Volunteer Week by the Numbers

I cannot believe our first group of volunteers at Project Homecoming have already came and gone. It was such a joy meeting folks who came all the way down from Brigantine, NJ and Murrysville, PA to help rebuild this week. They did some amazing work on three awesome sites: Colapissa Street, Terpsichore Street and Annunciation Street (you can click on the street name if you want to learn more about each!)

One of the best things about my job is I get to talk to the volunteers and hear what made them decide to come down to New Orleans. One of the volunteers from NJ, Stan, expressed that although he was excited to help rebuild homes he was most looking forward to learning about storm recovery. Stan was affected greatly by Hurricane Sandy and expressed his struggle to rebuild his home and offer assistance and support to other residents in his town. This really struck me because I had never thought of the knowledge mine that New Orleans is when it comes to storm recovery. People here know what works and what doesn't and have the experience to back it up. Stan and his group are hoping to bring back information to help their town recover and I found that such an interesting and admirable reason for service.

Homeowner Wendell leading "This Little Light of Mine" at Neighbor Night at the Village!

While I was reflecting (and because I am a numbers oriented person) I transformed this week into numbers to give y'all a feel of everything that goes on to make a week of volunteers successful and fun. I definitely have room for improvement (especially when it comes to knowing how much food to buy for large groups of people!) but these groups honestly rocked and confirmed that I am in the right place doing the right thing.

So this week consisted of...

630...total volunteer hours completed
76...scrambled eggs
52...hours I spent at the Village
21...total volunteers
15...meals eaten at the Village
10...amazing work site managers
6...loafs of banana bread
3...work sites located all over New Orleans
2...states from which volunteers came from
1...beautifully decorated chalkboard

The volunteers beautifully decorated our chalkboard!

I love my job, I love the people of Project Homecoming, and I LOVE the work that we do here. It is hard to describe how awesome it feels to be a part of such an amazing organization. I'm already counting down the days until the next group comes! (22 days!)

In the month that I have been in New Orleans there have been ups and downs and many days where I have cried but it's times like these - when I step back and see the big picture - that I realize the minor hiccups are going to be unrecognizable specks when I am done with this journey. What I have and will learn will help paint the picture of my experience and that is worth remembering.

Lesson from the Journey: I am apparently very talented at baking banana bread...I made some for the volunteers on a whim and they asked for more!