NCC Youth Group Work Trip

2012 Work Trip Update: Destination Known!

John Erickson — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 18:30:15 +0000

From Mary: (February 7, 2012)

Dear People Interested in the April Work Trip,

I am now able to give you more details about the 13th annual Norwich Congregational Church Youth Work Trip: The trip will begin on Friday, April 13, when we board a bus in the McDonald’s parking lot in West Lebanon, NH early in the morning. We will travel all day and spend the night at a church in or near Harrisonburg, VA.

The next day, Saturday, April 14, we will drive to an overnight stop at a motel near Gadsden, AL. The following morning, we will drive to Greenville, AL to worship with the congregation of Friendship AME Zion Church. They are an African American church founded in the 1800’s. Their rebuilding project started in 2007 but has been delayed for several years. With the help of volunteer teams like us and others they hope to finish this year. The roof will go up this month, and the interior framing/sheet rocking would be our job. We will have some experienced workers with us, who can teach and direct the work for the rest. We will be staying at another facility, perhaps a school, in Greenville.

Our work week will begin on Monday, April 16th. We will work four (4) full days and maybe a half day on Friday. We will still have plenty of time for recreation, possibly visiting a local state park. We will be cooking our own meals for the most part, with teams rotating through the week. I expect that our host churches will also provide us with some meals.

We will leave the Greenville area on Friday, April 20, visit a state park for a few hours, then drive on to a motel. My hope is to get a head start on the trip home so that we can have a little time the end of the next day, Saturday, seeing some sights in Washington, DC. Christ Church Congregational will host us again on April 21, then we will head home on Sunday, April 22, arriving in West Lebanon by the end of the day.

Some of the participants have been on these work trips before. They know that we have fun, are challenged, and see a new part of the world. If you have no experience in building, you will learn new skills. We are warmly welcomed by our host churches and always make new friends there. The music is great. We hope to include new fellow workers, both from the Norwich Congregational Church and others.

I am happy to answer questions from teenagers or parents. I have registration forms for those who are interested. With the registration forms and the code of conduct form, please include a check for $100 made out to the Norwich Congregational Church. This will hold your place on the trip. For those coming as part of the Norwich Congregational Church Youth Group, participation in fundraising is essential. For those coming from other churches, or those who are unaffiliated we hope that you can contribute an additional $300 per person through fundraising. We do not turn anyone away who cannot afford the trip. Each participant also needs to bring money to purchase some of their own meals on the bus trip, about seven (7) meals worth.

There will be more planning meetings when we get closer to the trip. I will send more information to those who register.

Please get in touch if you have questions: Mary Brownlow: mary_brownlow (at) yahoo.com

Update from “Miss Rose” (Rosina Henderson) in Beaufort, NC

John Erickson — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 16:11:39 +0000

Hi Work Trippers!

Mary just had a call from Rosina Henderson of Beaufort, NC. “Miss Rose” is doing well; her church (St. Stephen’s Congregational) took in one new member since we left, but they are still looking for a pastor. At a UCC association meeting last weekend, she met Mark and Margot Pickett — Mark is the former pastor of the NCC UCC — and showed them photos of our work last March. The Picketts were thrilled to see such a large and hardworking group of teenagers from the Norwich area in NC! Rose spoke fondly of the famous fence and what it means to her. Brother Theodore is also doing well.

Rose reported that forest fires in nearby counties burned from May to August and affected the air quality quite a bit. Hurricane Irene also caused a lot of damage in the area, though happily Beaufort just lost power for a while. She asked about Irene in VT, and I told her about some of the damage and the recovery efforts.

She wanted to greet all of the 2011 Work Trippers and give her love and blessings!

Announcing NCC Youth Group Work Trip 2012

John Erickson — Tue, 11 Oct 2011 17:28:35 +0000

From Mary…
Hi Folks,

I have had a few questions about a work trip for the Spring of 2012.

I will soon be getting to work on finding a destination/project, with all the usual delays and vagueness that goes with it We are planning on the trip taking place April Vacation week, April 13-22 2012

Meanwhile, I’d like to get a couple of things started:

First, who’s interested in going? There are a limited number of spaces. Here’s how I prioritize registering kids:
- Anyone who has been on the trip before
- Any high schooler from the Norwich Congregational Church
- Any high schooler from Our Savior Lutheran Church
- others
Once I know how many of you want to go, I can see how many spaces are left over. If you want to be taken off this list, just let me know.
Also, the group may want to begin fund raising. I hope that parents will help organize this. One event that is coming up is the Holiday Bazaar in Tracy Hall on Nov 12. I hope to have an organizational meeting before then, at the Norwich Congregational Church (UCC).

I am looking forward to another fun and rewarding trip. See you soon,

Mary Brownlow

Location of storm damage in relation to work trip location

John Erickson — Mon, 18 Apr 2011 15:39:36 +0000

Many of you might be curious about how close the damage due to this weekend’s terrible storms in the Raleigh, NC area is to our recent work trip locations in coastal North Carolina. This map provides more detailed information:

http://www.newsobserver.com/2011/04/17/1136209/tornado-and-storm-damage.html

So far, we haven’t heard about any damaged churches…

Final Work Trip “Panorama” Photo Available

John Erickson — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 01:53:49 +0000

We’ve posted a high-resolution version of our final “Panorama” photo taken at the Vermont Welcome Center here.

When you follow the link, you’ll see that you can zoom in and pan across the image. Note that it is very large and make take time to load, depending on your Interweb connection…

Day 10 (Sunday): Homeward Bound!

John Erickson — Sun, 27 Mar 2011 21:15:26 +0000

Today was all about spending the day on the bus, driving from Silver Spring back home to the Upper Valley!

Our final stop was at the Vermont Welcome Center just across the border in southern Vermont. Soon we’ll be home!

Day 9 (Saturday): Travel & Washington, DC

John Erickson — Sun, 27 Mar 2011 02:26:59 +0000

Today we were up early, had a quick breakfast of cereal, did a general clean of our living spaces at First Presbyterian and were out the door.

We arrived in a sunny, chilly and very crowded Washington, DC mid-afternoon to tour the sites. The crowds were due to the annual National Cherry Blossom Festival, and they were in full bloom!

Tonight the kids are playing various games like Empire and will hit the sack at a normal time. We’ll be out the door at 8a and will have breakfast at a buffet north of DC.

We’ve posted photos from our visit to Washington, DC are now on the daily web album.

Day 8 (Friday): Final Day of Work!

John Erickson — Sat, 26 Mar 2011 02:01:53 +0000

Whew, today was a full day!

We started the day with a quick breakfast of scrambled eggs and sausage by Jan’s team, then “Circle Time” and off to the work site!

The goal for every Friday on work trip is finishing and cleaning up the site, leaving it cleaner than we found it. This meant finishing the Memorial Fence, the siding on the St. Stephen’s sanctuary, the trim and painting on the St. Stephen’s fellowship hall (including The Impossible Window, and the roof on the Mt. Zion garage and trim touch-up on the sanctuary. And it meant cleaning every inch of the St. Stephen’s Fellowship Hall, turning it from a warehouse for tools and materials back to a nice place for people to gather.

We did it! We had to take a late lunch, but doing so allowed us to feel good about having completed a monumental task! Our lunch at Roland’s, a local BBQ place, was graciously provided by Rosena Henderson of St. Stephen’s. The work we did this week, especially the Memorial fence, was done in memory of her late husband. The kids were tired by the end of the day…

Following lunch we spent a few hours at Fort Macon State Park, a historic fort dating back to just after the War of 1812. This turned out to be a great way to spend the afternoon, since the weather has turned chilly and the fort and museum provided a nice refuge.

After our “play time” at the fort and museum we enjoyed an awesome dinner at Sanitary Fish Market and Restaurant, a restaurant on the waterfront in Morehead City.

We finished up the evening packing for tomorrow’s bus trip and having our traditional final “Closing Circle,” when we share our thoughts about the week.

We’ve uploaded a ton of pictures from our work and play today to the daily web album.

Day 7 (Thursday): The Big Push

John Erickson — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 01:29:45 +0000

We started the day with Mary’s team making bagels, cinnamon raisin toast and scrambled eggs for breakfast. After the usual “Circle Time,” we were off to an hard day of work at St. Stephen’s and Mt. Zion!

The various projects were completed or nearly so. After some extreme effort, the glazing was finally completed and painting teams started on the window frames. The teams working on the scraping and caulking of the high parts of the ends of the building also finished priming.

John’s team’s carpentry on The Impossible Window was finally finished and readied to paint. Nearly all of the “pickets” on the Memorial Fence were finished and about half of the fence was primed by “Quittin’ Time.” John & Co. were even able to make some progress on repairing the roof on the garage at Mt. Zion, and Dan’s team got started on the siding repair on St. Stephen’s.

For dinner tonight John’s team cooked five varieties of pizza from scratch including pepperoni, “Margarita” (tomato, basal and cheese), “Supreme” (a carnivore delight), “Hawaiian” (ham & pineapple) and cheese (with a few surprises). It was crazy and Dan’s team had a heck of a mess to clean up, but at least this year there wasn’t any flour on the ceiling!

We’re looking forward to a half-day of intense work tomorrow — our last day on site! — followed by lunch at a restaurant and an afternoon at the beach and possibly Fort Macon State Park (all depending upon weather).

We’ve loaded today’s pictures to the daily web album. Have at it!

Day 6 (Wednesday): “Hump Day”

John Erickson — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 01:38:24 +0000

We began the day with Lynne’s team making amazing oven-style maple syrup-soaked French Toast, scrambled eggs and Kayla’s award-winning oven-roasted bacon. During our morning “Circle Time” we remembered why we’re here and then we were off to the work site!

St. Stephen’s smelled of SPF-50 as the kids dove into the fence project, the windows and trim, the stair railing and other assorted projects. A change of plans in the design of the Memorial Fence resulted in an unexpected expedition to Loew’s and a delayed lunch, but the kids were great about it.

One of our big goals for the afternoon was to finish prepping the exterior for painting, which we pretty-much accomplished and some of the kids were able to start priming the front of the building. The group working with Jan were able to make great progress on the re-designed fence. Tomorrow will be a major push on painting, finishing the Memorial Fence and other projects.

We had a short end-of-the-day visit to the extremely-windy beach, then joined the congregation at First Presbyterian for their regular Wednesday dinner, which tonight was a benefit to raise money for a work trip for their upcoming youth group work trip to Appalachia. Their’s is a great mission, weatherizing houses very much like COVER in the Upper Valley.

Some of you may have noticed in Tuesday’s photos the shots of a local newspaper reporter interviewing some of the kids. The story was featured in the local paper today! The online version of the front-page story Youths use break to lend a hand can be found here, and a nice mini photo gallery from the paper is here.

We’ve loaded our photos from today onto the daily album here.