Carl and I had our photo taken by Mary for “the Wall.” Every
volunteer group and all coordinators get their pictures posted in the workroom
for an entire year! Those from January of 2011 were taken down at the beginning
of February and the volunteers for January of 2012 were posted. It’s fun each
year for returning groups to find their photos from the previous year.
Last couple of days for the New Lenox, IL, team. Lynda and
John from Naperville, IL, came to work with them for a day and a half because
they’d worked together last year. Then on Thursday we had two local groups come
from Dwight, IL, and Taylorville, IL. There were a total of 32 volunteers, not
counting Roger in the desk shop, Harold in the sewing machine repair shop, and
Ronald in the bicycle repair shop!
On Thursday morning we had a trash bag rolling party!
Volunteers at all 5 of the work tables were rolling bundles of 12 trash bags
each for flood cleaning buckets. We went through 9 boxes of 250 black plastic
trash bags for a total of 2, 250.
Some of the group from Dwight rolled trash bags in the warehouse because it was too crowded for everyone in the workroom.
There were about 5 people over at the sewing table and 3 people pressing one-handled school bags.
Four ladies from Dwight updated MMDC information packets,
and, when that was completed, they layer hand towels and wash cloths for
Personal Dignity Kits (PDKs). When the gals from Taylorville finished their
ironing, they joined in layering towels and wash cloths, too. 392, 394, 408
They ended up with a “Tower of Towels” after going through 2
bales of hand towels. There are 25 dozen in each bale, so their “Tower” equaled
600 hand towels and 600 wash cloths!
Another job one of the Dwight ladies did was to stamp the 3rd
class postage permit on 500 MMDC business envelopes.
And there were more erasers for school bags to take out of the packages.
In the afternoon once again we assembled PDKs. The group
from New Lenox had gone to Xochimilco Mexican Restaurant the night before, but
after having rolled 168 PDKs like a “burrito” the day before, ordering a
burrito wasn’t all that appealing! Today they filled 6 boxes for a total of 126
PDKs.
After we got
a little ahead on trash bags, the gals from Dwight out in the warehouse began to assemble flood cleaning buckets.
Judy spent the afternoon counting the red pens that had been
removed from the bundles a couple of days ago. Three black and three red pens
had been bundled for teacher school bags, but we needed just three black pens
and three pencils for the student school bags this week. So after volunteers
had taken the red pens out, they filled two and a half boxes! Judy counted…drum
roll, please…a total of 2,569 red ink pens!
Out in the desk shop the guys finished up their desks. They
were very pleased to complete 18 desks and 22 extra desk tops in just 4 days!
They didn’t even want to take a morning or afternoon break
in order to finish more desks, but they did. There was a big crowd for break
with all of our volunteers that day.
On Thursday two guys from Dwight worked in the wood shop to
cut desk parts. Dick continued to cut desk tops.
Meanwhile in the bicycle shop local volunteer Ronald
performed his magic on the donated bicycles.
In addition to the items donated by Methodist churches, many
of the supplies for the work done at MMDC are purchased in bulk. For example,
Mark can buy cases of toothpaste for something like 50¢ a tube. I am amazed at
the skill of those drivers who back those behemoth semi-tractor trailers into
the loading dock. Here is one of the semis backing up to unload.
Since the New Lenox team was heading home on Friday morning,
we did our deep cleaning of the workroom at the end of the day. The guys from
the wood shop came to help wet mop the floor and vacuum the anti-fatigue mats.
The bathroom toilets and sinks were cleaned, the work tables all wiped down,
the shelves below the tables dusted, and the windows in the front and back
doors washed! Thanks for a job well done. You were very willing workers!
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