So, with another five or six homes under construction in various stages of completion, we had "Let's get Jackie home by Christmas" dumped in our laps (isn't quite right, but that conveys the idea).
Last week we got the green light and put all of our attention in staging the sight with materials and doing the prebuild- cuttting all the pieces that get nailed together to make the house . This is a joint venture with Calvary Baptist Church, the University of Alabama's business school and Habitat. The first two groups raised the $60K and Habitat is providing the leadership and skills to get this new home built by Christmas. Calvary has a home repair ministry and Jackie Wright had been one of the folks they had been helping over the years. She is a single mom and lives with her sister and three adopted nephews. The home that they lived in wasn't actually livable, with gaping holes in the wall, holes in the floor and utilitiy bills that exceeded $500/mo. So, we tore the old house down and will build a new one on the same spot in two weeks. Yesterday morning, first official day of the build, we had the foundation in, the floor system built and the saferoom completed. The two long walls laid out and ready to nail together. At 8:00 am had our kick-off meeting. Local TV, city officials, sponsors et al, had a couple of speeches, prayed, then off we went. All walls up by 10. Trusses set by lunch. (Somebody pre-cut the angle pieces for the gable end and built the fly rafters in the pre-build protion). All wall and roof sheathing installed and taped by 3pm. Sent 'em home early. Seems like we are on track. Stay tuned.