Indianapolis-Habitat for Humanity

Monday, March 25, 2013

Indianapolis, IN

First and foremost, we'll start by saying Site Leader Allie was originally supposed to write this blog post. But it was solidified that she is useless when it comes to technology, so we're restarting.

Today began with every one of us happily bouncing out of bed at 7:30 a.m. with smiles on our faces (sarcasm). Allie and Cody were already awake, helping the Sisters shovel out the parking lot. What angels. After a quick breakfast, we hopped in our cars and headed off to our first day with Habitat for Humanity. Since there was six inches of snow on the ground, we were luckily going to paint a POH (previously owned homes). The first car arrived at the site safe and sound. The second car struggled due to badly given directions (Dalton…) 30 minutes late is almost on time, right?

We quickly were introduced to Emily, who was overseeing us for the day. After only a few minutes, we learned that Emily was just 18 years old.  Which basically meant she was doing more with her life than most of us had done by 20… Emily, a native of South Florida, decided after high school that she wasn't focused enough for college, so she joined AmeriCorps. She's been building with Habitat in Indianapolis since September. Afterward, she wants to attend William and Mary College. She also has a twin, so she's a pretty cool chick.

Emily told us about the process of becoming a Habitat family. A family must do 450 hours of work. It's split up into 300 hours of classes that teach you about maintaining a home, and 150 hours of sweat equity that you put into your own home or someone else's. Also, your friends and family must work with you to build up your support system.

Our job was to prep and paint the entire inside of house. Piece of cake, right? Especially with this dysfunctional group… We started out by taping cabinets, unscrewing blind holders, and "cutting in", or painting the corners and around the doors of a room. How about that jargon?

We then began painting, with Tucker's phone blasting Summer Hits of the 90s.  We knocked out the project, room by room, all the while having deep talks and becoming BFFLs. The bathroom got a little shambly (word of the week) but we finished by 2:30!  Then it was time for naps and episodes of Criminal Minds.

Dinner consisted of chicken salsa burritos (some of us had two…) and then bowling! Safe to say, none of us are professionals. But it was a good end to a pretty great first day of work. Can't wait for day 2!