Christmas In April - A Volunteer Opportunity

This past Saturday our church had the chance to join an organization called Christmas in April (CIA). This was the first time we've participated as we're new to the church. Our church serves a lot of individuals and families in Calvert County. Our church had the opportunity of serving by helping do repairs at 5 homes.

I was put on a team with Pastor Robert, his 2 sons, 2 other men from church and my oldest son. I had no idea what this experience was going to look like because I didn't know what skills the pastor had or the 2 guys who were with us. Our task at this house was to install a door and gutters.

We headed to North Beach to check out the task ahead of us. One of the guys, Ben, was someone I hadn't met before. Jason is a guy I've talked with a few times since he heads up our Greeting team. We arrived at the home and the homeowner brought us around to the back of the house to show us what needed to be done.

I was selected to run to the local hardware store to get some painting supplies for the door & frame, work gloves, silicon, and some drain tile. We actually made a few trips to the hardware store as well came up as we were working on the project. Thank goodness we were only a few minutes away from the store. Each home was allocated about $100 from CIA for supplies. Thankfully we came in much lower than that.

It was great being able to get the door painted, installed, and the gutters up for this family. The door had to be replaced because the homeowner had no gutters so the water was rotting the wood so hopefully that problem will be resolved. We didn't have enough gutter to cover the entire back of the house, but the owner said the family had old gutters they could put up at a later time on the areas we weren't able to do.

One of the things I appreciated was watching the pastor teach my son how to do what needed to be done. Pastor Robert's boys (one 14 and the other a preteen) both got into the job and went to town. It was clear he's been teaching them construction skills for a while! Watching him explain to Jacob about installing the door was terrific. Who knew the pastor was also a handyman?!

During my 2nd trip to the hardware store the guys cut 2 holes in the deck so that the water from the gutters would go under the deck instead of spilling over onto it. This will definitely help keep the home in good shape!

I definitely wish I could've gone to each house to see the work everyone was doing. It was wonderful hearing about the repairs that were done: windows installed, water heaters replaced, clean up, and so much more.

I'm already looking forward to participating next year!