After finally crushing all of the obstacles in our path, we arrived in Nebraska on November 30, late at night. Our final obstacle put us a day late, but we are here. It was kind of funny seeing my wife's reaction to seeing her breath on the jetway...I think it was 2 degrees that night in Omaha.
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| My wife and baby ready to brave the elements! |
We have been so very busy with life here, I have neglected my blog responsibilities...I know you all want to know how things are going. I am in contact with many of my Omaha friends, but there are those of you who are not in "the loop."
Weather
My wife has never experienced temperatures below 65 degrees...seeing her breath on the jetway was just the first rude thing mother nature threw at her. She got to experience a typical Nebraska winter...not a lot of snow this year, but we did have our cold spells. There were stretches of time when she would rather not leave the house, she even spent some time indoors with her hat and gloves on!
Food
Thanks to Beaver Brooks, we already knew that she would like Mexican food. Chinese - No, Italian - OK, Runza - YES, American - Yes. Besides Runza, she is a big fan of Chik-fil-a. She has cooked some Haitian meals at the house, my nieces and nephews are big fans of Haitian Spaghetti. We have found some produce that she is familiar with at an Indian grocery.
All of our stuff an what we spend money on
My wife was not only surprised by the number of cars on the road, but also by the number of cars for sale everywhere. For those of you in Omaha, imagine her surprise as we drive from 204 and Dodge to the east. There are thousands of cars in many dealerships in a two mile stretch. I took my wife to Goodwill and she was like a kid in a candy store...I told her that she could get as many of the weekly special one dollar items that she wanted. The next day, we went to Sheels and looked at some of the clothes there...I was happy when she told me that the clothes there were too expensive. She told me how many pairs of jeans she could get for the price of one sport top there!
Victoria!
Our daughter is now 8 months old and she is doing great! Omaha has a good health care option through One World Clinics. We have gone for vaccinations and checkups and we have one healthy baby! She is sitting up and making lots of fun sounds...no teeth yet and not quite crawling. We have been blessed by so many friends and family members with toys, chairs and clothes.
Me?
I have been doing some "side work" for friends and family to keep busy. Setting tile, painting, carpentry, and other odd jobs. I have also been building some of my drums stateside as well...right now I am actually behind on production. I would like to do some fundraising soon too. I am looking to raise money for the construction of my carpentry shop and school.
The Carpentry Shop and School
As many of you know, I have been very successful with my accidental carpentry business. It started when I was trying to help an orphanage find a source for beds. I ended up making the beds with a Haitian carpenter friend of mine, Jean Philippe. The quality product started to sell itself and word soon got out that I was a decent carpenter. My product line now includes beds, desks, benches, tables, drums and storage boxes. With no shop, showroom, inventory or marketing - I am busier than I can handle. I want to capitalize on this success by making it grow.
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| Some of my product line |
With a building, I can actually have some people working with me every day. I can build up some inventory of my commonly sold products and have a showroom for some of my more unique work. Also, with a place of my own, I will be able to hold workshops on specific projects. For example, I would have a stool workshop where the students would work and learn for two weeks about shop safety, general carpentry knowledge and some practical experience. Their class fee would cover the cost of the finished product as well...they keep what they build.
I see this quickly moving to other disciplines. Like I have said before, I have a lot of experience in many fields that I would like to share. Electricity, Plumbing, Computer Skills, Painting, Tile...etc.
If you would like an email reminder when I post a blog, please send me an email at blueteamleader@gmail.com or post a comment to this blog with your email address. I send out a quick email whenever I finish a blog with a link, just to give you a heads up that I have an update.
Also, if you would like to help me with this dream of a carpentry school and workshop, please use the donate buttons on the top right of this page. The donations go to "Tools for Success" a Nebraska corporation. I am working on the 501(c)3 status for it right now, but it does not yet have federally recognized nonprofit status.
I am also working on getting a shipping container for physical donations. When I have that in place, I will let you know the kinds of things that we can put in there to ship down to Haiti.
Thanks for following my adventure,
God Bless You,
Scott, Ruthcher and Victoria.
