Teen Mission 2013

This week a group of teenagers or near teens has been working on 17 or 18 projects around town and in the area helping other people. One of the more involved projects was the building of raised bed gardens behind the CDC Resources Building on the east end of Angelica Street. I missed construction on the first day, and by the second day, Tuesday, one of the frames was almost complete.

 One of the younger members of the crew got a chance to pound in a nail.

 There were also some power tools on the site--I hope that the kids got a chance to use them.

On Tuesday evening both frames were completed and one was filled with dirt.

 Teen Mission is sponsored by several area churches--Burr Oak Mennonite, Bethany Evangelical Free, Harvest Baptist, and Hope Community. About fifty or sixty people are involved, including 32 teens.

On Wednesday the group was back on the job, filling the second frame with dirt. The plan was to finish on Wednesday, but they did not meet that deadline.

 To finish the project they installed pavers around both frames. The frame on the right will have benches, two of which are already installed. The concept is that those in wheel chairs will have access to the left box, while those who are not in wheel chairs can sit on the benches while they tend the flowers and vegetables that will be planted.

 In the background you can see playground equipment that is used by the day care at Treasure Keepers. Treasure Keepers may be leaving the CDC building and moving to the Jasper County Youth Center on Sparling Drive. They can get essentially free rent and a bigger space, so they will benefit. CDC, however, will be hurt by the move--they will lose the rent that Treasure Keepers currently pays. I wonder if the people who control the Youth Center building took into account the harm they were doing to CDC when they encouraged this move.

While I was at CDC, I took a peek at their new exercise room. The equipment was partially funded by grants from the Jasper Foundation, the Newton Foundation, and the REMC. You can see pictures of installation on the CDC Facebook page. (See here, here, and here.) The page has been around a while, but post frequency has only recently increased. If you are interested in what they are doing, Like them on Facebook.

 Among the other projects Teen Mission had was trimming hedges, painting a house in Morocco, and weeding garden plots at the Community Garden that are producing vegetables for the Food Pantry.

It was not all work for the teens. They had a pool party on Wednesday evening, and there are other fun events built into their schedules. And maybe a few even consider weeding fun.

Update: More pictures here. (Click the right arrow to scroll through them.)