Led by one of our 70 x 7 volunteers, funds donated to Ridge Point have purchased a “hood cleaner” (a piece of machinery used to clean grease out of fast food fryer hoods/vents) and have put the men from Building Men for Life to work. Here is their story:

Well, it's Thursday morning and we have a little over 24 hours left in the big city of Chicago. Sorry for not updating more - internet has been a bit scarce - something we didn't expect in Chicago Land. But, we are having a GREAT time! The kids are really putting themselves out there meeting people... from different cultures, ethinicities, and serving with everything they have.

Serving Group # 1

This group spent their morning at the local YMCA playing with younger kids, and watching a practice for a graduation ceremony for the kids. They also had a blast helping the elderly fill out their cards for bingo later in the afternoon and handing out prizes.

My heart is just bursting right now and I have to share some of this with you.

As some of you know, we worked at Sam's house last week with the Philly Team.  The stories that came from that are incredible...how the Philly kids washed and bandaged the feet of the kids next door to the house we were gutting...how they fed them dinner on Friday night.  The Philly kids saw poverty like they had never seen and they were moved. 

A snapshot of stories from the Foster Care/Adoptive family picnic hosted by Ridge Point in June:

WOW – What a day!  The sun was scorching hot today.  The team did a great job working in the sun.  They continued working on the wall, mixing cement and laying block.  We also got to see the new addition to the family!  The construction workers we hired to help us delivered a new calf yesterday.  This means the kids will also have fresh milk! 

Wednesday was a great day!  In the morning, we visited a school for handicapped children.  For a while, it was the only school in the country that taught these children.  They have 70 students - some come from long distances and actually live at the school during the week and go home on the weekends.  We found out that the school makes pizza to sell at other schools.  This teaches students skills and provides an income for the school.  We were so impressed we ordered pizza for lunch!

On Tuesday, we went back to work on the wall in the morning.  We have a hard working group of students!  Mixing cement and moving blocks in extreme sunshine is hard work. 

Today was our first day working on the security wall at Hogar de Amor Orphanage.  It was HOT and SUNNY!  The team spent the morning mixing cement by hand and filling columns in the wall.  They worked VERY hard! 

Sunday, June 20, 2010

Our Saturday night church loaned us all of their equipment – guitars, keyboard, drums, bass, speakers mics, mixer – EVERYTHING!