build a house with habitat for humanity

I have been fortunate enough to have been involved with Habitat for Humanity throughout high school and college. Some of my most memorable service experiences have occurred with HFH. My freshmen year in college I went on an Alternative Spring Break trip to San Pedro Sula, Honduras and built a house with Global Village (a program part of HFH International). My Sophomore year I participated in a collegiate challenge blitz build in Columbus, Georgia and we built a entire house from a concrete foundation in under a week. Another trip was helping with Hurricane Katrina Relief in New Orleans, which might have been the most memorable for me. Occasionally being lucky enough to participate in and witness dedication ceremonies for the homeowners is a really amazing experience as well.

If you’re looking for a way to volunteer or an organization to support, I recommend either donating to HFH with money or your time (or both). It’s one of the decisions that has brought a lot of joy into my life.

I want to be able to do this within the next year or two.

I’m obsessive about infrastructure (roads and water, generally) and have been for several years. As awareness of these issues becomes more mainstream, most of the volunteer opportunities around them require urban planning experience that I don’t have; require long, involved international travel that I don’t have the lifestyle or drive to support; or are focused only on fundraising. As a philanthropic professional, I understand the value of raising money for wonderful causes, but I want my own volunteer experiences to be more hands-on.

Understanding that, I’ve started looking for Infrastructure-type programs that are a little closer to home. Housing is another cause that I care greatly about in the abstract (without having any direct experience with those who are homeless or without appropriate housing). What I have learned about Habitat For Humanity impresses me greatly, and I would be happy and proud to be affiliated with them.

I am a relatively unskilled carpenter; I can use basic hand and power tools without supervision, can follow plans, and am good at following direction on building projects. I’m interested in developing electrical skills; my father is an electrician, and while I have a very difficult time learning from him, I would like to learn at least the basics of electrical wiring (installing lights, grounding outlets, etc). Working with Habitat may well give me the opportunity to support a great organization, help a deserving family, and develop my own skills.

Must be involved in an entire build. Can’t be one afternoon of carrying wood.

I want to help build a house. I also want my girls to help. I think they will have fun and learn at the same time.

Yesterday evening, I had my first volunteer orientation for Habitat for Humanity of the Greater SF Area. The volunteer director, the Habitat office employees, and all of the other prospective volunteers were all amazing people. Deb, the volunteer director, was such a fun and enthusiastic individual, and someone I would genuinely love to work with on a daily basis. There were two other volunteers in the room that are professional architects during the day that wanted to share their experience with Habitat. This is definitely a crowd of people I wouldn’t mind being surrounded by for a volunteer project.

New home building in San Francisco will not begin until November. In the meantime, I have decided to help volunteer with the Family Selection process and am eagerly awaiting an e-mail from Habitat.

Today marked the second day of we building a house for HFH. And I was having so much fun!

I am so glad I’m actually doing this.

now that the summer break is on. I’ve really been thinking a whole lot about helping out with all this extra free time that I’ll have.

Since I was 9 months pregnant when we were building our own house..I couldn’t help out. I worked in the kitchen part during the build week. I have, though, helped out a friend’s house that got us into the program a few years ago.

OK, I’m not removing this goal from my list because it;s something I still feel do-able.

Fair enough, the move to work in New Orleans rebuilding didn’t work out due to unseeable misfortune, but I remain optimistic and who know what’ll happen next year. It may be all systems go again.

I decluttered my list with goals that I was hoping to achieve from the move to USA but I will list them here, just to remember that if it every is back on again, they are still achievable.

1. Live in New York
2. Help victims of hurrican Katrina
3. Go to a mardi gras in New Orleans.
4. sing ‘Walking in Memphis’, whilst walking in Memphis.