Happy 2012 to all! There are a couple of new beginnings here in the start of the New Year. We finally reached an agreement with the local YMCA for us to use the awesome camp in the woods to begin housing volunteers who come to Tuscaloosa to work with Habitat. We begin on this Tuesday the scraping, painting, roof repair, putting together a kitchen, building bunkbeds, etc. in order to get Y's Acres (that's the name of the camp) ready to house up to forty volunteers per week. The camp had fallen into a state of disrepair over the years and our agreement with the Y is that we will fix it up and then we get to use it. A win-win for all parties involved and especially for the city of Tuscaloosa, that still today, six months after the tornado, there are piles of debris all along the major streets in Alberta city- a section of T-town where we have two homes under construction and lots ready for another three. Until now, it has been a number of the local churches, such as 1st Presbyterian, that has opened their doors as volunteer housing. One would have thought that in a situation where a major part of the city is destroyed by a natural disaster that the city itself would have stepped up and made some arrangement for those folks willing to come from all over this country to help. And the volunteers do continue to show up- we had a great group from West Virginia at the start of the new year and this week had groups from Maryland, Wooster, Mass and Georgia (Ogelthorpe University). We are currently working on three sites and depending on how many people show up, we keep all three going at once. It,s a bit of a juggling act with the tools and materials, but that's what we're here for. In other news, on a more personal level, I have just purchased a home here in Tuscaloosa. I had been living in my friend (and boss) Brandon's basement and I figured since I would be here for at least one year that I would buy a house. So I did. I'm determined not to fill it up with stuff. The move from Brandon's house was pretty simple- my bed and couple of boxes made it in one trip with the caravan (my work truck with all but the front seats removed). It's a small 3 bed/2 bath. I was thinking when I first came here that I would get one with the roof missing, save money and fix it myself, however the reality that there are not enough hours in the day for that type of activity, the house that found me needs no work done to it.  
   And finally, the last piece of good news is that we are expecting the arrival of our NCCC Americorp team this week . They will be working with us until March. They provide a great boon to'our'operation. Well, that's all for now- till next time- Peace out- Peter