Westlake, Day of Service, Houston, and a Swamp Tour!

The dedication at the WestLake house was the most touching dedication I have been to. Mainly in part to this is the house we did the majority of the work on. When we got here it was just dry wall, four walls and a roof. We transformed it, we gave it floor, doors, a kitchen, bathroom, and took the house and made it a home for This family. We painted, cleaned, and landscaped. Mrs. Abby and Mr. Lawernce are amazing people. It was such a joy to get to know them and work side by side with them! It is bitter sweet handing over there keys to them because it means that next week we will be back in Maryland and away from Louisiana. I wish all the families we have given homes to well!

This weekend was our day of service, Global Youth Awareness day! We worked at the Mayors Progressive Family Fitness Park day. By showing families how to be active and have fun was amazing. Above is a picture of myself with my mayors fitness challenge certificate. I did 10 REAL push ups, 10 sit ups. 20 jump robes, ran in place 50 times. and did 10 jumping jacks!
Along with getting the youth active, other booths were there for safety. Red cross came out to help families organize hurricane disaster plans. This is derby! The disaster truck for the red cross! He kind of scared some of the little children when he tried to talk to them... i guess the children haven't seen Cars.

This would be Jamie and his crazy awesome hat that was made for him!
The minute maid baseball park! HOUSTON in the background!
BASEBALL! MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL!
Meg and I enjoying the game! We went to Houston Sunday for the day! We went to an Astro's game, enjoyed the farmers market and had awesome Mexican food. It was good to see the fun part and welcoming part of Houston!

Today we went on a swamp tour! It was so much fun, and i learned a lot. I learned how important it is for Marshes and Swamps to be so they can slow the hurricanes down and cause less damage. I learned how they are trying to restore the marshes and swamps. I realized that we need to put more thought into they things that we as humans build before we do and think what kind of impact it will make on the environment down the road.
Meg and I had an awesome boat ride!

Jamie and his Gator! I named her Charleen!

The marsh!
I love this picture! It makes the marsh seam so beautiful!

She was just a little hungry! This swamp tour was amazing. This hole trip to Lake Charles has been! Just one more week here then its back to perry point and then on to camden NJ!

House Dedication and Ground Breaking

The last two days have been full of excitement and emotion. It really has shown us all, wolf 7 super troopers, why we are here doing what we are doing. Yesterday was the Channel Street House Dedications and it was amazing. Giving the three families a roof over there head and a steady living environment. The families have been waiting for 3 years for this moment and they got the keys and walked into there all finished homes :). It is one of the best feelings ever of my life!

Today was the Ground Breaking in Deridder and that was just as exciting and emotional. We are starting these two houses for these two very deserving families. Both of there stories touched my heart so much! One of the families adopted an adult male out of a group foster home for adults with disabilities and have a daughter with autism and i teared up. It touched my soul to see people care enough for those who need just a little more patients and TLC.

The Families at the Ground Breaking
Bank Donation
Ground Breaking
JROTC color Gaurds

Ribbon Cutting for one of the Houses
Meg and her balloons
Ribbon Cutting
The construction team giving the keys to the houses over
One of the 3 houses!

Break in NOLA

This weekend was spring break :) It was so fun. Ariel and myself took the train to NOLA(New Orleans Louisiana) and meet her mother there. We stayed at an awesome hotel two blocks from canal, super close to the french quarter. It happened to be french quarter fest. Which was great free jazz, blues, zydeco and other great music! I can't believe how much there was. Dancing down every street.

It was also good to see other AmeriCorps people there. It was also a good adventure hitting up bourbon street saturday night. I can check that off my list of things to do before i die:)

ARG!!!!
I find it amazingly funny that this guy was walking down bourbon with a giant white cross!!!!
Mine and Ariels Hurricane, when you visit NOLA its a must have!
This is where the night goes blurry right???!!! HAHAHAHA
Ariel and Krystal Dancing up a storm
zydeco dancing
Amazing music, jazz, this lady is amazing on the clarinet :)
LOL this lady was SOOOOOO drunk and it was only like 10:30! The band was great also
Oldest bar in NOLA, used to be a black-smith shop
The haunted church. The vampire tour guy, jonathan, said no one besides nuns have ever been in the attic and it is VERY haunted! He went on to tell us about a 30yr old cold case that he believes was vampires. 2 dead girls left on the door step that were missing 90% of there blood and the corner cant explain the blood loss from the two marks. I told him i think it was the illuminati instead HAHAHAHA! Thats what happens when I am reading angels and demons. You can't fool me! Jonathan thought it was funny then decided we needed to refill our drinks so we stopped at the bar.