Today, Wednesday, April 24, is our third day here at Lake Shore Assembly and Retreat.  Sharon and I arrived here last Friday after a short trip from Loucon Assembly.  The drive only took us about three hours down the Kentucky Turnpike to Hwy 641 that took us to Eva, Tennessee, where Lake Shore Assembly is located.  We got the RV set up and met with the team leaders for this NOMADS project.  We went into Eva that evening to do laundry and get some dinner.  We normally stay away from the chain restaurants, but there was a Pizza Hut right next door to the laundry, so we ate there.   Saturday was spent taking care of a few items on the RV.  It is amazing the little things that go wrong on a motorhome.  Of course it doesn't take much for an 18,000 pound house on wheels to cause some problems.  Things that are not fastened down good get shook up pretty good.  But, nothing that I couldn't fix.

One other couples arrived on Saturday afternoon.  Now we are almost complete.  The other team members would be arriving on Sunday afternoon.  By Sunday afternoon everybody had arrived.  Now, to you that may not sound exciting, but after working a project with a partial team, it is exciting for us. 

Monday morning we met with , Corky, the maintenance chief.  He welcomed us to Lake Shore Assembly, and discussed with us the projects that we would be working on.  The initial project plans called for us to build a couple of storage sheds, but things change.  Lake Shore had been planning to upgrade the RV campground for sometime.  When they found out that we would be willing to do the work they bought the supplies.  The project was putting in sewer lines for the RVs to hook up to.  For those of you that aren't familiar with the plumbing of an RV, RVs have holding tanks for waste water.  There are two tanks, one for grey water, that's dish water and bath water, and another tank for black water, that's the other waste water.  These tanks have to be dumped on a regular basis.  This usually requires disconnecting all power and water connections, and getting the RV ready to drive.  Once this is done the RV is driven to a dump site.  Having a direct sewer hook up keeps you from having to go through that disconnect, and the mess of a dump site.  We were able to complete the sewer line installation in two days.  Most of being able to complete the work in two days was due to one of the maintenance staff using a ditch witch to dig the line for us.

While the men were working on the sewer line, the women were painting and cleaning.  The camp is  getting ready for summer camp so all of the cabins have to be prepared.  Many of the bunk beds had to be painted, and all of the shower/restroom areas had to be cleaned and painted.  The ladies were offered the opportunity to work with the men on the sewer line, but they decided it was too hot to work outside.  Sounds like a good excuse to me.

Today the ladies continued with the painting and cleaning.  An additional cleaning task was added to their cleaning.  The conference center and dining facility had to be cleaned in preparation for a women's conference that starts tomorrow. 

Two of the men started the work on the storage buildings, well not really work, they spent time figuring out the materials that would be needed for the project and then ordered the materials.  The other two of us men have been assigned to put new ceramic tile on the walls in a large shower, and on the floor of the rest of the bathroom.  First thing we had to do was rough up the painted wall in the shower.  We used two grinding tools to do this.  It took us all day to do this.  We spent a lot of time taking breathing breaks.  The dust created from sanding the walls was really bad.  I think I will be sneezing green paint dust for days.  We did get all the sanded enough so the glue for the tile will stick,

That's where our project is for now.  Here are some pictures of the team working, and sometimes not working.

 
Here are all of the RVs parked at the campground.  There are a total of six, from small to large.  The only real difference between any of them is the size.  They all come equipped with sleeping, eating, cooking and bath facilities.

This building is a Yurt.  It is perfect for us to meet in since it is fashioned after the type of tents that nomads of many years ago used to live in.  It is a portable structure. This one is set up pretty permanently.  It is used as a classroom where classes on wildlife and plant life are taught.  We are using it for our group meetings and morning devotions.

 

Here are some of the team members.  From left to right, Brenda from Tennessee, Kyoka from Ohio, Pat from Georgia, Sharon my wife, and Jerry, Kyoka's husband.

 
Here are team members Jerry, and team leader Joe, discussing how we are going to get started with the sewer project.

                                 Joe and another of the team cutting some of the sewer pipe.

One of the Lake Shore staff members using the ditch witch to dig the sewer line trench.  The ground is very rocky making this a much harder task than you would think with a machine like that.

                                            Some of the sewer line has been installed.

I don't know what they are looking at, but this is the end of the sewer line where it ties into the septic tank.

Joe on the left, Jerry in the middle, and team member Ash on the right.  We have just enjoyed a nice lunch provided by the kitchen staff at the camp.

As you can see we have gotten off to a good start here at Lake Shore Assembly.  Many things to do here to help the camp get ready for the summer. 

I'll post again sometime this weekend, so have a nice rest of the week, and remember

God Loves You

Gary