Habitat for Humanity

We both have doing a Habitat for Humanity build on our bucket lists. When we heard that our good friends, Rob and Laura, were going to host an Escapees hangout for the sole purpose of doing a Habitat build, we knew we had to attend. The build was to take place in Hobbs, NM and even though we were not planning to go west this fall, we signed up. In addition to the hosts, there were going to be a few other couples attending that we already knew and we were certain we would make new friends while we all worked together giving back to the community. Here is a summary of our two weeks in Hobbs and what we accomplished.

We arrived in Hobbs a few days before the official start of the hangout and we parked in the parking lot of a former church the Hobbs Habitat for Humanity affiliate had recently purchased. We spent the weekend with Rob, Mike, Terri, Chris, Jenny, TJ & Peter, all folks we have met in the past. A bonus was Amy’s sister and her husband, Karen and Fergy, joined us for the night on Friday as they drove home to Colorado from Waco, TX. The weekend quickly passed and the long awaited hangout began.

Dan’s first assignment was on the framing team for a new house but the concrete pad that the house would be built on had not yet been poured. To fill the time while waiting for the slab to be ready, several fences needed to be built to separate existing homes in the neighborhood of Habitat for Humanity homes built by other volunteers. These homes were on the same small block as the home we were to build. The work week began on Tuesday and ended on Saturday. When we arrived at the work site on Wednesday morning, the slab for our house was already poured and we would begin framing on Friday. In the meantime, we drilled almost 40 holes and got poles cemented in place for three separate fences.

Once the slab was dry enough, we started laying out the walls per the blueprint. The slab was not square so adjustments had to be made to the chalk markings on the slab to make sure the walls would be square once they were erected. We spent the remainder of Friday building the long walls of the house and were prepared to stand them up on Saturday morning. Not only did we stand up the two long walls on Saturday, but we built and stood up the two end walls and the center wall that divides the duplex in half. Below is a video that shows all these walls going up. A very rewarding experience.

Amy’s first week of the hangout was spent working in the church building which is being refurbished as a ReStore. Although the work done here was not what Amy had in mind when wanting to participate in a Habitat build, getting the Restore up to code and open is important to the Hobbs affiliate so she was onboard for that goal. The main project was to add double layer 5/8″ drywall between the front and back half of the building for fire code reasons. While a fairly large team was starting that work, Amy’s team was performing tasks throughout the building. There were some rooms upstairs in which no drywall work was being done that needed to have some unwanted items thrown out and their walls, furniture, and carpeting cleaned. We cleaned out and reorganized a large janitorial closet, a storage garage behind the building, and the office supply room. We started the sanding and painting of the railings in back of the building and one of my team mates began the refinishing of a bedroom set that will eventually be sold in the Restore. To keep the overall dust level down from the drywalling activities, we mopped the sealed concrete floor of the large gathering space several times.

The work week at the Hobbs Habitat for Humanity affiliate ends Saturday at noon. Our first weekend with our new and existing friends kicked off with an afternoon visit to the local beer garden. Once the afternoon of relaxing and exchanging stories with one another was over, we discovered that the executive director of the local affiliate, Richard, had picked up everyone’s tab as a thank you for all we had sone so far.

On Sunday we had a potluck brunch and a bike ride along a trail in Hobbs. On Monday, the majority of the attendees drove about 90 minutes south to visit Carlsbad Caverns National Park. We had toured the cave a couple years ago but decided to go again to experience it with our new friends. We had a great time and enjoyed recognizing most of the people in the cave with us. Our two day respite had quickly come to an end and it was time to start our second week of work.

Dan spent one more day at the build site before being reassigned to work on drywall at the ReStore. During his final day at the build site almost all the inner walls on both halves of the duplex got assembled and put in place. At the ReStore on Wednesday and Thursday, he helped finish drywalling on the second floor. By the end of the day on Thursday, the daunting task was brought to a successful conclusion with the exception of some mudding and drywall sanding.

Amy spent most of the second week mudding and sanding drywall while other members of her team finished that back rail painting project as well as painting the metal frames that hold the Restore signage near the entrance to the church parking lot. Her team also painted baseboards and chair rails in some of the downstairs area and refinished the door that will be in the executive director’s office. We decided that the “baby poop” brown paint just had to come off to expose the beautiful wood veneer underneath. Amy did have some time to help with pulling some weeds out front, move shelving from the inside the church building to the recently reorganized storage garage out back, dusting and covering remaining furniture items to protect them from the drywall dust.

Amy’s work during the second week was cut short because she made plans to attend our nephew’s wedding in Maine. We got up at 4:00 AM on Friday to take Amy to the airport, leaving Dan to fend for himself for the weekend. Among the things that Amy missed were two potluck dinners. The first was Friday night at Richard’s house and the second was a Halloween party on the last night of the hangout. Some of the costumes at the Halloween party were quite creative (not Dan’s). We had the shortest woman of the group (probably < 5′) dress up as the tallest guy in the group at 6′ 8″.

The two weeks went by very fast and Monday, November 1st was here before we knew it. We originally planned to stay an extra night for Amy’s return flight to Hobbs, but she changed her return flight to go to Lubbock, TX, enabling Dan to leave with several other couples that were all meeting up at the same campground in Lubbock. See our next post for details on the fun we had in Lubbock with some of our close RVing friends.