Hampton owned by Miss Shirley. She is 32 years old and very friendly. Her family has lived in this home for the last 10 years. She has three children. A 15 year old, Chris, who left on a Greyhound bus to St Louis in order to spend the sumer with his Dad. A 14 year old, Kim who has kept to herself so far this week. The third child is Jasmen. She is 8 and the team has spent a lot of time loving on her this week along with her 5 year old friend Amber.

Our project for the week is to re-roof the front of Miss Shirley's hous. We are ready to finish shingling on Thursday.

Dean and I have been very impressed with the teams hard work thus far on our project, but we have been even more impressed with their focus during our devotionals at lunch each day.

What an amazing experience for the teenagers as well as Dean and I.