First off let me give you a heads up on photos. We will be sharing construction pictures in person rather than on the web. That's why we will update you on the work but you won't see construction photos on the blog.
HOWEVER, we couldn't resist one "construction area" photo. We found it soooo funny that the cows were allowed to graze along Red Mills Rd when clearly they were in a CONSTRUCTION AREA - AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY area. Where on earth is their PPE? (personal protective equipment) Don't they KNOW how risky that is???? {does anyone actually even MAKE hardhats for cows?} Mothers and children out there no less!!!
This time at Wallkill Jeremy is having more of a share in oversight. Just a little here and there where he is needed. But that reality hit us when we saw a shipment of tile come in to the D Res like this!
So last week we had three RBC volunteers come for work Thursday through Saturday. Two brothers and a 19 year old sister. We worked like crazy to prepare for them because we needed to finish base work so the volunteers had walls to set tile on. They worked really hard and we had a good time getting to know them. At one point we had stacks of wall tile, buckets of mud and buckets of water, strings of extension cords for a temporary light, Jeremy giving instructions AND all three volunteers in the bathroom getting to work! Let me tell you, it was one packed bathroom! {keep in mind too, we have no air movement in the bathrooms, no fans or a/c} What a sacrifical spirit!
Part of the prep work before we tile the bathroom floor is painting an olive green waterproofing goop on the concrete floor. Along the joints where the wall and floors meet we use that goop to stick a type of fabric along the crack to make sure water could NEVER, EVER, EVER, get behind the walls and create mold or moisture issues. [Bethel hates water issues and does everything possible to minimize the risk] I had a fine time that day crawling around the bathrooms and waterproofing everything. Feeling really glad to be productive, I was walking back to my locker in a hurry (it was meeting nite) and I went to tuck a bothersome wisp of hair away from my ear when I realized my hair felt....... clumpy. That's when I realized I had gobbed some water proofing in my hair! How do you remove something like THAT when you know you can't wash it out with water?!!! Given the time factor (and the irrationality of the panic factor) I grabbed scissors and hacked it out. Yep. I did. It's not too bad, really. I have curly hair and that hides alot. I hope. :)
As a reminder, here is a picture of our Kingdom Hall. We had CO last week and were very built up. This is the last visit of this CO and everyone is sad to loose him now that they know him well. The friends told us he tends to be direct and we better understood on Tuesday night. As he listed the week of activities and times for them, he told us the Saturday field service meeting would be at 9:30 rather than 9:00am. He followed up with something like: "and that should work better for you friends since that is about the time you all showed up last time anyway". I laughed out loud, but no one else did. Awkward. The best part about the story is that due to heavy construction along the highway (that many of us use to get to the Hall) the CO was LATE to Saturday service! He arrived at 9:35! HaHaHaHaHa!
Now that summer is here and so many Bethelites travel away for their conventions and vacations we have open seating for breakfast. Normally when you arrive at Bethel you have a seat location you are assigned to. It helps your table head to keep track of you (say you don't show up for two or three morning worship/breakfast times, he finds out if you are sick or have an adjusted work schedule, or are struggling to managing your time....) and keeps the tables full so waiters are not serving huge bowls of food to partially filled tables. But with so many Bethelites gone, open seating allows for us to sit were we choose: with old friends, to make new friends; and the waiters just make sure we fill each table up. On our last day with our assigned table we had a "table party" which means we all bring goodies and take pictures. Here is most of our assigned table after our table party. {we are missing two folks because they were distracted gleaning food from other tables and missed the shot}
So we promised to let you know what else is going on here at Wallkill. So here is the run-down:
The Services Building is getting revamped. It needed a new roof and other renovations. It also has an auditorium that was restructured with wider aisles and seats. I believe it will seat about 800 when finished. Above the auditorium will be offices that likely will be the new location for the Service Department that is moving from Patterson sometime soon. There were bathrooms and lockers in that renovation area but that began in early spring and although that work is ongoing, the tile crew is split up with some working there, Jeremy and myself are in the D Res.
There is also a recreation building in the works. It is obviously the last on the list for importance and ground work is really just getting started. Nearby are the new location for basketball courts, sand and hard court volley ball and the soccer field. They are just finished this week! They are lighted and our parking garage location is right next to the courts. On our way to meetings and ministry we see and hear the fun and Jeremy heaves a little sigh of regret and gets in the car and we drive off. :) One day Jeremy, one day you can play.
About field service: two weeks ago we had not yet checked out a territory and found our cargroup of Bethelites needing something to do one Sunday. So we drove to yard sales and stores looking for people to witness to and found a lot of people speaking foreign langages. So we would strike up a conversation (if possible) and direct them to the websit in their language and give them the JW information card (the one that looks just like a business card). We were really nervous but we will keep practicing. It seems there are a lot of Ukranian and Russian speaking people in our territory. 
We stopped at Gray Towers (one of our favorite places to hang out and relax in Milford) and after talking with a nice Russian lady, we stopped to play at the water table. Here are the boys passing fruit at the table. It was a nice change of ministry and bonus: I found a great bookbag at one of the yard sales! :)
Last Saturday evening we went to help a commuter couple Frank and Terri at their wood stacking party. They live about 25 minutes away. There were lots of people helping and it was pretty fun.
There is a downside though. After the work and the cookout they hosted, we played frisbee in the yard. I sent it flying into some brush several times and Jeremy didn't want me to get any poison ivy so he went in to retrieve the frisbee and sadly, very sadly, HE got poison ivy. EVERYWHERE! He has smeared creams and taken every antihistimine possible for about a week and it still seemed to be speading badly. Finally yesterday morning we sent him to the Bethel infirmary where they put him on steriods and gave him MORE ointments. Finally we have it under some control. Whew! Here is our last bit of amazing news:
Bethel branches always have more tours than normal on national holidays because people often have the day off. Everyone anticipated lots of visitors on Memorial Day.
But no one expected Wallkill to have 1,935 people tour on that one day!!!! It was so exciting to see families from everywhere coming to see this wonderful part of the Branch! The lobby brothers and Bethelites assigned to give tours that day were wiped out! [in a good way]
So there is our news. Share your tales with us when you can!
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