Greetings from Bay St. Louis

Hi everyone,

It is Thursday night and Charlotte and the boys have once again headed out to serve at God's Katrina Kitchen. Ethan and I will work hard on the house Fri and Sat. The family will return Sat evening.

It will be an interesting week for them. There has been controversy over the existance of this ministry because some perceive it to be a nuicance as some of the lowest in society are there.

The kitchen is located only blocks from a particularly dangerous neighborhood. Volunteers are told not to walk north of the site.

The ministry is being proactive on helping people out of their poverty situation. They are requiring positive I.D. and job applications to be filled out. They are encouraging people to look to Jesus for their answer. Church services are held in the dining tent every night.

The kitchen only has permits to operate until July. I was listening to a program on the radio today and there was testimony about a recent meeting at city hall. The council member from the ward the kitchen is located has made her hatred of the kitchen very well known. Numerous volunteers arrived at city hall for the meeting declaring their love for this vital ministry. Many were praying for favor. The hearts of the people on the council were changed.

Joan's house is coming along quite well. All of the beams are now in and I have managed to level everything in quite well. I am framing walls for the new floor plan. We have permits for construction, plumbing, and electric. I will be doing the plumbing and I will be doing the electric under the supervision of a licensed electrician.
Windows are ordered thanks to a Baptist church.

I am not trying to be redundant, but the dire need of this disaster is amazing. The need for skilled trade laborors is huge. Today, Carol from the Salvation Army visited the site. She has been assigned 7 new cases this week. All 7 are total rebuilds and all 7 do not have any help.

A recovery program called Project Recovery has logged 350,ooo phone calls in the last 19 months.

Serious, if you know of anyone willing to spend time here and they are skilled in any construction related trade, they are desperately needed. Have them contact me and I will connect them to people who will put them to work.

I am regularly hearing comments from people who are touched by the countless Christian volunteers. Joan's 70 year old brother loaned us his lawnmower. He told me the generosity of all of these volunteers has touched his heart and that he felt he needed to re-evaluate his life.
Christian pastors and leaders feel the coast is ripe for a very major revival. This will be the springboard God uses to touch people.

We are all homesick and cannot wait to return, but it will be bittersweet. It is hard to return when thousands need skilled remodelers. It is hard to tell people no, but I am now having to do that. It is safe to say we will return next winter. This recovery will no doubt take at least 10 more years.


Thank you to everyone helping at home. We could not do this without you. Peggy, Amanda, and Nathan, we appreciate and love you! God bless you for all you are doing for us!!

In His service
Brian and Charlotte and the family

Rosa's birthday

Hi everyone

Today Rosa turned one. She is such a blessing. You will be amazed at how she is advancing. We will hold a party for her upon our return. She is walking very well and communicating well also.
We did not do anything special here for her today.

We are working hard for Joan.
Joan has already told us that we are a specific answer to her prayers. We are enjoying working for her. She is an awesome person.
We are nearly complete with heavy structural changes to remove all lower interior walls.
The weather is great. Highs in the 80's and lows in the 60's.

We will work hard to complete this project so we can return home.

We miss everyone.

In Christ

Brian and Charlotte

Working for Joan

Hi everyone

It has been a busy week working for Joan. I am completing the demolition aspects of converting the home into the new design. New beams will be delivered tomorrow. The floor system has sag problems from poor construction and the mud from the flood waters. This home was flooded at least to the ceiling of the second floor. Yes, this is at least 19 feet of flood water. I have not determined if the attic was flooded.

It has been a blessing working for Joan. She is so humbled by all that has been going on. Things are falling into place for her. A local Baptist church ordered her windows today at their expense.
The Salvation Army is donating thousands. She will be amazed at what we will be able to do with the funds she has available.

Charlotte and the children have spent the week at God's Katrina Kitchen in Gulfport. They are serving over 500 meals.The staff there loves my family, in fact they offered Charlotte a leadership position. She was flattered but will decline the offer. Ethan and I spent Wed night with them after church in their bunkhouse. Ethan has spent the week with me at the jobsite.

It has been a hard week for them at the kitchen. They are incorporating a new system. A voucher is necessary to receive meals. Criteria such as job applications must be met. It is good.
Charlotte challenged someone about how Waffle House was hiring and this person was hired.
Waffle House of Gulfport opened this week, right in front of the kitchen.

We are very pleased with our car insurance. They approved repairs of $3360.00 to our minivan. They have been awesome through this whole ordeal. They are IMT of Des Moine, Iowa. Charlotte and Samuel have been seeing the choiropractor and are feeling better.

We love hearing from you. My cell is 7156134601. Charlotte is 7156134602. You can respond to this page. All you need is a simple Google account. It only takes a minute.

God Bless you all!
In His service

Brian

We have moved

Hi everyone

We have completed our move to Bay St. Louis, MS. It is about 35 minutes west of Biloxi.

It is actually closer to the heart of the damage of Katrina. I was near the beach area today. There is nothing standing within 2 miles of shore. Unlike last year, the debris is now cleaned up. There is nothing but slabs. There are countless missing homes here.

We are at a site on a canal just off of the main bay. Joan's home has parking for 4 yachts. We see many tropical birds and fish are jumping out of the water regularly. There is only one home beyond us on a dead end road.

It is our hope to help Joan rebuild her home, but are unsure how this whole thing will turn out.
I believe we have earned her trust and it will be interesting for sure.

Charlotte and the boys are at God's Katrina kitchen in Gulfport again tonight in their cabins. They must report to duty at 5:30 a.m.

They spent the evening with me here at my camp. I have Ethan. I spent the day doing set up things and have cleaned the mud out of Joan's main sewer. I hope to get into forward progress in the morning.

We are looking forward to returning. Sorry no pictures. I am not the technical expert.

Brian

Bumper cars

Hi everyone,

I have not written due to busyness and not being sure of what our plan was.

We have spent the last 2 weeks building Kathleen's house. It is a simple 3 room house 768 square feet. We started hanging drywall on the 13th, and the home is mostly complete. The boys have been awesome. Samuel and Andrew installed 360 square feet of laminate floor mostly by themselves this week. Each boy contributed to the progress of this project.
Kathleen is a handicapped lady and this home will be a huge blessing to her.

We have been "discovered" by several non-profit groups this month. Many agencies have monies available for recovery efforts, but dollars do not help people, materials and laborers do.
They especially are willing to help handicapped and elderly people. We have been basically begged to help in some situations.

As we are completing Kathleen's house, a Salvation army director named Carol has hooked us up with another handicapped lady named Joan. She lives in Bay St. Louis right on the Bayou.
She has 4 yacht spaces in her backyard. Her home was flooded into the second floor.
We did not think we would be candidates to work on her home as obtaining permits in flooded areas has been difficult for most. She will be be converting her home to make the upper floor the primary living space. An elevator will be installed. To our amazement, she walked into city hall, paid her fee and walked out with her permit. We have accepted the project as turning her down would not be right. She has had others make promises and break them. We realize this delays our return and for those who this affect, we are very sorry :-( We will not be accepting any more work here and anxiously are looking forward to returning to our "normal" lives.

We are especially excited about the wonderful progress with our new church North Ridge of Colby. Pastor Gayland has an exciting vision of moving forward and great things are happening. We know that God is going to use this church family to bring many in our community to salvation and discipleship.

On Wed. afternoon, Charlotte tryed playing Bumper Cars for real. Only a couple of blocks from where we are staying, She was looking at new shrubs that were just planted. They are carved into dolphins. She did not see a light change yellow. She braked too late and rear ended a Chevrolet Suburban.

Charlotte had Rosa, Ethan, Andrew, and Samuel. All are fine. All have been checked by a chiropractor. Charlotte and Samuel will receive some adjustments.

Our van, however did not fare as well. It is a 1998 with 144,000 miles it is only worth about $4000.00. The damage will likely be about $3000.00. The Suburban had a trailer hitch and it projected through the bumper, grille, radiator,AC condensor, dual electric fan and tranny cooler.
The hood is unrepairable. We are waiting for our insurance to decide what to do. It will be a close call on repair vs totalling it out.

The need for a rental vehicle was a challenge. Since we have 4 vehicles at home, we do not carry much insurance for a rental vehicle. We are only allowed $20.00 per day. This is only about one half of what would be needed. Our friends Hamp and Susan offered for us to borrow a Chevy conversion van that they do not use often. To my amazement, our adjuster let us rent if from them for the $20.oo per day. They are thrilled to get the rent money.

Charlotte and the boys will be on heavy duty this week at the Katrina Kitchen. They may stay in a cabin there as they need to report to work at 5:30 A.M. We will move the camper to Joan's house as this will allow me to work 11 to 12 hours per day. We are going to try to make this remodel the most amazing fast project we have ever done, we want to make it home. I did manage to learn how to use drywall stilts. It is amazing how the right tools make you more efficient.

Rosa and Ethan have become beach-aholics. We have had them there numerous times lately.
Rosa will have her birthday party upon our return.
We love and miss you all.
Thank you for giving us the grace to do what we need to do.

Brian, Charlotte and the kids.

April update

Howdy y'all

Just a quick update,

We have been very busy.
We just completed doing some soffit and siding on 2 very large homes. Yesterday we spent another volunteer day at Maureen's.
We did laundry room cabinets and closet storage. We took an hour off and enjoyed the beach.

Our beach was opened about 2 weeks ago. We are aware of the fact you are still getting winter in April. Wow, what's up with that?

We find ourselves in a cool situation. There is a large volunteer operation at Kiln, MS called Camp Coastal Outpost. They are in the process of building 57 houses. They may be starting hundreds more soon. They are very simple needs only houses. No extras. They partner with Americore, Churches, Schools, Universities or whatever. They provide materials and volunteers provide labor.

Due to a shortage of volunteers and some picky inspectors, a lady named Kathleen has not been able to get her new home complete. Kathleen is 76 years young and struggling with health problems. Through some circumstances and a man named David, another organization named Fellowship of Christian Peace Officers of Canada has hired us to finish Kathleen's home. FCPO normally helps Police and fire fighters get into homes after disasters.
These public servants usually work long days and do not meet their own needs in these times.

David has stated that meeting us and our availability to complete this home immediately is a specific answer to prayer.

Through God's grace I was able to get all of the permits complete yesterday and we will hang the drywall today. FCPO is providing me a carpenter named Tommy to help. He is working down here full time mostly for free. He will be paid by FCPO also.

Kiln MS is Brett Favre's hometown. It is a very small town and is severely damaged.

I had looked at a siding and soffit job in Mobile, Al. I decided to decline the job. Now the man is begging me to reconsider. He was referred by the customer we just completed. We are not sure what to do with this offer.

The family is great. Rosa is walking great. It is a delightful week. We have comfortable temps and sunny days. We did have a heavy rain the other day, but the soil is so sandy, the water dissipates quickly.

Our Easter service at CLCA was awesome. They burned their mortgage during the service. They are 100% debt free. Praise God for that.

Charlotte's aunt Genny broke her ankle and the procedures at the hospital are not going well. Keep her in your prayers. My Grandmother Haines broke her hip and is suffering dimentia and is not well. She needs our prayers also.

Sorry it was so long since we wrote.

Keep in touch.
Brian

Getting around Quickly

Howdy Y'all

We have been non-stop busy. Sorry we have not written more lately.

Since we have last written, so much has happened.
Rosa has learned that she can walk. She is only 10 1/2 months. She is so cute. She can pretty much walk anywhere she wants and is trying to do steps already.

Ethan has asked for his training wheels to be taken off, and is riding his bike constantly. He has literally wore out his tires since we have been here.

I purchased a set of drywall stilts last weekend and all of us had a blast trying to walk on them. Even Charlotte got in on the fun.


We had a surprise B-day party for Charlotte while her family was here last week with over 40 in attendance. It was a great time. (Thanks Hamp and Susan!!)

For work the past week, the boys and I have completed a large siding and soffit job in Vancleave. It was a new home and was a large project. It had 440 feet of soffit and fascia. We also did the porch ceiling and gable siding. The house is built into a steep hill and had very steep and high roofs. It was an adventure, but it is complete and looks awesome.

Yesterday I did a honey-do list for Essie, the lady who was our host last year. She had some small projects and it was fun helping her out.

The city opened the beach April 1. It is awesome to see some life down here. Nearby there is a business set up where you can rent Jet-skis, kayaks, and the like.
A demo crew has been tearing down a 8 story Howard Johnson hotel and Waffle House restaurant nearby for the last 2 weeks. It is Concrete and steel and has stood up well. They are using a crane and wrecking ball and a large backhoe. The front of the building was destroyed by Katrina. It gives you a respect for the power of the storm. When it is gone, we will have a huge increased view of the beach.

It has turned from spring to summer since April 1. We have been running our A.C. 24/7. On Sunday we had heavy rain. They closed I-10 near us due to flooding. We must have had at least 5 inches, maybe more. The soil is sandy, so only hours later everything was normal. The humidity is very high.

Thanks to everyone helping us out at home. You know who you are. You guys rock!! and we appreciate you.

We plan to return home approx May 1. Everyone enjoy Easter. Enjoy worshipping Jesus at church with other believers at Church. He is risen!! He is coming again!!

We will be enjoying Easter dinner with Adam and Pam, Friends from CLCA.

We miss all of you.

Brian and Charlotte