Brandee's journey

Hey Folks,

This post will have some words from the 2012 Women Build Home recipient Brandee, about her journey with Willamette West Habitat for Humanity to become a homeowner for the first time. Brandee is an incredible woman and mom. She continues to work so hard to provide a loving home and good life for her daughter Kaylee. We are so very, very happy she is part of our Willamette West Habitat family.

Here's Brandee's story:

I grew up in Portland Oregon where my father Craig Roberts is a truck driver and my mother Dianne Roberts used to be a house cleaner and they raised 4 children, they are kind and loving parents they have been married 40 years. I am employed at Fred Meyers and have worked there for 12 years I like the customers and the fellow employees. I am a single parent. My Daughter Kaylee is 13 she really likes her new school and has made lots of friends! I used to work at my fathers landscaping business he has taught me a lot of things over the years, one of the most rewarding with landscaping is all the hard work with the beautiful finished product. I have already planted grass with Paula's help. She was the Women Build Lead on my home. I also have lilac bushes and rhododendrons and roses, a magnolia tree and a Japanese maple that Kate donated. It was at the Hillsboro Library that Josephine my niece, Kaylee and I went to learn about Habitat For Humanity program with Mark Forker leading the presentation. We received an application which I, as quickly as possible, filled out and returned. The application requested job history, credit, 3 years taxes and current living conditions. I was already excited about the hopeful future for Kaylee and I. A couple of gentlemen reviewed my application while I waited to see if we would get a second interview in our current home. I am delighted to say we did! Two very kind men Sung Ho and Fran interviewed Kaylee and I to determine our need and to see if she was agreeable to change schools. In the mail on June 30 2011, I received a partnership letter from Habitat For Humanity which was a life changing moment. I was going to be a recipient of a Habitat House! I started jumping up and down! I still get teary eyed thinking about it. In July I started volunteering for my hours and by December I was informed I was the recipient of the Womens Build house. What an honor! Building my own house has always been a dream of mine and Habitat for Humanity, all the regular volunteers, Habitat administrators, donors and many other volunteers have made my dreams come true. Thank You! I really enjoyed swinging a hammer, framing walls, and doing dry wall. I also did duct work and mudding with Cathy and was so happy to work side by side with Paula Ohland, Lynn Johnston and Mary. Their dedication and patience with me was wonderful. Mike, Mark, Erin, Molly, )I want to name all of them) Harry, ,Larry John, Ernie, Jerry, June and Hal. Just to name a few. What an encouraging group to be with! Definitely God's will. I feel I have received the greatest gift of friendship and joy so I hope to pay it forward and continue to help others. Along with family, regulars and friends I finished with my 500 hours in July of 2013. I continued to work and donate hours to fellow Habitat recipients. I signed the papers on October 30 of 2013, where I was greeted by a welcoming party and a beautiful tool box filled with tools I used to hang curtains and put in a fire extinguisher ! Our house, Kaylee and I received a Blessing from Cliff and Habitat for Humanity! I feel more secure, less unsure about the future. I love the warmth in our home. In our former apartment we had baseboards bellow the windows which was very expensive heating and I could only afford to turn the heat on for 1 hour a day usually in the evenings after work. In our new home we are able to be warm. Forever Grateful, Brandee

Check out today's next post about a fundraising event held today.

Nanette

Gorgeous day to be outside!

Hey Folks,

Here's one of the daffodils I took a photo last week, now open with it's face to the morning sun. The day started out cold but by noon it was thoroughly delightful outside. I felt very fortunate to have been able to spend the day working outdoors.

Insulation and drywall have been started in house 8, with kitchen and bath cabinets going in on house 7.

I spent the day framing interior walls for the second floor in house 5 with some of the super folks who are members of Oregon School Employees Association (OSEA) union from the Beaverton School District. There were no walls at the start of the day, but with hard work and good leadership from one of our site supervisors, we completed almost all of them. Good thing too, as roof trusses are due to arrive later in the week. One of our future homeowners, Mohammad, was also working with us as part of his family's 500 hours of sweat equity.

Here it is...the wonderful foundation hole that is the base of the future Women Build and Thrivent houses! :) This work is contracted out to Subcom Evacuation & Utilities, a company from right there in Hillsboro, where our build site currently is located. The gentlemen to the left worked very hard, with a little help from their backhoe, to get all the dimensions correct and connect the water and sewer pipes from the street to the outside of the foundation. We use gravel to cover the foundation floor to keep it from becoming a big mud pit while we are working laying out the forms for the concrete pour, which you can read about in the Jan 20th post.

By the end of the day, as I'd said earlier, most of the walls were framed in house 5 and house 6 was off to a good start as that group spent much of the day getting the rest of the sheathing done on the outside of the house. The instillation of the cabinets in house 7 were nearly complete as was most of the insulation and drywall in house 8. As always, it was another productive day with hardworking volunteers.

Some of the folks I work with:

Meet Hal, Terry & Cliff, Willamette West Habitat's Site Supervisors! Between them they have decades of experience building homes for hard working families. All have 'retired' but spend 3 days a week, and often more, volunteering their time to teach and lead volunteers like myself, as we learn and work building houses. Hal was a forester, Terry managed engineers and their projects at Intel and Cliff was an engineer with the Dept of Agriculture. At the time they were drawn to this service, I'm sure they didn't imagine it would become a life mission, but here they all still are, giving our volunteers and families their best each day. We are grateful to have such dedicated people to work alongside us.

That's all for now. Until next time, live your best life, however big or small it may be!

Nanette

Never so happy to see a backhoe :)

Hey Folks,

This first photo shows the progress that was made during Tues & Weds build days. Not only was the decking completed on the second floor for both houses but they got a good start on the firewalls that separate the two homes.

I worked with a few folks on house 6 side to finish the firewall. The frame for the wall was waiting for us when we arrived, so it was a matter of covering it with fire resistant sheetrock, placing some insulation between the walls, then to set the wall in place.

Lifting even a partial wall with this heavier sheetrock takes some brute strength, so of course, we got some motivated women to do the job. :) This gals are from a Meet Up group in PDX, out for a day of volunteering. They were great to have on site & we're hoping they'll be interested in helping out on the Women Build.

We've glued the subfloor where the wall will stand to assist in securing it, then the wall is set in place, checked for level and nailed to the subfloor. We put braces in several places until these firewalls can be secured with tie plates to other interior and exterior walls.

Unfortunately, because of my sieve of a memory, I missed taking a photo of the finished product so you'll have to step aboard the imagination train. We continued our work but placing insulation between each stud then covered the open side of the framed wall with more of the fire resistant sheetrock. Basically sandwiching the framed wall. The sheetrock is placed 1/2 inch up from the bottom so it won't wick standing water on the decking from the rain and develop mold. At the end of the day, both walls are covered with heavy duty plastic, again, to prevent them from getting wet until the roof is on to protect them.

House 7 was painted with primer by the family of one of our future homeowners as part of their 500 hours of sweat equity. They really cranked it out and completed the entire home in one day. Now that's hard work and enthusiasm! :)

Meet Paul and his joyful daughter Lola who will be the recipients of house 7. I've been working with Paul since the previous build site as he works toward providing a permanent home for he and his daughter. Of course I had to go in with her to see which room was hers and how she was going to decorate it. She will paint it half daytime and half nighttime, with the nighttime part featuring the moon and stars over her bed. There is also a cubbyhole space part way up one wall that is intended for storage but will be an area for Lola and her friends to hang out in. That space will be decorated “all girly”. :)

The biggest news of the day is we had the excavation team out to dig the foundation for houses 3 & 4, one of which will be our Women Build home. Whoohoo!! We'll be working soon on the foundation, I believe, until the subfloor decking gets on the first floor. Then starting April 8th we'll have a Blitz Build for 12 days which I'm looking forward to joining in on. This build event will take us up to getting the sheathing on the roof and it'll be all hands on deck. From that point on we'll have the Women Build happening on one house and a Thrivent Lutheran build on the other. So looking forward to the experience!

This last photo is a sign that spring is indeed coming. One of my favorite flowers, the daffodil, is ready to spread some cheer during our continued overcast days.

Until next time, live your best life, however big or small it may be!

Nanette 

Cake Pops...or not

Hey Folks,

It's a Bake Sale day and one the items on my menu was to be cake pops. Maybe you've seen those cute little cakes on a stick that can be dipped into melted candy chips and decorated in all kinds of adorable ways. Really! That's what the box containing the fancy schmancy cake pop baking machine said when I bought the darn thing. Yeeesss...I bought one (head hung in shame). Well, let me tell you after numerous hours of monkeying with the cake batter and the machine (heating it up & cooling it down) and my kitchen looking like a flour bomb went off in it, I finally had to call it...FAIL! They came out looking like little pods from some alien movie. I was afraid if I stared at them long enough some screeching, slimy little creature would come bursting out and chase me around until it could attach itself to my spine and control my mind. I would then be forced to take over the world and make my fellow humans do stuff like eat nothing but pizza for every meal 7 days a week for like...forever! And though my cousin David would happily submit to that, I'm sure the rest of you would tire of it in no time.

Anyway, digressive diversion aside...needless to say there were not cake pops for sale today. Several hours past my bedtime & in the midst of the disaster zone that was my kitchen, I found myself making cookies. Somehow my subconscious mind had taken over when I was shopping the week before and had bought extra ingredients for a Plan B I was unaware of. I'm beginning to think my subconscious mind knows me a whole lot better than the conscious one seems to. Hmmmm...

As for the candy melts I was suppose to dip them in and they'd come out looking all perfect? Did not perform as advertised, 'nuff said.

Despite my silly exploits in the kitchen, and because of my wonderful co-workers, it was another amazingly successful fundraising event! My awesome celebrity co-baker Cindy E made a rave worthy Oatmeal, Spiced Cake with Cream Cheese frosting. Many thanks to her!! My contribution was of course, not cake pops, but Oatmeal Cranberry Raisin cookies and two kinds of Five Layer bars, one with chocolate chips and the other with butterscotch chips. My generous co-workers made donations totaling $84.01!!!!! I'm so grateful! Thanks as well to Mollie from Willamette West Habitat, who stopped in for a tour of our building and got a few treats to bring back to the office with her. You may remember from my first post, she's the one who got me into all of this. Wait!?! I'm thanking her? ;) Yes, thank you Mollie. :)

Don't faint...I actually remembered to take a picture of the table before the start of the sale. The plates were notably empty at the end of my day. Many, many thanks to all!

Nanette

Safety first...

Hey Folks,

This week we continued our focus on houses 5 & 6 as well as house 7. It was another mixed day weather wise. Some sun and the 'r' word, without the hail this time. Got pretty soaked in a couple of downpours but that's the nature of the work. And for some weird reason, I don't seem to mind.

If you remember from last week, we ended Saturday having worked on some first floor interior walls and had begun the stairs. As you can see from this first photo, the rest of the interior walls were framed and most of the TJIs were set for the second floor in both houses. The stairs were also completed. TJI (or sometimes called TGI because it rolls of the tongue easier) is short for Truss Joist I-beam the main support of the subfloor along with one or more strategically placed beams. 

Since we're nearly ready to begin the decking on the second floor, it was time to put safety measures in place to keep someone from taking an unfortunate step off the second floor and end up with a very expensive ride to the hospital. Plus there would be the trying to live it down part, which could be worse than the broken arm or leg gotten from the fall. :P In this photo, one of our future homeowners is working with one of our AmeriCorps volunteers to get the rails secured. I'm in the blue hardhat working with Cliff, a long time WWHH volunteer and site supervisor, getting the last few TJIs set in house 6. Exact placement is very important not only for the strength and stability of the floor but to be able to predict where you will need to align the decking sheet seams so they can be nailed into the TJIs.

While some of us were outside, we had some returning volunteers from Tualitan HS work on cleaning up house 7 after our mud & tape folks completed their work. They did a great job getting everything ready for priming the walls.

By the time we broke for lunch, our rails around the second floor were in and all TJIs in place. As you can see we even got a bit of a break from the downpours with the sun popping out for a bit. 

Lunch was in our new Habi-Hut which will be in house 2 for a while. 

Our old hut will be used for storing insulation until it's taken apart and moved. As you can see our new spot is much larger and will soon have indoor plumbing. Yeah!

We even have a ham in the kitchen wearing an orange cap (Kevin, one of our AmeriCorps crew leaders :P) along with the second shift of volunteers from Tualitan HS and Ri Len who is giving them an orientation.

Bill even has a real office now. :)

After lunch nailers needed to be installed along the front and back of the houses running horizontal to the TJIs. Nailers are strips of wood we cut from leftover decking (we try to find a use for everything so as not to be wasteful) and are set above outside wall top plates and interior walls that also run horizontal to the TJIs. These strips are meant to overhang the top plates by about and inch to an inch & a half, giving the folks who will be installing the first floor ceiling drywall, something to screw into. They use the TJIs for the rest of it. Once more the distance between the TJIs comes into play for the most efficient use of materials with the ceiling drywall. Job complete by end of day.

The sun was bright and warm as we walked off site. A lovely way to end our productive day. :)

Until next time, live your best life, however big or small it may be!

Nanette

A thought for today

We're framing a future

Hey Folks,

This week was a framing frenzy. And we kept on working in the sun, hail & of course the 'r' word because Mother Nature was making darn sure we were going to have some balance to the lovely, spring like day in the 60's we experienced the day before. Just like her. :P

Walking on site I could see they made some good progress on Tues & Weds on houses 5 & 6. All the outer walls for the first floor were up & sheathed with a few of the inner walls framed. Our job was to continue work on the interior wall framing. Women Build crew leader RiLen and myself worked with some bright and enthusiastic young women from Pacific University on constructing several walls and tying them together with others already in place. I hadn't taken a drawing and built a wall since October so I'll admit, it took me a bit to get all the synapses firing in 'read and build' mode. It finally all clicked and we were off! This process of course, seems to always include going to Bill, the fellow that designs our houses, and asking some questions. Better to ask than having to redo.

The young women from Pac U caught on quickly, were tenacious and did a great job. Our 2X4 & 2X6 boards were precut for us beforehand to save us time during the framing process. We did learn though, to double check the measurements in case something was off a bit. I've learned the hard way it never hurts to measure again. It's a royal pain to get 16 penny nails out of a 2X4 board. Seriously, no fun. :(

Once our walls were built we followed the measurements of where they should stand in relation to the other walls already in place. Then we checked them for level and made sure they were square before securing them to the subfloor and tying them to the existing walls with our tie plates on the top of the wall. By lunch we'd completed our task and bid farewell to the super volunteer group from Pac U.

After our break, framing continued in house 6 with two of our future homeowners (on the right) putting in some their sweat equity hours (500 total) along with more young volunteers from Tualitan HS and some of our crew leaders.

In house 5 we worked on putting in stairs. My first time. Our stringers (I guess I would call them the outline cutouts of our stairs) were precut for us though I've cut them myself once and learned you have to be very precise for safety reasons. The stairs need to be the correct depth for feet to step on and also need to be level so there isn't an unsafe tilt to them. Two 2X4s are measured to the length of the two outer stingers and cut on the ends to match the angled cuts on each end of the stringers. One is then attached to the angled wall going up the stairs and the other against the wall that divides the two homes. Next the stringers are set into placed and nailed to the landing, 2X4s and the subfloor, with a third going in the center. Time for the risers, which are set into place before the stair treads. Once more we are careful to make sure everything is flush and level to prevent problems with tilt on a stair. While cutting the risers I was able to learn to use a new tool which happened to be a new table saw we've acquired. It was lovely. :)

All in all it was a very good day despite all the weird weather changes and we were, as always, grateful for the wonderful volunteers who hung in there to help out.

Till next time, live your best life, however big or small it may be!

Nanette