This past week we hosted a great group who came down from Lancaster, Pa. to help build Keith and Amy's new home. They were from Highland Presbyterian church and they were a joy to work with. Many of the folks in the group were highly skilled and made my job easy for the week. Larry, the leader of the group, has vast experience working with Habitat at home and also leading and instructing volunteers. All I had to do was say, "Make with window trim units", show him the stack of wood, hook him up with his helper and off he went. When I came back later, it was done and done well. Refreshing! Howard was great too- same thing- little direction, show him the materials and Voila! Attic stairs- done;  side porch deck, done; etc. John and Jim were special ops working on getting the saferoom on the house next door ready and installing the mudsills over the block for the next home. Their team, together with our faithful law students from U of A, finished installing most of the bamboo flooring and also hung most of the interior doors and cut and fit a bunch of gthe baseboard after the flooring was installed. Amy (the future homeowner) has been working right beside us the whole time and has just passed 300 of her sweat equity hours that are needed before she (and Keith and kids) can move in.
     Brandon has been working out at "the pit" . Future home site with quite a steep sloped lot that posed lots of challenges. We had to hire a concrete boom truck to place the concrete in the stepped footings and all of the block had to be schlepped (sp?) up and down little goat paths.   Saturday, though, Brandon hosted a group from his church here and they were able to install the floor framing and deck plywood, so that it no longer looks so challenging. Cat is going to frame a six foot wide exterior deck at the whole length of the back of the house which will remain part of the house but will also serve as a level platform for volunteers to work on while framing the house walls and roof, which I understand will happen friday of this week. Pictures forthcoming. 
     Returning to Y's Acres tommorrow and Wednesday to try to finish up the kitchen and bathrooms and start on trailer number two. Jared tells me we have groups scheduled to start staying there in the middle of this month- guess we better hurry up.  Aaron the plumber got the new septic system installed and just completed running new 300 ft of drain lines. So were dangerously close there too.
      Thank you all who have come to volunteer with us and hope that you will consider coming back again (and bring a friend!)   Over and out.   Peter    
     Birthday wishes this week to my son Paul (some readers may have met and worked with him). He turns 23 on Saturday.