Man, I love my job! Go ahead, ask me why. OK, I'll tell you. I get to work with great people from all over this nation ( and the world) to build homes for people that normally wouldn't be able to buy their own home. Some of the great people that were here with us this last week are the Kairos Carpenters. This is a group of friends that have been going on mission trips both here and overseas for over twenty years. The group is led by a couple, Larry and Cheryl Winger. They are farmers from Lafayette, Indiana. they own a bunch of acres and also harvest for about ten other farms nearby with the big ole John Deere harvester. Larry invited me up to his farm after a build in Indianapolis a few years back and let me drive that thing. But I digress. This past week is the seventh group that the KC's have spent with us in Tuscaloosa in nearly three years. The group stayed at our camp in Cottondale called Y's Acres (it is owned by the local YMCA) and Habitat restored and runs the camp. It can house up to 40 volunteers at a time. One of the special perks that we are recipients of when they are here is that Cheryl makes the rounds to all of the sites- we had four houses under construction this past week- with here car turned into the chuck wagon- filled with thermoses of coffee and hot chocolate, homemade cookies and , MMM! Hot now Krispy Kreme doughnuts!
     Another returning group that was with us is a small Christian high school form Florida called Seven Rivers . They brought their entire senior class of 15 or so students. This was their third annual visit with us. Dana James, the headmaster, told me that the school is growing and that the visit next years will probably double in size. I felt so bad for a number of the students because when they piled off their schoolbus on the first day, none of the girls had brought coats and jackets with them and it was feerrr-eeezzing on their first day. Fortunately it warmed up for the rest of the week.
     The RV Care-A-Vanners are also still coming to work with us, and we have some boomerangers with them as well. Lavern and Sue Clark came back to spend a cupla weeks with us again. Mary and Dave Vandeveldt, the coordinators of that program also came for a visit last week. We are working on getting RV spots available again out at Y's Acres.
     A few years ago, my former wife told me- "You have and easy job". Since herding cats is actually not that easy, I asked her why she thought that. Lois said, "Everyone that comes to work with you comes ready to roll up their sleeves and get to work . I suppose that's mostly true. However, I had somewhat of a challenge with another of the groups that was with us this past week, They are the Indy Tigers from Indianapplois. It is comprised of a group of mostly retired fellows that work every Tuesday at their affiliate back home. I know that there are many ways to skin a cat and build a house, but these guys way seemed to be 180 degrees from the way that I am used to doing. They were also somewhat set in their ways and didn't take what I thought would be a good suggestion to them for getting a task done more efficiently. Anyway, on Thursday night, I told myself, just let them be and go install the columns by yourself. If they need anything, help them out. Brandon, our construction supervisor, is highly organized and has made our jobs extremely easy also. One of the documents that he has is a little booklet on "how to build a saferoom" and how to build a storage shed. We have built 38 saferooms and 38 storage buildings behind the 38 homes that we have built here . The booklet has step by step instructions - what length of wood to use to cut into what pieces, etc. On their last day here, I gave them the booklet and asked to please build the storage building. Somehow, they managed to make the drawing on how to cut the truss parts not work. (They used 2x6's instead of 2x4's) Oh well,   I still love them and hope they come back again. We did get a lot done- On the cold Monday that we started, there was only a slab and on Friday there was the shell of a house with doors and windows installed and a roof blacked in, and a somewhat unique storage building out back.
     We also had a day visit by good friend Bill Lifsey and wife Jane, in town to interview our staff concerning the response to the tornado. Bill spent a month with us here last year and he was block captain in LaFlorida, Peru last May at the Millard Fuller Legacy Build.
     Speaking of which, I'm fired up about the same Millard Fuller Legacy Build that will be this year in Luuuhhhville, Kentucky. Why does spellcheck not like the way I spelled that? It's pronounced correctly, at least . It runs from April 6 thru 13th and we will be rehabbing ten homes and building 2 new. I offered to go there a week early to help with the prebuild/staging. 
      Spring is in the air here. Son Alex and I were re-doing the planting beds at the Lion's Den. The daffoldils are popping up, the birds are back singing their songs in the morning and we hope to soon be done with this cold down here in the south.
     March madness will continue with inundation of college kids on their spring break. We have 80-ish here starting Monday this week. UVA, FSU, USC and GWU, all out in force,spending their spring breaks doing something good instead of something else. We love the happy trouble of keeping all these guys busy and safe and having a good time.
     Alex and I are going thru the New Testament for Lent and fasting various things each week as we go, based on a guide for Lent that was put together by Capstone Church. So far, so good!
     That's all for this week. Ciao. Love you all!   Peter