#71 - CHECK!

Number 71 on my list of 101 things to do in 1,001 days was to volunteer my time to help out Saint Mark's Disaster Relief team. I had the opportunity to knock this off yesterday! Myself along with Justin, his parents, his sister, and two other church members met up at the church at 7am to drive over to Albertville, AL to help with the tornado damage. For those of you readers that are not in Alabama, a massive tornado hit Albertville this past Saturday and devastated much of the city. It was an F3 tornado and it's only by God's grace that no one was killed.

Justin and his mom went up there on Wednesday also, but didn't do any manual labor. The boys were hoping to do manual labor when we got there yesterday, but no such luck. The City of Albertville needed us for another reason. FEMA needed an estimate on how many hours people were spending on cleaning up damage. This included the owners of the home, any friends or neighbors that helped out, and even any professionals they hired to help clean up their homes. Based on this information, FEMA would know how much money to give to aid Albertville in getting back on its feet. So our jobs was to walk from house to house asking the residents a series of questions to get this information.

Most people were very nice and welcoming, others were a little standoff-ish. I guess I would be too if someone was asking me if I lived alone or how old I was or for a phone number. I remember this one lady the most because she said that so many people were coming by offering their help, but no one had actually stepped up to do anything. She had finally gotten some Baptist Church volunteers to clean and cut up the trees in her yard to put on the side of the street for pickup.

We were trying to help organize things because no one knew where to ask for help or how much more needed to be done to what houses. So that was basically what we did. Our group of 7 people were given about 10 streets of houses to cover between us, so we split up and went door to door seeing if anyone needed any medical supplies or food so that we could get that information to FEMA/Red Cross.











Do you see the curb that was lifted up with this tree?? It is so crazy to me that winds from a tornado can do that!





This is me and my sister-in-law, Jennifer, as we were going house to house. Fun fact: Jen informed me yesterday that she has started a 101 List herself :) I'm hoping to convince her to start a blog, but we'll see how that goes.



Albertville High School got a TON of damage! This pic is of the portables that were completely turned upside down!! P.S. that's Justin and his dad, Gordon, in the picture surveying the damage.



Pictures can't do this one justice. This warehouse had a wall that completely fell over into the street. On the ground you can still see all the bricks lined up in a row in perfect order.



This picture and the one after is of a home that was completely and totally demolished. You can see the wall that had a window on it, the matresses from the bed and even dressers and personal clothing.



It is so hard to imagine what these people are going through until you see it and talk to the people. Guys PLEASE pray for these residents. They still do not have power which means they can't heat up food or keep it refrigerated and they have no air conditioning while the high is in the 80's. We met a few people that, because their home was moved off the foundation, they have to pay for their entire house to be destroyed and re-built. Many of these people do not have home insurance so please please please pray for them. I can't imagine what that must be like. It was a great experience for me and I was only able to do it because my firm allows us volunteer days that do not count against our PTO. I am planning on getting certified to be an official member of our First Response Disaster Relief team so that I can do this again.

On a side note, how happy am I that my sister-in-law is doing a 101 List!?!?! On top of that, I have a follower that said she's been following for a while that has just started a 101 List. I don't know her personally, but I do know her soon-to-be sister-in-law. The link to Brenna's 101 List is here. Follow her and root her on in completing her list! I love how quickly this list is spreading to other people!!!!

Birthday Celebration

On Wednesday, I turned 27 years old. It was a pretty awesome day. I got a gift from my in-laws the night before. They gave me a gift card to REI (best hiking store ever as previously talked about here) along with some Under Armour workout clothes. I also got a very hilarious card from my pal Lauren who lives in Seattle. Justin gave me the sweetest card ever that made me tear up a little bit. When I got to work I had two more cards on my desk. One from one of our administrative professionals at work and another from Melanie (referred to as "Mel Mel"). This year I got a lot of the cards that make noise/sing when you open them. I LOVE THOSE!!!! Melanie was sweet enough to give me pretty much anything that Bath and Body Works makes in Japanese Cherry Blossom scent as a gift along with making me a cake.

At lunch, myself and about 10 others went to eat at Cafe Lazio at Patton Creek. It was DELICIOUS! I'd only been there once before but I remember it being good then too. This time I had a Hawaiian Pizza Calzone. Very yummy! Melanie brought my cake to lunch and it was so good. It was chocolate cake with oreo flavored icing that Melanie made from scratch. She prettied the cake up with some pink icing.





After work, I headed home to change clothes and head to Iguana Grill where Justin and I met all of our friends for dinner. After eating at Iguana Grill, we all headed to Oak Mountain Lanes and went bowling, where Melanie brought the remains of the cake for everyone to snack on. Seriously, I think I gained about 5 pounds on my birthday.



Devin and Mary Morgan



Lauren and Rob



Sam and the V-man. Shelly had to work so she couldn't make it :(



Wade and Mel Mel



Trevor and Tiff. They also gave me a fun singing card and a gift card to ABWA, the place where Justin and I go diving.



Me and Vaughn. Vaughn is OBSESSED with Justin's jeep and kept asking to drive it at dinner. We set him up in the driver side before heading to the bowling alley and he was in HEAVEN. He was really upset when Daddy made him get out :)



Tiffany actually took this. Devin does this weird thing with his leg when he's bolwing and Trevor and Rob are making fun of him while he was actually bowling. It was pretty funny because that was the ONE TIME Devin didn't do the leg thing.

I don't think I've mentioned it on the blog, but I've had to come to a halt on my P90X workout and running. I have been having this constant pain in my left leg and it feels like a pinched nerve. I went to American Family Care (which apparently was a mistake according to bunches of people). They took X-Rays and said it was an inflamed muscle. I've had a pinched nerve before and I swear that's what it is but whatever. The doctor told me to stop activity for a week and take the medication he gave me and if it doesn't get better he'll take an MRI. Needless to say, even if it doesn't get better, I won't be returning. But in an attempt to try to get it to heal quicker, I stopped P90X and bowed out of the UAB Dollars for Scholars 10K I signed up for this weekend (tonight actually). I'm planning on picking back up on P90 either Monday or Tuesday of next week. I'm almost done with Phase 2, so I only have 5 weeks left to be able to knock that off my 101 List.

Good Birthday though. I'm confident that 27 is going to be an excellent year for me :)

The Number 27...

Tomorrow is my 27th birthday! I have been a little resistent lately to becoming "an old fart" (call me crazy, but I want to be 26 forever), but 27 is growing on me. Tomorrow I am going to lunch with a group of my closest friends at work. We're going to Cafe Lazio at Patton Creek and will hopefully be sitting outside in some nice weather :) As of now, there's a zero percent chance of rain with a high of 65 which is kind of perfect!! After work, our close gang (us, the Lobdell's, the Williamson's, the other Morris', Rob and his girlfriend Lauren, Wade and his girlfriend, who I work with and will also be at my Cafe Lazio lunch, Melanie, and Devin and Mary) are eating dinner at Iguana Grill and then going bowling.

Lets talk for a minute about some interesting things that happened on April 28, 1983 and about the significance of the number 27:

• I share this birthday with Jessica Alba, Penelope Cruz, Jorge Garcia (Hurly on Lost - who I absolutely LOVE), Jay Leno, Harper Lee and even the infamous Saddam Hussein.
• This picture graced the cover of Rolling Stones Magazine the day I was born, which is funny because my sisters and I celebrated my 21st birthday at his concert at the BJCC, where I am fairly certain he was wearing this exact same thing:

• 27 is the number 3, cubed. Had to throw some mathematics in there :)
• There are 27 books to the New Testament
• The number 1 song on the Billboard Charts on the day of my birth was "Beat It" by Michael Jackson
• There are 27 bones in the human hand
• 27 is the number of cubes in a Rubik's Cube
• The sun rotates on its axis once in every 27 days
• God creates Male and Female in the 27th verse of Genesis

Thought that was pretty cool :) Maybe 27 won't be too bad.