Friday, March 17, 2017

Thursday: My Sister's House, Final Visit

On Thursday, our group was able to travel back to my personal favorite service site, My Sister's House. Having only seven women on staff, keeping the facilities in working order is a constant battle. They are always accepting and grateful for donations but easily become buried in inventory because they have daily tasks that must be completed before they can take time to organize these new items coming in. This is where our group stepped up! We came in with servant hearts and jumped into organizing and cleaning any room we were pointed to. Areas that needed special attention were the toy room, living area, dining room, and most importantly the supply storage areas.

Over the course of the week, being able to divide and conquer has become our specialty. The toy room at My Sister's House is used as a place for the victim's children to have a safe space to play and be a kid and, as I'm sure you are well aware, children can be a wee-bit messy! A portion of our group cleaned this room top to bottom, pilfered through the toys to pick out the ones that had seen better days and the ones that could still be played with, and disinfected all furniture. This took several hours but the group somehow managed to make their time in the kids toy room enjoyable and fun causing the time to fly by.


While one grouped cleaned the toy room, another took on the task of organizing the storage areas that held everything from canned goods to toiletry items and everything in between. In pairs, we split up to check expiration dates of every single item in the room. Myself and one other analyzed canned goods for expiration dates, arranged them in order of which needed to be consumed the soonest, and feel we have a future in grocery management if we ever have that desire! Another dynamic duo took on a large wall of shelves covered in shower necessities, baby items, more grocery items and various other items that didn't have a place yet. The rest of the group worked on similar tasks such as packing boxes and cabinets full of office supplies, tooth paste, toilet paper, and again, anything that didn't have a place.
Before:

After:

After a quick lunch in the vans, we got right back to work. Using the mountains of various toiletries we unearthed in the morning, and a VOLunteer assembly line, we created incoming care packages for the women and children who will possibly be coming into the shelter without the bare necessities.


Back atour housing site after dinner, we were treated to the sweetest gift: ice cream and all the fixins from our AMAZING hosts Chris and Lindsey Hamil, who are also follow Volunteers and share the volunteer spirit with their amazing servant hearts! Both graduated from UT! Go VOLS! We were able to present them with a small token of our gratitude for all they have done for us over the week!





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