A big thank you

CC's niece Laura is back from Africa and has this to say:

To everyone who has wished me luck and kept me in their prayers, thank you so much! I can't tell you how incredible my trip was and how blessed I am to have been there. Fortunately, I was very well taken care of and felt extremely welcomed by the people and more importantly, the children. It's heartwarming to know that I have so many people thinking about me and praying that all went well. I will continue to pursue helping this orphanage by means of raising money. I've created a page with a paypal account to make funding easier and more accessible, please share it! Any bit of awareness helps and all donations are appreciated and go a long way!

Please visit the page.

Once again, thank you so much for everything and keeping me in your thoughts! I can't express how blessed I feel. :) Thank you, thank you, thank you!

The goal is very modest, but the amount would go a long way in Kenya...

Thank you for doing this, Laura.

Sleuth is building a house - Part I

Here are the first photos of Sleuth's new house, with her own captions.

Hey Sleuth, we expect more pictures as the building progresses, so we can follow this interesting project step-by-step.

Staking out the excavation area on the original hill, which was covered
in scrub sumac, briars and other icky stuff.

Heavy equipment starts digging in.

First boulder dug up. We called it the gnome hole boulder. It has lots of nooks and
crannies in it as a result of pockets of oxidized pyrite.

It's starting to look like a hole. Lots and lots of shale. We'll be using that for
backfill and landscaping.

Another really great boulder pulled out of the hole. Lots of tiny fossils in it and sparkly stuff.

A view from above. Dan'l stands in the middle of what is the first floor.

The Amvic block arrives!

There's a cement truck in my living room! Pouring footers for the walls.

More cement. The trench is for a wing-shaped retaining wall.

Dan'l next to a pile of blue clay. There's enough clay to keep me busy making stuff forever.

Huge slabs of shale! Not sure what I'll do with these, but I'm pretty sure it will be spectacular.

Wall is going up. Yes, that's water. We hit a spring, but no worries, we have a plan!

Wee Christmas trees spared. Didn't even know these
two little guys were up there.

 Thank you, Sleuth.