Camp Baldwin and Community

Elberta/Foley/Gulf Shores is an area that has been affected by hurricane Ivan and also the oil spill. The beaches have been cleaned up but there are crews working on other beaches. The boat below was beached by Ivan. Camp Baldwin lost about 200 trees during Ivan.

Camp Baldwin is blessed with many tall pines and these live oak trees. They stay green all year but shed leaves continually.

This is the sign that greeted us on hwy 20 as we approached Camp Baldwin. This camp is a ministry of the Baldwin Baptist Association. It is both a summer camp and retreat center. The facilities are continually being updated and is well maintained. It is located on Wolf Bay about 8 miles by water from the Gulf of Mexico. The camp is developing a new outdoor program including sailing and boat building. The programs director has a dream of building a lighthouse for the classes. He lived on his sailboat for ten year sailing much of the Gulf.

This is the 65-foot sailboat that Rusty uses for his classes. He took us for a two-hour ride in the bay. As we were getting ready to set sail, a dolphin swam by our boat--about 30 yards away.

Women SOWERS February 2011

Two of the SOWER ladies cleaned motel rooms. Marilyn and CC did laundry and made beds.
They also worked in the gift store and made angels to sell in the store. They made dolls for the children in the Appalachian Mountains. The dolls are given out by missionaries to help explain the way of Salvation.

Men SOWER Feb 2011

The stairway leading from the gym floor to the room where Tom and I spent 3 weeks dividing the large room into two smaller meeting rooms.

Tom cutting studs and plates to frame in the steel beams and purlins.

I am taking a break from insulating. Note the mask on the saw horse. Itch and Itch some more.

Tom resetting some screws as we were taping. Thankfully the ceiling is suspended so no upper seams.

We got both rooms taped with the first coat and one room with the second coat then the project was done. Next month they will finish taping and maybe put in the suspended ceiling. Another project will to build a human foos ball court. That sound like fun. There will be at least five SOWER couples during March. Tom will be there in March so he will be able to let the new group know where we left off.

pictures after Jan project

A farmer doing his spring field work by Bonifay FL--plowing a cotton field. BD and BC were on a road trip to check out a tractor salvage yard--lots of "rusty iron".
Part of the old fort is St. Augustine.

BD and LD by the Alantic Ocean

BC and CC by the Alantic Ocean

The Ladies found a place to buy some beads in St Augustine/

Too busy to blog

Hi everyone. We finished teen challenge and took a trip to St Augustine for three days. We didn't take the RV's so we had to be back by Wed to pack and move out by Thursday morning (SOWER rules). B & L headed north and B & C headed to Camp Baldwin in Elberta AL.

Camp Baldwin is mainly a summer camp with some weekend retreats. When there is a retreat we help serve the meals which means we get fed. Very good food. The ladies do the laundry after the retreats and clean the rooms. They also make angels for the gift store. They also are making dolls for missionaries--the ones with closed eyes on one side and with open eyes on the other side--also a way-of-salvation neckless.

The two of the men are painting and two of the men are dividing a large room into two rooms--sound simple--the room is up in the roof structures--cables in the way, the ceiling is slanted, wind bracing to frame around, a wall AC to frame around that is setback like a fireplace--it keeps the brain active. We have lots of the framing done this week. We should be able to start sheetrocking next week.

The weather has been very cool--frost in the morning and 40's in the afternoon--maybe in the 60's next week. It has rained several times so it is good to be working indoors.

I will get my act together and post some pictures. nlsower

second week projects

Steve putting screws in the backer board. We put down about 75 three foot by five foot sheets--lots of screws--about 3200.
BD down on his knees.

My knees were too sore to kneel all of the time.

The water tank--getting ready to stand it upright. This took lots of planning--we did not want it to fall on the AC units. It went up according to plan--Praise the Lord.

During the second week we laid some backer board and tipped up a water tank.

tank project

Ropes were needed to pull the tank over the last few degrees because the backhoe couldn't quite reach to the top. There were three guys on each rope.
Lifting the tank--the blue tractor was there to keep the tank from rolling down the hill.

The tank is upright--thanks to the rope pullers in the background.

This the whole crew--after a job well done.

BD is on top of the ladder disconnecting the chain and cable. I just sit on the backhoe and watch.

We were able to slide the tank over unto the slab. This tank is for the sprinkler system in the blue building.

Thanks for the comments--they mean alot.