When you're a chicken -

Dear friends, there was once a pretty cool blog post coming your way! In fact,  it was more than half completed when the computer decided to play games and we lost it. (The title even tied in to the post! Though it doesn't now, admittedly.)Yes, the post was saved, but by some nasty whim the main body of writing disappeared. Not wanting to waste all the uploaded photos, here they are minus the accompaning chit chat. I'm sorry. Maybe next time someone posts, they'll have the inspiration to write more.

Our photos jump from the stage you saw in the last blog post to this. All the blocking in is done, the support pillars constructed and installed, the second story built and the trusses laid out.

We built the trusses on the second story. First we drew the plans on the plie-board, before measuring, cutting and piecing the trusses together. It took just over a week to accomplish from beginning to end, but it worked.

The view from the second level. We put the scaffolding up so we could carry the first truss over to the far side. Well, half of the first truss. Two trusses are actually nailed together to make one unit, but we carried them over one at a time because of the weight issue.

The runway. :) Looking toward the road.

On the Saturday of that week we installed the first truss. The next day Dad preached at church, but many of the men chose to work on the building that Sunday. They installed all the trusses that we made, and this is what the church looked like the next morning when we walked to work:

We thought it was funny that they capped a church building!

This probably doesn't look very amusing to you...because you don't realize how far away from the ground it is! Hermano George is an ingenious and considerate friend, who returned Hermano Tito's hat shortly after it fell off.

Monday morning, securing the trusses together.

 We took a side shot of the building too:

After all the trusses were secured together we started building the front section. We had to take a few steps backward again, because we discovered the measurements on the plans weren't correct. But for every step backward we seem to make a couple forward..

They couldn't have been in better positions if we'd organized it!

 After this we started putting beams in for the roof, which will be plie-board underneath and tin on top.

Nailing on a support bracket for a beam.

This is how a lot of our communication works! There are drawings all over the place.

Cuidado! (Be careful!)

And that's it for now! We would never have made it this far if God had not blessed the way. There have been frustrating days, and slow days, and laughter-filled days. We've learnt a lot and made life-long friends, and we give God the glory. So that takes you up to last weekend, anyway! More photos to come...