Day One - Ferry Place

Back row: Brent, Sue, Lisa; Front row: Scott, Rachel, Allison

Our work site this year is by the river on the border of Orleans and Jefferson Parrish. We're working on Ferry Street, right next to some fairly busy train tracks. The street is mostly new construction, except for a few houses that need lots of repair.

We found out this morning that we don't need to be there till 8 AM each day and we'll work till about 3:30 or so. Our day started with the basics, safety, and who's working on which house, which was all based off of whether you're afraid of heights or not. Scott and Rachel were supposed to be siding the second floor of one house, well, I guess they did, but then they had to take it all apart because their house is crooked...OOPS! I also saw Brent up on the roof of another house...I think also doing siding, but I'm not entirely sure. Allison, Lisa and I were on another house doing a bunch of different tasks. Lisa and I rocked the circular saw for a bit to try it out, we did MUCH better than some of the other volunteers! Then I headed up to the roof to work on sheeting. Allison and Lisa were installing trusses on the second floor. We also did insulation on two houses...that was not the best task to have all the cottony stuff attacking you...most of us sneezed quite a bit!

There was a lot of moving around today and we did get rained on for a brief bit, and it is humid, humid, humid today...I forgot what humidity felt like!!! All in all it was a decent day.

I have pictures! Unfortunately I'm not only having internet issues, but I'm also having camera downloading issues. I'll try again later to add some photos.

Till later...

Sue

Landed!

We arrived without a hitch! Allison and I were the first to arrive so we headed over to our work site so that we wouldn't be trying to figure it out early Tuesday morning. The houses are two stories this year, and very colorful. We checked in around 2 PM to our humble abode for the week. Not nearly as eclectic as last year and the internet connection is worse, but I'll try to make do. So let me apologize in advance if there's a delay in our updates because it was a struggle to get on.

Rachel, Lisa, Scott, and Brent arrived a few hours after us so we all met up for dinner last night at Pierre something or other. We took a walk around the quarter to work off dinner so that we could head to Cafe Du Monde for some tasty treats. Lisa, Allison, and I ended the night with a trip to Mango Mango...pretty darn good daiquiris!


We start our hard work Tuesday at 7:45 AM...looking forward to seeing what we'll be working on! Till then...

Sue

One week out

I totally have ants in my pants. Maybe its the long winter, or just because the experience was so wonderful last year that I've been dying to go back.

I'm looking forward to enjoying this trip with Allison, Jan, Scott, Jessica, Femi, and Shatisha, and also our friends Rachel, Lisa, Brent, and Bruce, from the Omaha Jaycees.

Hopefully our hotel's wireless works so I can post to the blog...we've read some bad reviews from trip advisor...but I'm going to hope for the best!

Follow our volunteer experience here!

Take care,
Sue