Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Thursday, May 21, 2009

Cleaning Continues at Charles's House

We had another productive week at Charles's house. We finished getting the kitchen cleaned and hung a couple of fans. Here are some "after" pics that I missed taking last week. Charles was thrilled about his clean kitchen and very grateful.





Wednesday, May 13, 2009

Adopting Charles Houk

We decided as a small group to adopt someone who could use a little TLC for his spirit as well as his house. During the 30-hour famine, Kate and her group went to Charles Houk's house and did a bit of cleanup in his yard and some cleanup in the house. From that open door, Charles became open to the idea of our small group coming to help him and to hang out with him ...

Small Group's First Visit with Charles ...

Wednesday, May 6, 2009

We went over to Charles Houk’s house and visited with him for the evening. He had only met a couple of people so we spent time introducing ourselves and talking with him. He really enjoyed the company. He made a statement about there not being "this many people" in his house for a very long time.

During the time we visited, the guys took a tour around the house making some notes on what projects needed to be done around the house.

The list of to-do’s looks something like this:
Kitchen cleaning, organizing, painting, etc.
Dining area floor soft on left side.
Plumbing issues – leaking going on in basement
Air conditioner not working
Doors hung
Rooms cleaned and organized.
The yard cleaned up

I may have missed a few things, but those are the main things we will be focusing on to start with. When we were leaving, Charles said to me that we could come back whenever we wanted :)) It was a joy getting to talk to him and learn some about his life. We decided to go back next week, roll up our sleeves, and get to work.

Our Second Visit to Charles' House

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

As we pulled in, we met Charles outside the back door of his house, leaning on his grill, enjoying the fresh air. He said he just had his tooth pulled and was in some pain. He seemed to be able to talk just fine despite it :)) Regina, Charles’ daughter came, and was extremely helpful in being able to answer our questions about the projects we were getting ready to undertake.


Charles and Chris talking about bird feeders

The girls got to work cleaning and organizing the kitchen. It was a huge task, but we tackled it like nobody’s business. The kitchen cabinets and drawers were cleaned out, washed, and liners and shelf paper put in. Then, the items not thrown away were put back in drawers and cabinets. Overall, I think we threw away approximately 5 HUGE garbage bags of trash from the kitchen alone. Carol tackled the refrigerator and boy, did it look awesome by the time she was finished!!! I wish I could have gotten before and after pictures of that! As a side note, I think Carol got the bravery award for the evening, going most of the night with no gloves :)) I counted up the hours in the kitchen between the 4 ladies, and it equalled out to 14 hours of labor spent in the kitchen alone. We will have a little bit left to do as far as cleanup goes, but I think the majority of the cleaning and organizing is accomplished in the kitchen area.

The guys worked on the electrical. The kitchen lighting was a top priority. Also, there was plumbing in the bathroom that needed attending to. Come to find out, the toilet was actually leaking into the wall; hence, I think why the floor is soft in the dining area. They were able to get that fixed, at least temporarily. If I’ve missed other things the guys did, sorry. I was busy working in the kitchen with the ladies :)) Charles spent the evening in his chair sleeping after his earlier extraction. It seemed that we never even disturbed him during the whole process. We worked from approximately 6:30 to 10:00 p.m.


Kitchen before cleanup.



Dining area



Kate looking a little unsure about where to start ...



Cleaning, scrubbing, washing, organizing, throwing away ...



Inside a cabinet after the items were removed. Sorry to say I didn't get an after picture of what this looked like once it was clean with new shelf paper down ... I will snap one next week when we go back ...



The drawers were overflowing with "stuff." This is what one of them looked like when we got finished.



Kitchen after cleanup ...



I'm thinking I need to be better at this "before and after" picture taking. The pictures just do NOT do justice to what was accomplished ... I will try and do better next time :))