MORE Pics!

These are a few of my favorite things PICTURES!

Navarro Nation Project

My group's last project was at the home of Jerry Navarro, president of Navarro Nation, who runs a recording studio out of his home. He provides demo recordings, full production recordings, band rehearsals, and music lessons on pretty much any instrument that exists.

Jerry's home is his livelihood. He could have walked away from it (and all the equipment in it!) but decided he needed to do what he could to restore it.

It sits in sort of a valley in his neighborhood and all the water ran down into his backyard and just sat there. Though he spent lots of blood, sweat, and tears cleaning out his home, he feared there was mold growing in places he couldn't see.

He got in contact with the Westminster PDA, and we (Paul, Sara, Larry, Awesome Josh, and I) were sent in to do some exploratory work to see just how bad the mold problem really was.

First, he took us on a tour of his home (which was awesome!): His recording equipment:

The rest of the house:

Getting to work: 

That's Jerry, on the right, and Paul in the mask.

Tiny bits of mold

Larry removing the baseboard

Josh and I sprayed around the upstairs, while Paul, Sara, and Larry worked on removing the baseboard in the basement.

The bad news? There was mold. The good news? It wasn't nearly as bad as it could have been. So we removed most of the baseboard and sprayed the walls and baseboards. Another group will come in and work on the rest of the project.

It was great to get to know Jerry, to hear his life story, and to listen to the awesome music he played for us!

Sharon's Pics

On the trip, Sharon shared her photos with me. She and a couple of others toured the Opryland Hotel after church on Sunday and took some lovely pictures.  

She also took some pics of us traveling as well as from a work site. Check them out here!

I Need Your Stories!

Hey, Mission trippers!


Westminster Church wants YOUR stories! If you have a little story you'd like to pass on--and I KNOW you do!--please email them to me and I'll pass them along to the church. (albauer at yahoo dot com)

If you're a Facebooker, you can check out Westminster's PDA Facebook page and share a story or picture there too!

If you'd like a couple pictures posted on this blog, you can email those to me as well. 

Coming Home

Our last morning in Nashville was full of packing and cleaning and, most importantly, fixing the lettering on the vans for our return trip to PA!!

Here are some pics:

The signposts of all the groups who have worked at Westerminster's PDA site. 

Loading the vans

Tracy's van!!

Toby, Shane, and Tommy

Best sign EVER!

And here's us taking over the Bob Evans for dinner!

Check out more coming home photos HERE.

"The Summons"

Hello, again!

I'm going to continue to update the blog for a while with new pictures and reflections in the next week or two. So please keep checking back!

Anyway, I wanted to share a song we used in worship at Frankfort Church yesterday after we finished talking about the mission trip. It just seemed to be a perfect fit!

(PS It's one of the songs written by John Bell, who was the guest speaker in worship at Westminster Church when we were there!) 





Here are the lyrics (in case you miss them during the video):
1. Will you come and follow me
If I but call your name?
Will you go where you don’t know
And never be the same?
Will you let my love be shown,
Will you let my name be known,
Will you let my life be grown
In you and you in me?

2. Will you leave yourself behind
If I but call your name?
Will you care for cruel and kind
And never be the same?
Will you risk the hostile stare
Should your life attract or scare?
Will you let me answer pray’r
In you and you in me?

3. Will you let the blinded see
If I but call your name?
Will you set the pris’ners free
And never be the same?
Will you kiss the leper clean,
And do such as this unseen,
And admit to what I mean
In you and you in me?

4. Will you love the ‘you’ you hide
If I but call your name?
Will you quell the fear inside
And never be the same?
Will you use the faith you’ve found
To reshape the world around,
Through my sight and touch and sound
In you and you in me?

5. Lord, your summons echoes true
When you but call my name.
Let me turn and follow you
And never be the same.
In your company I’ll go
Where your love and footsteps show.
Thus I’ll move and live and grow
In you and you in me.

Denny's pics

The group was sad to learn that while on the trip, Neal McCoy's grandfather passed away. Neal was on the trip with his other grandfather, Denny. They left early in the week, along with CF and Colleen, for the funeral. But before Denny left, he passed along his pictures to me. 

He has some great shots of the work site where the foundation had shifted and they needed to pour concrete footers inside the basement. Here are some of them: 

Moving the 80 lb bags of concrete mix. 

Meanwhile, on the OUTSIDE of the house ...

The human stepladder

And of course, I have to include this picture: 

Spencer and the petrified rat on a stick

AND here's a close-up:

Yum.

 To see more of Denny's photos, click here!