We do work, really!

So we realized that our posts and pictures so far have only shown us at play! And even though our jobs don't always feel like "work," that is what it technically is. We work with some amazing people who have taught us a lot in our jobs, about the area and about ourselves. Maybe we can get the girls to share a something specific about their experiences so far :)

Here are some pictures at work:

Christina works at Heart & Hand, a ministry that operates two thrift stores, a garden market, provides food boxes to people in need, financial emergency assistance, among other things. Christina typically works in the Philippi thrift store sorting and stocking racks, in the office making up food boxes and keeping the food storage room stocked and organized. And one day a week she goes with Mike to do "pick-up's," which is usually furniture and other household items that people are unable to bring to the store themselves. Mike drives the truck and together they do the heavy-lifting!

Ranita works at The Myers Clinic. The clinic is a mainstay community, providing health care to the community since 1933. At the clinic, Ranita gets to do a variety of jobs with hands-on experience of how a health center runs. She has checked in patients (collect information, take temperature, weight, height, blood pressure), performed basic laboratory tests, answered patient calls, and contacted pharmacies. She has also worked in registration, filing and scanning. Plus, there is usually lot's of food brought in!

Tara currently works a couple of jobs, with another one soon to begin! She works a couple of days at the World Vision Storehouse. The Storehouse operates much like a Lowes or Home Depot with items for construction and around the house, donated from large companies like those mentioned. There is also a Gifts in Kind section that is specifically for churches and other charitable organizations to go through and pick up things like clothing, self-care items and other random things for them to give away. Tara does sorting, stocking, cleaning and whatever else they need done.

Tara also works a couple of days at Heart & Hand, also sorting donated items and food in the pantry. Hopefully beginning in the next week, she will start work at Philippi Elementary as a teacher's aide. She will help the first grade teachers specifically, grading papers, making copies, and working one-on-one with students. The plan is also that she will get to use her art interests and do some special projects with kids during their library time.

Tara and Christina enjoy a snack at World Vision. Heart & Hand was closed for Veteran's Day so Christina joined Tara at work.

We leaders are also very busy with our various jobs. Mike is currently working one day a week at World Vision doing various jobs like laying carpet (as pictured), sorting, stocking and recently installing tv's. He also works one day driving truck for Heart & Hand doing pick-up's with Christina. This is all in addition to his work for Goshen College here at the ITS Media "east coast satellite office." As well as all of our SA Leader duties, of course!

I (Heidi) am working for Heart & Hand a couple of days a week in the office doing some bookkeeping work, as well as marketing. I wrote an article that was published in the county paper and have been working on getting the Fall newsletter out, writing articles and laying it out. At some point I will also redesign their brochure. Alas, there are no pictures of me sitting at my desk!

Jewelry, couches and cows

Last week Susan Nisly, Director of Service Adventure, came to Philippi for her fall visit, so we were all on our best behavior! Really, we had a lot of fun with Learning Component, meals, and just hanging out. Tuesday (October 12) night after Susan arrived, Ranita prepared a great meal and later Heidi taught everyone to make beaded flower rings - an advantage for Heidi in having an all girl group!

Tara, Heidi, Susan, Ranita and Christina

Concentrating

Later that week we got a new-to-us futon from Heart and Hand to replace a very uncomfortable couch we had in the computer room. So before the couch left us for good, we had a little fun...

the girls

the boys

And today is Christina's 19th birthday! This is McHugh's week to cook, so Heidi made lasagna and chocolate cake at Christina's request. After moving furniture and sorting clothes at work all day, we think it was a nice birthday evening, including a Skype call home!

A cow cake of course! (she grew up on a dairy farm)

All lit up!

Confetti blast

Moooo!

Relief Sale and Home Visit

This past weekend we traveled to the Shenandoah Valley for the MCC Harrisonburg Relief Sale and a home visit with Ranita's family. It was the longest road trip our group has taken yet and we made it round-trip without van trouble! (We lost two lug nuts on a relatively short trip to Buckhannon early on).

Helping make apple butter

We arrived in Harrisonburg, Virginia late Friday night and some of the group stayed with Ranita's aunt while the rest stayed with friends Ranita's (actually the family of a current Johnstown SA participant!) Early Saturday morning we headed over to the Relief Sale for a tasty breakfast of hot sausage & egg sandwiches, omelets, and pancakes. After our fill we walked around and met up with Ranita's family. We spent the rest of the morning watching how corn meal is made, riding the 'cow train,' helping make apple butter and watching the quilt sale.

Ian, Tara, Ella and Ranita riding the "cow train"

Poor Christina, only 2 kids and 3 participants :(

The afternoon was relaxing time at Ranita's which was easy to do with the trampoline and gorgeous farm view behind the house. Sunday we attended Springdale Mennonite, Ranita's home church, and had another delicious meal with her family before making our journey back to Philippi.

Road Kill Cook Off

Yesterday was the event we've been waiting for...the Road Kill Cook Off. I've included a brief video below to give you a 'taste' of what we saw at the event. Besides the tasting of 'road kill' dishes like ... there were booths with various local crafts and other baked goods, a parade, games, and live music. The two-hour drive to Marlinton was beautiful as we made our way through the very windy mountain roads. Leaves on the trees were already beginning to change from green to orange, red, and yellow. We arrived in Marlinton hoping that we'd be greeted with signs for the festival since it was in it's 20th year, but none were to be seen (Mike printed out directions to Marlinton but not the festival!) Once in the town of 1200 we quickly noticed the large crowds to our left so we followed traffic until we could park (a few blocks away from the booths).

We found the road kill tasting fun but some of us were a little disappointed that there weren't more creative or odd dishes, like possum as all the shirts showed... and the red neck parade wasn't as red neck as we'd hoped, but you can judge for yourself if you watch the video. We sampled boar, "bull," deer, "cat" and "panda", none of which tasted too strange. Then we got good old mystery meat hot dogs from a vendor since samples only go so far!

Open House

Family photo surrounded by 'school pictures'

We've certainly continued to be busy around here and this past week was no exception. A few weeks ago the girls had a great idea to paint their room to make it feel more like their own place for the next 10 months. They had big plans to paint bright colors and stencil patterns on the walls, paint the living room with a fresh bright color, and write a meaningful bible verse on a wall. To help keep everyone motivated to actually get the work done we set a date to have an open house and invited the church and our coworkers to stop by. Today was the open house and it was a success! Well, we still have to finish a few details, but you can view some of the pictures here, and watch the video of us creating our family tree. The family photo pictured above was a fun activity and the 'school pictures' that surround it are meant to be funny with us looking a little silly. If you want to see it in detail you'll need to drop in for a visit!

Busy weeks

Last Wednesday our house celebrated Ranita's 18th birthday! We tried to do our best to make it a special birthday for her by decorating the house with some streamers & birthday banners and making her a delicious dinner with chocolate cake for dessert. It was also the first week of meal rotation for the girls so they were tasked with making the birthday meal for Ranita. Cards from friends and family poured in all week for Ranita so we hope it was a memorable 18th!


In addition to starting meal rotation, we have started our weekly worship nights, weekly learning components and started making plans for local weekend activities. In a few weeks we're planning to spend the day at a roadkill cook-off in nearby (two hour drive) Marlington. Events include a redneck parade, possum run, and other wacky events. We'll be sure to include a full post-trip report.

Heidi's parents came to visit us over Labor Day weekend and we did our best to introduce them to everything that Philippi has to offer. Since we've only been living here for a month, however, we could only show them a few local hot spots so they'll have to return again soon once we learn of more places to see. Mike's family is looking at dates to visit too so this will give them a taste of what they'll get to see. Besides taking a walking tour through downtown Philippi, we drove past a coal mine, visited the historical society, and had some ice cream at the local Dairy King.

Working on the farm

Tara helping Ella, Ranita and Chad supervising, Christina working hard

On Friday we spent the evening at Shepherd's Field where four Philippi Mennonite Church families live. On the farm the families each have some gardens and animals, some of which they share responsibilities of care. One of the shared responsibilities includes cleaning out their sheep barn. Traditionally the Service Adventure unit has helped with the cleanup so we offered our services for the night in exchange for pizza and fellowship. None of our participants were strangers to this type of work since they've each had some farm experience (two growing up on farms). All were willing to take a turn at scooping and shoveling for a little while and enjoyed relaxing after-wards with some delicious home-made pizza.

Everyone's Here!

Ranita, Tara, Ella, Christina, Mike, Ian and Heidi

Everyone has safely arrived in Philippi and we began our orientation last Wednesday. Our volunteers have had some time to settle in and experience the place they'll be calling home for the next 10 months. Living in the small hilly city of Philippi is different for each of them as they've come from flatland farms and towns even smaller than our population of 3,000.

During the week of orientation we have spent time going over what living in community will be like, explored the city and met many members of the local community and supporting church, Philippi Mennonite. We were able to spend some "relaxing" time hiking up Seneca Rocks and hoped to also get to a state park, but were rained out two days in a row, so we'll save that trip for another day.

Seneca Rocks

How big is Seneca?  So big!

After our hike we stopped in Harman to pick blueberries at Lester and Mary Beth Lind's.

Everyone is ready to begin working at their job placements on Wednesday. Ranita will be working at Myer's Clinic assisting anywhere she's needed, whether it's filing or observing patient care. Tara will be working at Head Start assisting teachers in the Preschool age classrooms. Christina will be working with Heart and Hand Ministries at their local garden market and thrift store.

Unit leaders arrive!

It has been a long week of travel, unpacking, settling in, meeting people, more unpacking, and there's still a lot to do! We arrived in Philippi late Monday night (11:30PM) after over 15 hours of travel from Goshen, Indiana. Travel was not without "adventure" since our rented moving truck broke down several times adding significant delays to our journey. Fortunately, the first break-down occurred within minutes of our planned lunch stop with family in Columbus, Ohio. About an hour after leaving Columbus it broke down again and while we waited for the service company, we enjoyed an unplanned dinner stop at a rest area. We finally arrived in Philippi, though too late to unload the truck but were fortunate enough to have a member of the support committee let us stay at their home for the night. The next morning we unloaded the truck with help from members of Philippi Mennonite Church. The following night we lost power while trying to make dinner with the same family from the church. Power wasn't restored until about 18 hours later.

It was a busy week of unpacking and setting up the apartment. We've started to rearrange the unit house in anticipation of the arrival of our participants on the 17th. There's still a lot to prepare prior to their arrival but we've felt very welcomed by everyone we've met so far!