Habitat gift wrap

This was a big week for Habitaters; because on Thurday a true all-star team came in, including Darcy Tucker and Wendel Clarke. This was to be my last Friday on-site before moving to Saturdays. The day started out by a group cleaning of the back of the houses, including a magnet sweep. I kept my area clean by going through and cleaning once in the morning, and then later in the afternoon, and one of the guys from the ACC seems obsessed with leaving the plane clearn for us. He did such a good job I should have hired him solely for clean up!

On to the day, today consisted of prepping the window frames along the back for a process called blue skinning, and then skinning them. Blue skinning is a roll of rubber that has an incredibly sticky tar-like surface on the one side. Blue skinning is used to provide a watertight seal around the window, to prevent water from getting in through the window as it runs down the house. There can be no water that penetrates through to the wood, as the wood will then begin to rot.

Today I split up the eight people in my group to work on different goals: the first group was responsible for measuring all the windows, and cutting Blue skinning strips to the proper dimensions. Once they got a system going, they were able to carry through the entire day, from the first to the second floor. The second group consisted of 2 pairs of two blue skinners each, and they worked on putting up all the tape, bottom up. The third group went across first to make sure all the shims were properly nailed in, and broken down flush with the window edge. They then continued throughout the day to do smaller jobs, but if was very good that they did them without complaining, and seeing as Tom is a professional contractor, without even asking questions. Tom also did the side window with Hung, his group member for the day, and single handedly repaired some Tyvek that had ripped free with the air, and was threatening to take more of the Tyvek with it. This involved going up onto an extension ladder much more precarious than I ever would have, but his work had him up on ladders like this quite frequently.

In the afternoon, we had to do the second floor windows, which meant that the teams split up further into one person doing the ladder and the skinning, and the other person holding it steady on the ground. By this date, they had cleared out the ground for the second lot of homes, and they piled all the dust and dirt beside the first block of homes. Add a little wind, and this meant that we had the opportunity to eat that sand all afternoon. It got in everything – it was like being in a sandstorm almost, but my team were real troopers, and continued to work despite the sand getting everywhere. That was even more fun up on the ladder. I swear I got a temporary sand tan that day it was so bad!