In the Sunshine State!

We are now on the NOMADS project at ECHO and have finished the first week. The weather has been wonderful even though a couple of days the natives were complaining... the morning temperature was 55 which was like summer time to us! We are in a wonderful campground and Linda has been enjoying the swimming pool.

Our site is level and has a nice "patio" where we can relax at the end of the day. We are also located near the laundry facilities and the swimming pool so that makes it even nicer. We are surrounded by campers from Illinois, Kentucky, and Indiana, sort of the Midwest Gang. The campground company has a wonderful $3.00 breakfast every Saturday morning which makes it nice!

ECHO is the acronym for Educational Concerns for Hunger Organization. This organization is a non profit organization that has developed many ways to provide food for people who are in need. This includes issues relating to sustainable farming in tropical countries as well as urban gardening ideas that can be used by city dwellers every place. The organization has several missionaries in training that will use what they have learned to help people live just a little better in many parts of the world. ECHO has locations in Florida, East Africa, West Africa, and Southeast Asia, the areas where hunger is the greatest problem.

When we arrived we were met by a couple that had worked with us on other projects as well. It is always great to see a familiar face after a long journey!

The NOMADS team consists of 14 members. The team members are from New York, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Minnesota. Our daily routine is to start each day with a devotion, then proceed to work on our assigned projects. Breaks are taken as a group so we are able to enjoy some fellowship...the spiritual growth opportunities and the fellowship opportunities are just as important as the work we do!

So what are we doing you may ask. Linda has been assigned to do power washing of the facilities. This includes washing buildings, sidewalks and other structures. I am glad she is getting this experience so she can wash our house this summer and not be on me to do it!

One of the houses where the interns live while on site needed more cabinet space in the kitchen, so the first idea was to just add a "lazy Susan" in the corner cabinet. The problem is there was no corner cabinet but a counter top over an open space so the project evolved into building new cabinets for the kitchen. The space was such that standard cabinets would not work and the budget did not allow for the purchase of cabinets from Loews or Home Depot, so I was given material int he shop and told to build something, including making the counter top. This is certainly not going to be a one week activity, I am sure I will be at least another week building the base cabinets for the kitchen.

During our fist weekend we did relax! I took Greta for a couple of long walks in the local forest preserve and she really enjoyed the outdoors. We managed to see the movie Selma, visit a flea market, and observe the matinees, Tonight we will attend a meatloaf dinner at the Tice United Methodist Church.

So far this has been a wonderful trip...lower gas prices, dry pavement, warm weather, we are just hoping the weather up north changes before we have to start back!

Linda:  So far I went swimming 2x even though I am wet most of the day power washing sidewalks and buildings-the green and black mold of Florida is very difficult to remove.  On our days off, we like to go on nature walks and do some exploring.  we did see the movie, SELMA.  Very moving.

Our Georgia Adventure!

New Years Eve was spend in Georgia with friends that Linda knew from the day she taught school in Latin America. Our trusty GPS got us to our trailer park in Cumming, Ga, but the route was very scenic and challenging. At one point our GPS took us in a circle, and we knew that since we saw some of the same sights more than one time. Finally we did arrive at Twin Lakes RV park. It was a nice park with full hookups, but we did have to unhitch so we could go to Steve and Sally Campbell for dinner and the New Years Eve events. We had a very nice dinner with the family and played games afterwards. We did retire early since we would need to make an early start the next morning to complete the next leg of our trip. We knew when midnight came because it sounded like a war zone and Greta really let us know something was going on. The next morning we left early and I am sure everyone was still sleeping in! As luck would have it our trusty GPS took us directly through downtown Atlanta. Glad there was not any traffic. Ironically we did not see any road construction on I-75 certainly a rare event. The evening of New Year's Day we arrived at Ocala North RV Park. We set up the trailer and met some other NOMADS for dinner. We made the decision to spend Friday just relaxing before making the last run to ECHO.

On Our Way!

It is Monday Morning and the weather is cold. The roads are dry and at 5:00 am the trailer is hooked to the truck, everything is loaded. We are off on another adventure. The day was very uneventful and the driving was good. Linda and I managed to make it to Metropolis and visit with my folks before heading across the bridge into Kentucky. It was just turning dark when we arrived at Duck Creek RV Park in Paduach. They had a pull through site and I hooked up the electricity, filled the water tank, and we were in for the night. This was a very nice park so Greta had the chance to go to the dog park and get her exercise. It was very soon after we were able to get into the trailer, it hit! I had the flu and spent most of the night in the bathroom on the porcelain throne!  I was so glad we had a sewer hook up. The next morning getting read to travel on was not very easy.

Tuesday I felt weak and sick all the way, but we did not have a long drive. We traveled from Paduach, KY to Chattanooga, TN. I was really glad to see sign directing us to Mack Smith Drive and the Holiday RV park. Set up the trailer and finally had the courage to eat a meal. Seemed the flu was gone and I was on the road to recovery. After spending the night in Chattanooga, we were on the road again.

Getting Ready for Another Mission

Christmas is approaching so that means it is about time to start on another mission trip.

The RV is now in our driveway and today I will open it and turn the heat on so we can clean and start packing. Our goal is to leave Janesville, weather permitting on Monday December 28. We plan on spending some time with my parents and with friends in Georgia as we travel south.

Annual Meeting Ending

The end of the Annual NOMADS gathering is coming to an end. The final banquet and entertainment will be held in just a few hours and everyone will be on their way home tomorrow.

The meetings were inspirational, provided spiritual growth opportunities and a lot of fellowship. Training classes in various skill areas were conducted and did acquaint everyone with new ideas.

There were 317 attendees at the gathering. The main fundraiser, a community charity auction yielded $50,390 to be used to support activities in the future.

One point that was made is that we all need to work at recruiting younger members. Membership in the organization is slipping and many of the active members are older than 75 so if we are to continue younger folks must be recruited.

Annual Gathering First Day

The first day of the Gathering was a very interesting day. There is a large group in attendance this year and the meeting hall was overflowing both at the morning Bible study and at morning session. We had an excellent speaker at both sessions and his presentation was quite unique, but effective. The afternoon session was devoted to the auction and I am sure there amount of money that was raised was more than last year as the bids seemed to be higher. The business session was also conducted with the Board of Directors.

After the long day, we all traveled to a local restaurant (McFarland's) for dinner. The meal was good and the company was great.

The weather has been anything but fall like we expected. The temperatures were very high yesterday and the humidity made it worse! It has been so bad that Greta does not even want to go to the dog area, she just wants to stay under the AC.  

NOMADS Annual Gathering

The Annual  Gathering of NOMADS is an event that brings old friends together and allows the members time to have some fellowship, spiritual growth via Bible study, and meetings to conduct the business of NOMADS. It also provides the members with the opportunity to learn about new construction and repair techniques that will help them on future projects.

Our original plan was to travel to the Annual Meeting on Saturday arriving on Sunday, but a last minute change was made. Linda and I were asked to help with the Rock County Farm to Table Party on Saturday night so we delayed our departure until Sunday morning.

We had a safe and uneventful trip through Illinois and into Missouri. We made an overnight stop at Cuba, Missouri. We parked in the Ladybug RV park. The park was quite unique in that it looked like a church camp ground more so than an RV resort. We did find out the campground also served as the location for the Deer Creek Church. The folks were friendly and even gave us a discount when they saw our NOMADS sign. We did have a full service site (water, electric, and sewer) but we were directly under a tree so the TV reception was zero. Oh well, that was good, no TV we could go to bed early and get some rest. Greta was disturbed several times during the night by the animals moving in the area.

On Monday we continued our journey to Branson. We arrived at the KOA site just before noon and learned we were the last to arrive. As we entered we were greeted by our first NOMADS team leader and were made to feel welcome again. During the afternoon several people went to various shows, but Linda and I rested and visited with friends. We are looking forward to a great program and meeting many of the people we have worked with!