Things I Learned in Kentucky

1. The joy of serving others without desiring or expecting anything in return.

2. Learning how to use a drill and realizing the pleasure of pounding a nail into a board with very few strikes of a hammer

3. Two Chicks in Vinyl- "We lock it tight."


4. Getting to know people in our church whose paths usually do not cross

5. Dwight's experience as an Army tank commander explains his approach to driving the bus.

6. Overcoming a fear of ladders

7. The gratitude of the family we served

8. The teamwork of our group


9. Chigger bites

10. Sporadic cell phone reception on the calling rock and hiking to the mission dorm for wifi

11. Being in awe of people who choose to spend their lives serving the under-represented, uncared for, and unheard in society

12. You don't need a radio when Chuckles is around.


13. Feeling much more appreciative of my lifestyle and my blessings

14. A building trip is a great way for teens to learn life skills such as carpentry, measurement, etc.

15. The men's latrine and the females' excitement about being allowed to use the indoor restroom

16. Trying to understand the locals' tug-of-war between trying to leave such an impoverished area vs. staying near family and comfortable surroundings

17. The pleasure of not thinking about my appearance or minutiae of my life for a week

18. The thrill of seeing Curly Girl enjoying serving others


19. Getting to know the family we served


20. Trying to figure out how and when I can serve on another mission trip

Frakes, Kentucky- Final Day

Snapshot of Day 5 in Frakes:

We worked from about 9am to 9pm.

The gang working on the new room finished the walls, put on the roof, and covered it with tar paper.

The vinyl siding crew worked feverishly to complete the siding, but ran into some snags when the siding would not fit exactly into place. Just remember that buildings, especially trailers set on cinder blocks, settle over 35 years and hardly anything ended up being square. We also learned that measuring and cutting siding to fit small areas takes forever to do.

The family we helped was absolutely fabulous. They helped us work and even prepared a fabulous lunch for us on Friday.

Near the end of the week:

Our work team in front of the completed home:

The family in their new room. They plan to use the addition as a living room, and the current living room will become a dining room. Before the room was added, the trailer only had a small bar-like counter where the family could eat together.

Going to Frakes was a fabulous experience, and I look forward to working on another building team in the future!

Frakes, Kentucky- Day 4

Snapshot of Day 4:

We worked ten hours.

It rained a lot last night, so we had to battle mud this morning.

We made great progress today.

We met more of the homeowners' family when they stopped by this afternoon to express their gratitude for our work. Their excitement lessened our aches, pains, and itchy bug bites.

Siding crew:

The room addition gang:

End of Day 4:

Frakes, Kentucky- Day 3

Wednesdays are officially scheduled as off-days for Henderson Settlement work teams. Our gang opted to work this morning, though, and take off the afternoon to go into town. At breakfast this morning, the homeowners' daughter who works at Henderson Settlement, stopped by our table to say hello and thank us for the work we are doing for her parents. Better yet, she brought us a homemade German chocolate cake she made- yum!

When we arrived at the work site, our crew broke into the vinyl siding group and the gang working on the room addition. The homeowners' son and grandson came over to work again today, and we also met Tommy's sister-in-law who stopped by to introduce herself.

After installing the strips which the vinyl siding will fit into, placing and securing the vinyl siding moved rather quickly.









The group finished securing the floor joists, placed black plastic under them, and installed the sub-floor for the additional room.






Here is where we were at the end of Wednesday, Day 3.










Please keep us in your prayers on Thursday since we are planning to work a longer-than-usual day so we can make a lot of progress on the home.

Frakes, Kentucky- Day 2

Day 2 began like every other day- with devotions on the side of the mountain. The misty fog rising in the distance frames an incredible scene on which to meditate each morning.


Once we arrived at the work site, our crew split into two groups- the siding crew and the gang building the additional room onto the rear of the trailer.

The siding crew first finished framing the windows and nailing 2 x 4s every two feet all around the trailer. After that, we cut insulation board and nailed it between the 2 x 4s, all the while battling the wasps which continue to bombard us. As we installed the boards, we constantly experienced difficulty with getting the nails to catch onto something more substantial than the trailer's current thirty-five-year-old metal siding. (Yes, the family's trailer home is thirty-five years old.) After checking inside some of the spots where the old siding had pulled away, we realized the trailer only contained wet foam-like insulation between the current metal siding and interior walls. So we hope that the additional insulation board and vinyl siding we install will certainly keep the family warmer during the winter.












The other half of our crew continued to labor on the the floor for the new room. The guys secured the floor joists and laid the beams, but ran into a snag upon realizing that the trailer's existing concrete pad outside the back door was actually extending into the area where beams would need to be laid. This led to a lengthy process of using a sledgehammer to bust up the concrete pad and then haul away the rock.











We were joined by two new helpers today. The homeowner's son-in-law and twenty-one-year-old grandson spent the day working with us, too.

By the end of day two, we had definitely made more progress, but obviously have much more work to do.











During tonight's program at Henderson Settlement, we learned that the amount of poverty in the area greatly exceeds the Kentucky and national averages. Bell County where Henderson Settlement in located ranks as the twentieth poorest county in the entire country. Due to poor health care and a history of working in the mines, approximately one-third of Bell County's residents are disabled. Those statistics really clarified for me not only how blessed I truly am, but how great people's needs in our own country truly are.