12/8 Update, Team One has arrived.

The first of two teams, each expected to stay a week, has arrived.

The first team is experienced in Katrina recovery work, having team in New Orlenans, but new to Mississippi. Greg Jackson from Williston, Vermont attends the Williston Federated Church. He is joined by Dave Kay from Virginia, Barb Nuetzmann from Illinois and Steve Matteson of Louisiana.

Word is that the floors are down in the Pittman House, the walls are painted and some doors have been installed.

The clapboard and windows on the outside needed additional caulking and painting. There is still some sofit work on the outside. The rest of the doors, the trim, cabinets, toilets, sinks and countertops all need installation. Finally there is some finish electrical work to be done.

On Wednesday and Thursday a second team of Tony Lamb, Will Metro and Harley Donnelly from Williston, and Bob Platt from Shelburne Vermont will arrive for a second week.

By going we guarantee that the two houses we have an attachment to will be completed before Christmas. One or both may have been completed anyway, but this insures that they are and makes it possible for other houses to approach completion as well.

John the Baptist is working with them on the Pittman House.

12/01/08 Update

Camp Hope was closed last week so no work was done. We are looking for a small team of volunteers to return in the next two weeks to help complete the work. Contact Tony Lamb alamb@alamblaw.com if interested.

Update 11-25-08

Larry and Ann report as follows:

Vermont house, mudded and finished by experts from International Relief out of San Diego. Also sprayed for orange peel. Ready for painting Friday afternoon. Site shut down for a week. Expect painters the following week. Ann and I built the back deck and finished the front deck.

Waxton house, finished by the same group last week and painted Friday. Most of the junk out of the yard.
Linda's Grandson returning from Iraq in December.

Latest Info-11-19-08

Waxton house:
Last week Ann and Larry Barber built the back deck.
It has been taped plastered and expected to be painted Tuesday.
The exterior doors had to be adjusted as they were not correctly installed.
Some outlets and light fixture boxes were sheet rocked over but have been found.
All interior doors were adjusted to fit standard sized doors

Pittman House

Ann and Larry Barber finished the front deck to day and started the back deck which they will finish Wednesday
The sewer, water and electric lines have been buried.
Last week a team from Blacksburg Virginia taped and mudded.
Wednesday a volunteer professional will finish the mudding and it should be painted by Friday.

Next week is shut down and two more weeks of shutdown next month
and then depending on volunteers coming in, the apparent target for completion is January

Ann and Larry Barber have done 20 assessments to date and have three more to go.


Ann and Larry Barber are members of First Church in Burlington and live in Williston. They are long term volunteers in Mississippi, but will be home for the holidays.

The Color.

UMCOR normally provides a limited color pallet. White and Beige. We chose to pay for the paint ourselves and give Mrs. Pittman a choice. We showed her the color chips from Lowes and she chose the color. She did not know the significance of the colors name until after she chose Montpelier Peach.

The Last Full Day.

On Friday, we worked as long as we could with the sheet rock that we had and made great progress. Almost the entire inside sheet rock was complete. There are a couple of walls left to do. A group of the team from Shelburne was going to work on Saturday and do what they could to complete that work. There was also about two pieces of siding to be put up on the back and that would be done. Many people worked to caulk seams and around the windows. Some followed along and touched up the prepainted siding.

As we left it looked great.

Next trip

There is a trip planned to Gulfport, Mississippi the last week of February 2009. We will be doing renovations in the same area. The Gulfport site requires us to do some additional chores, including cooking, but the work is the same. For information contact Tony Lamb at alamb@alamblaw.com or 802-878-1251 (nights) or 802-876-1200 (days).