Abaco Day 3 | “Bend and Snap”

We got an early start because Monday marked the beginning of our women’s team siding project. Our project manager is Ricardo, a dear, brilliant Bahamian native, friend of the Hendricksons, and part of Kirk of the Pines (the church where the Hendrickson’s lead).

We kicked off the morning by stopping at the church to dig through the storage units out back and gather all the materials we needed to begin siding the home of an incredible family (more on them soon). We teamed up, pulled on our pretty work gloves, and started hauling groups of what some might call “Hardie Planks”… but we’ve officially renamed them party planks (very intentionally, of course…definitely intentional….).

Turns out, party planks will “bend and snap” if you’re not careful.

I’m happy to report that thanks to a truly amazing team (and the Lord’s kindness), not a single board snapped. Plenty of bending, yes. But no snapping. We did, however, continue to reference “bend and snap” from Clueless all morning, which is obviously essential knowledge for any house siding project.

Once we loaded up the church bus with tools and materials, we headed a short way down the road to our work site. That’s where we met up with Ricardo and his incredible sidekick, Abel (2 or 3 years old).

The weather was perfect, and we were able to jump right in. Ricardo showed us what needed to be done, and we spent the day establishing a rhythm: measuring, cutting, caulking, hammering… caulking, hammering, measuring, cutting...and measuring… You get the idea.

At the time, we didn’t have a nail gun, so we relied on our bicep guns instead. Some of the team even broke apart nails that were meant for a nail gun, which, honestly, felt like another solid “bend and snap” moment. AND also, a really beautiful reminder that nothing is wasted.

While one group worked on nails (hardware nails… not mani/pedi nails), Katie Macturk became best friends with Abel, and the hammerers hammered while the caulkers caulked. In the midst of all the project tasks, we had the privilege to meet Deena. She and her husband Victor are the homeowners, and we began to hear more of their story from Deena and the many ways they’ve seen the Lord at work in their lives and the lives of those in the Bahamas.

We worked from about 9:00 to 2:00, finding our rhythm and building a system so we could hit the ground running the next day.

Afterward, we gathered under a beautiful “pear tree” (what we’d call an avocado tree), where Nicole Perri led a sweet devotion, woven with scripture, architecture, and the goodness of God. We snacked on fresh fruit generously shared by Deena, who then courageously invited us deeper into her story, one clearly marked by faith, beauty, and hardship. Her story pointed us back to HIS.

There were tears. There was beauty. There was the undeniable reality of a broken world. And while the tasks matter, these moments were a beautiful reminder that “relationship” is the why behind it all.

We then headed back to Friends of the Environment to clean up and prepare for a women’s event at Kirk of the Pines. It was time to honor the hospitality of these women and dive into an evening of worship, laughter, and Truth.