Timeline

As both the Red House and Green House are getting close to completion I thought it would be fun to take a look back on how it all started.  A trip down memory lane as it were.

On Thursday October 20th, 2016, the excavator arrived all the way from Edmonton to dig the holes for the new homes.  Later on that same day, Craig, Jordan, Rolf and Kevin put the final stakes in the ground to map out house number one.

The next day, October 21st, Rolf was busy building a road back to house number two.

Our good friend Arnold from Edmonton, arrived on Saturday the 22nd to start digging the basements.  It seems like a long time ago already!  Craig needed to do some fine tuning on the dig and so he brought his own mini excavator!  (BYOME)  Let me say one more time how much we (I) like and appreciate Craig! 

Remember when the blog word of the week was schrakjlijch?  Well when we started working with the footings on October 28th it was very, very schrakjlijch down in the hole.

On November 15th, while it was snowing outside, we were pouring the basement walls and by the 17th the basement walls were being sprayed with a black, tar like material.

A month after we started digging the basements our building packages from Star Building arrived on site.  A big shout out to David for taking care of us at Star.  And on November 29th, the first beam on house number one is up!  I remember making a comment about beam me up Scotty - in reference to our framer Scott.  Thanks again Scott and Brian for serving us so well through the good weather, cold weather, super cold weather and then...the mud!

It was a cold winter and I remember nail guns having a hard time working never mind the framers and volunteers.  Here is Don from Gem on December 1st screwing the floor down.  Right where Don is standing there is now a hardwood floor.  And we had two father/son combo's helping us on December 3rd.  Richard and Ethan from Gem and Brian and Kurt from Calgary.

By December 22nd - less than a month after starting - house number one was looking like - well it was looking like a house was supposed to look like!  :)  And on December 28th one of our Alberta Mennonite Brethren pastors - Laurence was braving the cold and helping finish the garage.

January 4th, 2017, the first beams were going up on house number two.  It was very cold, and if you look hard in the background you'll see another father/son combo, Walt and Nathan from Edmonton also braving the cold as work continues to progress.

January 20th saw the tin roof up on house number one.  A big thanks to Ron and his crew from Duchess who installed the roof on both homes.  You may remember my reference to tin roof ice cream - tin roof is one great tasting ice cream.

One of my favourite Reaching Higher stories comes out of the two roofs.  We received one invoice for both roofs in the amount of $4,000.  In the same envelope as the invoice, was a donation cheque for $5,000.  If you think about it, not only did we get two free roofs, we actually made $1,000!!  How fun is that?  Because of the incredible support we are getting, both homes are being built for approximately half their retail value!

Thanks very much for your continued support as we push to finish the year strong financially.  Stay tuned next week as we continue down the staff home timeline.

Bob "Ranger" Kroeker
Executive Director

Thankful Thanksgiving

Hello from a very beautiful Camp Evergreen.  Yesterday we reached a high of 21 and as you walk around camp the leaves are crunching under foot.  Most nights dip below freezing, the canoe pond pump has been taken up for winter, we've had our second snow fall and our coldest morning so far?  Minus 10!  Winter is coming, but we're really enjoying fall while we can!

This weekend is Thanksgiving weekend and we have much to be thankful here at Evergreen.  We really feel that God richly blessed us this summer.  We had more volunteers than we've had over the last couple of years.  We had fewer hospital runs and discipline challenges.  Our staff really bought in to our vision of "seeing lives transformed by the power of Jesus."  We're very thankful for the 476 campers that we know of who made a significant faith decision this summer.

We're also thankful for our fall season.  Financially we are on budget, our new staff homes are getting closer and closer to being finished and we made it through our very busy month of September.  As an entire staff we put in extra effort to make sure our guests were well taken care of.  I'm thankful for our staff, each one bringing a unique perspective to how we do ministry here at Evergreen.  I believe I can speak for all of our staff that we are thankful for four days in a row with no guest groups!  (insert whoo hoo)  We intentionally do not book  guest groups over Thanksgiving weekend and are excited for the opportunity to sleep in, relax and re-charge as we have guest groups on site 19 days in a row once we return!

I remind myself almost daily that as we reach higher, every decision we make, every staff member that we hire, needs to be made with our summer campers in mind.  Summer camp is the heart of who we are.  It's an opportunity to share the Good News of Jesus Christ.  It's an opportunity to disciple our young people, to provide leadership training.  By the end of summer we're always tired.  Summer has long, long days, we're cooking for 200+ people, washing that many dishes.  But as tiring as summer camp is, I'm already looking forward to next summer!

The homes continue to move forward.  Last Saturday the basements were poured.  Thanks Kevin and Green Acres for heading that up.  Gary our finish carpenter finished (slight pun) the Green House and has now moved to the Red House.  Craig and Jordan were back to build the stairs into the homes from the garages and install the basement doors.  Han and Peter arrived late in the week to start the stone work.  And Ben, Andrew and Don came today to install the cabinets in the Red House.  We ordered gravel to deal with the schrakjlijchness, but so far it hasn't arrived, so you guessed it - the mud is still pretty schrakjlijch out there!

Thanks again for your continued support.


Bob "Ranger" Kroeker
Executive Director

Schrakjlijch!

Shoot - I mean chute!  Kevin and his gang from Green Acres built us this fancy chute right into the basement of house number two.  Its going to be great for night games when you need to hide quickly!  It had a more practical use this week as a means to get extra gravel into the basement to prepare for concrete.

Progress continues on the new homes.  The first coat of primmer paint is up which means the cabinet guy (our good friend Ben Nickel from Rosemary) has been given the green light to go ahead and install.  We're waiting for his farming responsibilities to release him!  Our finish carpenter, Gary, has started finishing house number two.  And both basements are now ready for concrete.  If we can get a cement truck in here this Saturday, the plan is to pour the first basement.

We have now passed Eight Hundred Thousand in cash and pledges for Reaching Higher with a current total of $810,136.71.  Andrew's ride through Alberta was certainly a boost for us.  So a BIG thanks again Andrew!  As the homes come close to completion we are now turning our focus on the lodge.  If you were to ask me what our single greatest need at Evergreen is, I would reply - a new kitchen and dining hall.  As I write this blog we have 165 students and staff from Heritage Christian Academy on site - and its snowing outside!  Cold muddy weather adds a certain challenge to feeding and providing programming for such a large group when hanging around outside is not an option.

You're probably wondering how in the world schrakjlijch ended up in my blog.  It's my word of the day and I would pronounce it "shrek lich".  I don't worry about the j's.  Then make the whole word come out from the back of your throat somewhere.  It's one of those low German (Plautdietsch) words I heard my parents using as a kid growing up.  You can actually look it up online in the Plautdietsch dictionary.  It means, dreadful, shocking, terrible, awful, frightful.

Craig was back again this week filling some last minute cracks for the finish carpenter and I met him over at house number two.  Getting to the homes in this weather is schrakjlijch.  It's muddy, it's cold, the clay is sticking to your boots, your vehicle is sinking up to its axle because the ground is so soft, the ramp to get into the home is snowy, slippery and muddy.  Simply put - its schrakjlijch outside!  (try saying schrakjlijch ten times quickly!)  Thankfully the flooring is one the last things to go in because you can't help but track about 10 lbs of mud in every time you enter.

We're over halfway through our busy September already.  Most of the staff who have been battling sickness seem to be on the mend.  We would however still appreciate your prayers so that we can finish our fall season strong.

As you can tell I still need practice with my selfies!  Today's selfie was taken at the Columbia Bible College alumni reunion at the Calgary vs B.C. football game.  Take note of Kevin way at the back!

Thanks again for your ongoing support as we continue to reach higher.

Bob "Ranger" Kroeker
Executive Director