Both Hands Project

Finally we have a widow and a date for our Both Hands project. A dear colleague of mine connected me with a sweet lady named Bernice. She is a wonderful deaf woman that lives in Ensley and is very excited about our helping her. She was a victim of the April 27, 2011, F5 tornado and a tree fell into her home while she was sleeping. Because Bernice is deaf she had no idea sirens were going off or that she was in any kind of danger. Her insurance took care of the part of her roof that the tree fell on as well as the inside ceiling but did not do anything to help her walls in one room where the storm did water damage. In that particular room decades of wall painted wall paper are literally peeling off her walls. We are going to fix her walls in that room as part of our project. We will be putting up wainscot or bead board of some sort and then painting that. The other major part of the project will be painting her home. We will have to pressure wash the front of the house to get the old paint off a wood porch and then clean the siding off before we paint. We are going to paint the porch, siding, trim, bottom brick part of the home and her concrete stairs and porch landing.

Here is Bernice and her home!

 

It is a huge undertaking and we are going to need a lot of volunteers; but that is Eric’s punch list not mine. We are writing letters to Lowes, Home Depot. Marvins and Sherman Williams to ask for donations for supplies. We just got all or important information to Both Hands and they are setting up a web link and account in our name for people to donate money as a tax-deductible donation. We are hoping to get the letters to the local stores out this week and then begin contacting our volunteers and letter writer’s as well. The date for the project is February 11, 2012! So we only have about 5 weeks to get everything in order!!! I am so thrilled to be helping out not only a widow but a member of the deaf community as well. As a sign language interpreter who has dedicated her life to this people group it really warms my heart to be able to serve the deaf community in a whole new way.