First United Methodist Church

Sorry this a day late, but we got here safely and arrived in Puerto Rico ready to jump on a bus to head to our home for the week. We are staying at a Christian camp up in the mountains that includes a longish uphill walk to the entrance since the bus can’t make the right turns. We are getting our steps in this week!!

Today we started out work projects! We began our day by singing some worship songs to prepare for our visits to the nursing homes later in the day (video to come later). We also wrote letters to put in the hygiene care packets for the residents. Also today 2/3 of our group went to work at a house that was hit by hurricane Maria and had the whole 2nd story come off in the storm. We worked on scrapping the paint on the 1st floor so we can start painting later in the week. Lastly another group started priming and painting the fence at the church we are with this week.

This morning our last small group went to the nursing home went to a Caserío (similar to a housing project) to pray with residents and play with the kids there. We brought some bubbles, balloons, and sports equipment to play with as well as Yahtzee and had a great time. We heard a powerful story from a resident named Elena that moved down from Manhattan after having a brain tumor and Alex prayed for her.

Happy 4th from Puerto Rico! Our group started the day with some prayer, worship, and volleyball!

Today we are trying to finish scraping the paint at the house so we can start painting it after lunch! We hope that many hands will make the job go fast and that we will be able to complete the job. Prayers for us that we can do a good job and leave the homeowners with a finished or mostly finished painted house when we leave!

We got to start painting the house! Doesn’t the yellow look cheery?

A small group went back to the house today to paint get the first floor painted for the homeowner. It is starting to take shape! It will need a second coat, but we feel good about getting the indoor painting  started for the family.

We got to go to the beach for the afternoon!!! After a morning of painting and visiting 2 different caseríos and praying with people and playing with kids, we had our second rec day.