Monday, October 25 2010

Tony spent a good 40+ hours over the past week on the Megarusalem room at church. It was never fully finished last year. Tony finished the mural that was started by a professional muralist, but never completed. With Karol's help two of the days, they also added a bunch of other details. I'll take pictures and blog them at a later date.

Tim, with the help of the guys, hung the cabinets and finished the shelves in the second dorm where the work shop will be. He's also hung shop lights in there, and started organizing all of the tools.

Dave Detloff came two days last week to finish the tongue and groove in the dorm room that he started a few weeks ago. That room is now ready for polyurethane and paint on the ceiling.

Molly's been working on editing pictures that she' taken for people.

Chrissy, with the help of Jen (before she left) printed labels for the 800 newsletters we had printed. They also had to put on the labels and organize all of them by zip code so that they could go out bulk mail.

Karol spent the better part of two days designing wood bunk beds for the dorms. There are two guys who have volunteered to build the beds for us, so it was time to nail down exactly what they should look like. It took online and code book research to get the overall dimension guidelines, then decisions had to be made on built in storage. Then precise plans were drawn up so that they could be built from the plans. Since it ended up being such a complex thing, we decided to have Tim build one prototype to make sure that all of the details are how we want them.

Before the rains set in, Tim and the guys started to reroof Molly's place. Nick and Richard took off some of the old roofing and the metal trim and edging. Then they were able to start putting on the metal roof.

We had a work day on Saturday. Mike Waldrop and Dave Detloff came for the day. They hung drywall on the ceilings in the second dorm.

Wednesday, October 20, 2010

Wow. We had probably the best work day ever last Saturday. We had a huge group, numbering over 35, from Cedar Grove, WI., and a smaller group of about 5 from West Bend. They got a ton of stuff done, and Tim did a great job of organizing so many different jobs and getting all of the tools ready for them. There were always at least 6 different jobs going at a time, so knowing that I'd never remember everything on my own, I took pictures of each.

Below, Marceaux is putting the finishing touches on the lift that he built for the washer and dryer that he and Jen will be using, located in their basement. He used treated lumber to build the platform that will keep the appliances off of the damp floor and any water that may end up there. Jen is excited at the prospect of not carrying her laundry up to the Hartley House every week!

They also started on the exterior of Molly's house. In the plans are a new roof and all new "siding". They started on the pump house, which was changed around last year. In the pic below, you can see a couple of ladies digging out the ground on the backside of the pump house. With the house being in the hill, there's always concern for proper water drainage. After digging out the dirt against the wall of the pump house, they put a plastic barrier against the wall to keep out ground water, then refilled the dirt with the proper pitch so the water will drain away from the building.

When comparing the pic above and below, you can see that the volunteers also firred and sheeted the exterior of the pump house, covering over where the old door had been.

They also firred and sheeted the exterior of the house that will be covered with cedar shakes. The entire exterior will basically be shakes and stone.

These guys spent the day doing masonry work. Richard mixed the mortar for them to apply the cultured stone to two of the porches on the Lumberjack Lodge (women's dorm). There's still one porch to go, then the mortar between the stones (like grout).

This gentleman worked mostly by himself in one of the unfinished bathrooms in the dorm. He drywalled the upper two feet of the room, then got a better part of the durarock (needed for tile) on the lower part of the walls.

The smaller crew from the West Bend church worked on the porch of the craft cabin (temporarily Jen and Marceaux') The did beautiful work on the tongue and groove that they put along the edge of the porch.

Looks good, huh?

Sorry, not the best picture in the world. This crew drywalled the ceilings in the dorm rooms of the Trapline Lodge (men's dorm). The Hartley House guys had already put up the plastic and much of the insulation and with the "lids" on, Tim can soon blow insulation into the ceilings, which is critical if we don't want to go broke heating this building this winter.

Below is our super speedy crew that installed the "buffalo board" (rigid sound insulation, so that future campers won't hear their neighbors snores in the night). On top of this board will be the tongue and groove. If I recall correctly, this crew got 3 1/2 rooms done.

Naturally, a fall work day is going to include raking leaves. And many a leaf did they rake! Molly and Jen headed up this crew, and I know that they were pretty pooped at the end of the day!

Raking this solid carpet of leaves made for a landscape of piles as far as the eye can see. A small crew used the tarp and pick up truck method to move the piles to the burn pile at the back of the property.
This gentleman worked with Dave Detloff, whom came up on a whim, on the tongue and groove in the room that Dave had started a couple of weeks ago. This is the last room in the Lumberjack Lodge that needed the tongue and groove. They didn't quite finish, so Dave came back yesterday and finished the job! Poly time.

A group of women started the day in the third room of the Lakeside Lodge. Karol had applied one coat of Polyurethane the previous week, so that they could start off by sanding the walls lightly, dusting off, and putting the second and final coat of polyurethane on the walls. This room will soon be used as a workout room. The circuit equipment we had donated a few years back has been in the nature center, but since that building isn't heated, it will be set up in this room. (Eventually, the equipment will be in a permanent exercise room in the new garage.)

The ladies also had to move an immense amount of tongue and groove from the dorm bathroom to the porch, then a pick up was pulled around and it was loaded into it to be moved to the other dorm where it will be used for the dorm room walls. The sand near this dorm was very soft, so both trips of wood that they loaded onto the truck weighed it down just enough that the truck, even in 4 wheel, couldn't get out without a tow from the bulldozer. It was worth it though because it was a lot of wood to move by hand.

These guys worked on trimming out the bathroom of the Birch cabin (black room in the Lumberjack Lodge)

Wednesday, October 13

Here's what's been happening since our last blog:
Dave Detloff (from Living Hope Church) has been up 3 times to work on trim and tongue and groove in the dorms. He has the trim in one room done and two walls done (with tongue and groove) in another. We really appreciate all the hard work he has put in!

Last week, Tony and Jen spent a lot of time preparing for our trip to a Joni and Friends disability summit in Palos Heights, IL. They taught a class on The Able Church. They both spoke on the philosophy and practical matters of the church. Tony and Jen took video footage at Able and made a 7 minute video showing how Able uses people with disabilities to lead the church. It was pretty powerful and many people got alot out of the class. Some people that work with people with disabilities don't see the leadership potential of people with disabilities, so I'm sure that it was an eye opener for many. Especially when they saw on of our campers, Jesse Towne, preaching. It was awesome!
Regarding the trip, Tony, Karol, Tim, Chrissy, Jen, Marceaux, Molly and Tim Mandich all loaded into the bus after Able last Friday and drove to IL for the conference. We all went to different break out sessions and each gleaned some valuable information from the conference. We got home pretty late on Saturday, but it was well worth the trip. Tony's been spending a lot of time on the bulldozer this past week. The two proceeding pics show some of his handiwork, but like I said before, it's really hard to appreciate all of the earth moving. The area behind the dorm in the first pic below shows the finished grade for that area. The top soil spreading, started during the youth weekend, was finished and seed was planted in the area. Richard's been watering every other day since.

Tim spent a good day filling the dump truck with top soil, driving it to the area between the two dorms, dumping, driving back to the dirt pile, transferring from the dump truck to the excavator (which, although sold, is thankfully still here) and using it to fill the dump truck again. I won't even hazard a guess as to how many times this process took place, all to get the top soil to where Tony could use it to sculpt the earth. After Tony was done with the dozer, then he used an ATV to drag a metal bed frame to smooth out the dirt and bring up the large pieces of rock and debris. The second order of seed was delivered today, so pretty soon this area will be seeded and rolled. Lucky Richard, in having another couple thousand square feet to keep watered!

Jen, Molly and Karol have been taking advantage of the warm weather by cleaning up the flower beds on the grounds. Jen also finished staining the Hartley House deck. There were some parts that they didn't get to on the youth weekend.

Tim and the guys have been working in the Trapline Lodge dorm. They've been insulating the ceilings and getting them ready for drywall. Also, there was a bunch of stuff stored in there, that was moved to the storage unit down the road.

The guys from Ideal Air were here yesterday and today installing the furnaces for the Trapline Lodge.

Chrissy got the newslette off to the printer. She'll be picking it up tomorrow and hopefully addresses will be done by Friday so it can be in your mailbox by Monday. If you don't receive our newsletter, and would like to, please email us at info@campdaniel.org and we'll get you on the list.

Monday, October 4

This past week has been more quiet around here than is usual. It reminds me to be extra thankful for the blessing that being a missionary is. Granted, there are many weeks that we, at Camp Daniel, work double and triple time, but it really is nice to be able to have a week like we did last week. Molly was able to go to her parents' and visit with a family friend, whom is dying of cancer. She was visited with an uncle, whom lives out of town, that she doesn't see much. Jen and Marceaux spent the week in Green Bay. Sunday and Monday nights, Jen spent the night at a hospital in Green Bay to minister to and be supportive of, Judy, Amanda's mom, as Amanda's grandmother was dying. On Monday, Jen helped Amanda and Sarah work on speeches that they were go give at the Down Syndrome Awareness walk last Saturday. Amanda's grandma, Evelyn, did die on Tuesday, and Jen helped with funeral arrangements the rest of the week. Tuesday evening, Jen, Sabrina and Sarah went to Amanda's to visit with her. They made dinner, and watched a movie together. Isn't all that what friendship and ministry are all about?!
Early Wednesday morning, Jen, Marceaux and Tony headed for O'Hare Airport for a day of round table discussion with other disability ministers from around the country. After the meetings, they drove to downtown Chicago, as Marceaux had never been there. He was impressed by the sights. Then they stopped for dinner at Ed Debevic's, a fifties diner style restaurant. Afterwards they headed home. It was a long day, as Tony didn't get home till after midnight. Earlier in the week, Marceaux was working on the Mega Micro Mini Bus. The disability walk went well on Saturday.

Also last Saturday, was the second annual Mega Car Show for Kids. Tony spent the better part of last week preparing for that. The weather last Saturday was better than last year, but not as pleasant as we would have liked. We're already preparing for next year.

Tim Kelly spent the better part of last week with his mom in Green Bay, as she had surgery on Wednesday, went home on Thursday to start recuperation. Again, what a blessing to be able to take the time to take care of family and be a blessing for others. Today, Tim is finished drywalling the ceiling in the dorm and started plastering it. The goal is to have the next work day group paint that ceiling, so that the work room can be moved into that room.

Chrissy has been working on the newsletter this past week or so. It's getting close. We are not writers around here, so the editing is pretty heavy. As a matter of fact, Chrissy just asked me to go over it again.

Wednesday, September 29

Well alot has happened since our last blog last week, but I think I'll focus on the youth work weekend we just had. The Faith Presbyterian Church (Crivitz) youth group sponsored the work weekend. We also invited all of the younger counselors that we had at Camp this summer. Most of the kids came Friday night and worked thru Sunday at noon. The above picture really captures this group. Getting stuff done, while never losing sight of having fun and being a bit dramatic! There were 15 to 20 workers here, and let me show you how much they got done:

Joe T, Pat Neitzer and Nick hanging drywall in the Trapline Lodge dorm room that will be used as a work room this winter.

Nick and Brian were able to do some plastering under the mentorship of Luke Kotecki.

Luke did all of the high plastering after they taped all of the joints and put the metal corner pieces on the outside corners.

Here the kids are "working" at spreading topsoil around the Trapline Lodge. Looks like they're having too much fun..

Tim had Pat do some caulking on the Trapline Lodge.

Now we get to the bulk of work that was done. Staining. Here Molly and Emily Neitzer are staining a porch on the Trapline Lodge. They did three of the four, as the fourth one had too much stuff in the way to get to the siding.

Karol bleached the eight dormers on the Lumberjack Lodge where the siding had turned black from the snow sitting up against the wood. After she was done, Nick Sterry, Johanna Hensler, McKenna Kelly and Emily braved the dangers of being on the roof and stained all eight dormers.

JoJo was a bit nervous, but she did great!

The kids found a great way to have fun. A hose and sand. Really, the possibilities are endless.

Staining..

More staining...

Did I mention that they stained?

Last Friday, Anthony got to drive the excavator all by himself, for the first time. Tony stood outside the cab and told him what to do. He moved loads of gravel into the dump truck, to be used on the roads.

Also here on Saturday were Jerry Reiss, Dewey Sessler and two of his boys. They started the plumbing in the Trapline Lodge. They ran supply lines, and ran lines to where the furnace and water heaters will be. Also, a faucet was installed so that we have water in that dorm now for construction purposes. It was a huge jump start to getting that building done. Tim also had them move an outside faucet on the back of the craft cabin and install the washing machine in the basement of said building. We're always extra appreciative to have skilled labor here on work days. Tim was not about to let either of these guys touch a staining brush!!

So when the dust settled, and the staining brushes were all clean, here's what the teens did in a weekend: stained the entire Lumberjack Lodge, stained the logs on the Trapline lodge, raked out dirt, stained the Hartley House deck, stairs and lattice, filled in the trenches from the buried propane tanks, drywalled one ceiling, got about half done on the plaster work for ceiling of dorm in Lumberjack, caulked some of the Trapline Lodge.

Monday September 20

Tony and I have always said that there's so much work done that no one will ever realize. Some of that is just brain time; time spent thinking about the best way to do something, and some of it is physical work that goes unnoticed because, in the end, it just looks "right". The main example of this phenomena is the excavation of the grounds: knocking down hills a few feet, making a level area larger, easing a grade difference, making low areas for run off water to gather in, etc. Well, this past week there's been a lot of this kind of thing going on. Tony and Tim have spent a lot of time in the bulldozer and excavator, respectively. Don't forget to give Marceaux credit for keeping those old beasts running! So it all started with the need to dig the trenches for the lines that will carry the propane to the dorm heaters. (Remember that the propane tanks were installed a couple of weeks ago) That led to the need to decide where poured concrete walkways would be, which, in turn lead to Tony bulldozing to get to a finished grade. Once he started he realized that the second (men's or Trapline Lodge) was a good 2-3' lower than the other dorm. This required a way to grade change without all of the water running in towards the building. So he cut away a bunch of the fill and he and I spend the better part of the day trying to decide how to grade the property. Of course, one thing always leads to another, and what started out with sidewalks turned into where every upcoming building would be. And after all of that, we didn't really make firm decisions on much of what was being contemplated. Kinda overwhelming, really. So in the end, he dozed away a lot of dirt. I wish I could guess at how much, but I cannot. I can tell you that Friday, while Tony was dozing, Tim would get in the excavator, load the dump truck with fill that Tony had piled up, then get out of the excavator, and into the dump truck, which he would drive to the round about and dump. Over and over and over. Saturday, Mike Waldrop came for the work day and ran the dump truck while Tim ran the excavator, so they probably got twice as much moved as Friday. Still, over and over and over. And after all that..... It just looks "right". I know that this pic is boring, but here's a shot of a couple of the truck loads of fill that were moved.

On Saturday, we had a work day for the people of Able Church. About 6 of the girls came to Camp Daniel after Able on Friday and spent the weekend. About a 6 more people came for the day on Saturday. They really got alot done. One of the main jobs (which they finished by noon!) was to dig the trenches for the propane lines. They also started spreading top soil by the dorms, which is a huge job that will probably take the rest of the year.

They also finished staining all of the cedar shakes that we have!! If you've ever helped with this job ( I know that many of you have) you can understand the elation that tore thru this group upon completion of the last shake. This was a seemingly never ending job, that's been in progress for about 3 years. (I didn't have the heart to tell them that we'll probably have to buy more to finish the building exteriors)

Molly and Jen got started staining the Hartley House deck railing. The rest will be power washed this week and hopefully stained this weekend.A week or two ago, when Tony was working on the rock and mortar, I showed pictures of the new Camp Daniel sign. Well he worked on it on Saturday, and a few hours on Sunday. He had help from Anthony, Karol and Richard. Below you can see Anthony using the XL belt sander on the 6x6 posts that were used for this project. That sander is a beast, but Anthony had it well under control!The sign is almost done. A roof will go on still and the mortar between the stones needs to be done.

Sunday, we stopped and looked at a used Bobcat on the way home from church. It has the rubber tracks that we need (which are hard to find). Tony googled reviews of the machine and it seems to be a good choice for us, as it doesn't do damage to finished areas (grass, black top, etc). Tony inquired about the machine, and the guy called me today, so I asked a few questions, but I think that they're asking more than we can afford right now. Bummer.

I spent some time last night researching grass seed for the dorm areas. We're looking into planting a fine fescue blend, which is considered a "no mow" grass. It's natural looking without being tall and "weedy". And this type of grass likes sandy soil. Hip Hip Horray, cause we are all about the sand around here. Tony will go to Stein today to see if they carry a fescue blend. If not, we'll probably order it online from a place in Wisconsin. There really are not many "no brainer" decisions. Everything seems to involve either a lot of contemplation or a lot of research.

Today Jen is finshing the staining of the Hartley House deck railing, Molly is working on Able stuff, Tony is at meetings at church, Tim is drywalling the mechanical room of dorm 2 so that the plumbers coming this weekend have plumbing work to do, and well, you know what I've been doing. So I think I'll stop and get some other stuff done while we have nice weather!

Tuesday, September 14

Since blogging last, we've been doing a lot of little stuff. Ya know, cleaning this, mowing that, finishing the details on the other. There was a fun push to get stuff done before the picnic last Saturday, so here's some of that. Tony and Richard did a lot of rock and mortar. This pic shows the bocce ball court with the cultured stone all on, and the cap stones on as well. The caps and the rocks both still need finishing mortar in the joints, but it already looks awesome! Tim put additional coats of poly on the floors of the two finished dorm rooms. Then he put two coats of wax on them. The wax will protect the finish from scratches. We got bunk beds out of storage, cleaned up and put together in the two finished rooms. Now you get a much better view of how the room will be used. Although these are not the bed we will be using when we have camp here, they will work for now for work days and any other times that people want to stay on the grounds. We bought these beds a couple of years ago from Habitat for Humanity's ReStore in Appleton. We got a great deal on them, and we're appreciative to have them to use for now.

We are in the middle of a sale of the excavator, trailer and dump truck. Which is great news as that gets us quite a bit closer to getting a Bobcat (plus Senior is happy to have less mess to look at around here!!) So before the excavator is gone, Tim is getting everything done with it that we need to do. We have a huge pile of top soil, that's been where the new garage will be going, for a number of years. We've used only a portion of it so far. Tim used the excavator to break it up and move it closer to the road so that it can be spread out by the dorms. Tony was using the bulldozer today to sculpt the land around the dorms so that it's ready for the dirt.

Marceaux has been fixing lots of different things. What a blessing to have a mechanic here. He works on everything, from the golf carts, to mini vans, to heavy equipment. He's also taken on mowing the majority of grass on the property.

Karol worked on a garden adding dirt and transplanting some things. She's also working on polyurethaning in the dorm baths. Jen's been working on Special Olympics stuff. There's really quite a bit involved in running a team. Lots of paper work, etc. Molly's been working on post cards and other correspondence for Able. Chrissy has been working on the email list for work days. We have many addresses wrong. So if you haven't received an email for work days, and would like to, please email Chrissy at kellys@campdaniel.org She's also working on the next Camp Daniel newsletter, and organizing meals for upcoming work days.

Tim and the guys have also been working on the second dorm. They drywalled the ceiling in the bathroom that will be used to store tools. Today Tim got shelving up so that we can stay better organized. The plan is to get all of the work stuff moved over so that the first dorm can be finished by the end of winter.