Weekly Report for Diamond

Louisiana gave us a HOT welcome back! Maureen Bauman, project foreman, from Ontario arrived on Tuesday. Tina Esau crew leader, from Germany, but came here from the New Orleans project and Ray and Martha Zimmerman, Project Director and Office Manager arrived on Wednesday from Pennsylvania.

It was a busy couple of days getting the camp cleaned up and materials purchased from the different suppliers and delivered to the work sites, when possible. The office work for the last two months was also worked on to get it back on track.

Friday the four of us went out to the beautiful Bayou and visited with two of the three very happy families that have moved into their new homes; that were inspected before we left in April, but didn’t have the power hooked up. We also checked on the two houses that the summer youth will be working on. Hopefully they will be finished by July 11, when a house dedication and “Celebration” is being planned for all the houses MDS build or repaired on the Bayou. The last visit of the day was at Mr. Ron’s house. He was thrilled to see us and thanking Jesus that we came back. He said, “I kept telling my friends, they told me they would come back June 14 and Praise God you’re here.” Mr. Ron is in a wheelchair and lives in a FEMA trailer. He can’t wait to see inside his new house! Hopefully the ramp will get finished next week.

Ray’s Saturday morning was spent going to the warehouses on the way to the airport to pick up Andy Weaver, crew leader from Pennsylvania. After a long delay he arrived. In the afternoon Maureen made a trip to the airport for Aaron Enns, crew leader from Ontario, so that Ray would be here to grill us dinner. On Saturday night Maureen and Tina went to New Orleans airport again, this time to pick up our cook Martha Moyer, from Pennsylvania, after her delay.

We are looking forward to three other crew leaders joining us on Sunday and are first youth group of the summer. We praise God that we all had safe travels here and look forward to seeing other happy families having a house to move into.

Please keep us in your prayers that we can tolerate the heat, to keep the bugs away from us and safety as we work and travel.

Martha, for the Diamond Team