MMAP French Camp, January Week 2

During a Christmas open house (at the FCA president's home), the floor collapsed due to rotted wood in this 1800's era home. There were also some problems with the fireplace and a wayward spark that could have caused even more problems.

Toward the end of the first week, Paul and another MMAPer, Rick, were asked to help replace the floor.

In a subsequent conversation, FCA maintenance found out that Paul had built several fireplaces, and the person that was to do the repair work on the fireplace was not going to be back to even start repair on it until the beginning of next week.

So after building the frame work and laying subflooring down, Paul collected and cleaned brick,

with Rick as his "gofer" and mixer, (thank you Rick!) and got started on the fireplace,
building up and putting rebar in under the hearth, ( of course the cat had to put it's mark on the foundation {bottom}!)

installing firebrick on the floor of the fireplace,

and building a new hearth.

Previously there was no support and no hearth. They worked all week in this home and Paul finished the hearth on Saturday morning. I will have to post a picture on a later blog.

On Thursday night, we met with another MMAP team working in the area (Lexington, MS) and had catfish buffet at Guy's, which was about the halfway mark. It was a really good taste of southern cuisine! We had not met any of that group before, but with 24 MMAPers getting together to eat around two long tables, there were no strangers.

The Lord is showing me flexibility: That our plans are not always His! The flooring installation started before Paul was done on Thursday, so he felt he had to finish up the fireplace on Friday, so we did not go out "rubbernecking" on Friday, but did on Saturday. We joined Milt and Paula, our fearless leaders, to see some of the churches and church additions that MMAP has been involved in. They have done quite a few here in Mississippi:

Buffalo Methodist Church in Kosciusko. This was the childhood church Oprah's. The building on the right replaced the white board building pictured in a previous post. The building on the left was the building MMAP built, with the brick work being professionally done.


Sunny Mount Missionary Baptist Church. where MMAP added the fellowship hall on the right,


and Poplar Springs Methodist Church, where they added footage to the back of the building and remodeled the front interior area, and built the connection between the buildings.


We also stopped by the current MMAP job in Lexington. This church, Sweet Canaan, is the second oldest Church of God in Christ Church in the WORLD. The building itself was built in the 1950's. They have been met with challenges, including parking in the mud, weather being cold and wet, and working outside.

The wood framing is for restrooms on each side, men on one, women on the other.
The steel framing was to have been installed before they got there, but it was just being installed while we were there on Saturday. It was fascinating to watch the steel workers as they walked on the beams as if they were on the ground!!

It is an interesting build; and to me, very confusing, because they are literally encasing the old building.
It will be interesting to see the finished building to see what the space around the old building will be used for.
The ladies folded and stuffed a mailing for the Camp of the Rising Son at the beginning of the week,

then a couple of us are learning a "new" craft: Tatting. Hopefully I can get the hang of it and be able to make some small cross bookmarks to sell in their gift store. I also got to get dirty and did some plaster work... but of course, I am the one behind the camera, not in front of it!!