Vounteer Bonanza!

Hi folks.

The last two weeks have been busy with spring cleaning and preparations for summer. We have had a few different volunteer groups go through to give us a hand and they have been greatly appreciated. It began with 3 eager students from the Ecoquest program from Saskatoon. They were here for 3 days and covered a bunch of jobs from raking gravel to cleaning windows to grounds cleanup. They came on a school placement and I think they had a great time getting outside of the classroom setting to do some hands-on learning. Their energy was certainly appreciated and if you make it to Shekinah in the next few months, you will benefit from the work they put in. 

The second group to make their way through was a volunteer chainsaw gang. They braved the snow to help cut firewood for the upcoming seasons and got a lot of work done! We worked through the bush along Coyote Fairway to pull out standing dead logs and buck them up for firewood. This is a big job every year for Shekinah and it was very rewarding to see those stacks of wood at the end of the day. And it was rewarding to see people with close ties to Shekinah back here helping out with this ongoing tiresome yet thankless job. 

 

One of the wood stacks from Saturday

The most recent volunteer group was part of the Rosthern Junior College Alternative Learning and Service Opportunities program. 12 students gave us two days of their time and energy. We got really muddy as we dragged the water bloc sections into submission and got them folded up onto pallets. Then we set to work on the massive task of dismantling the collapsed coverall building and moving its contents into our brand new pole shed. We got a ton of work done there as well and it is well on its way to being cleaned up.  These students were able to serve God with their hands and remembered what it feels like to get a sun burn even though they didn’t travel to warm southern destinations like some of their classmates. 

 

Before

After

Every time we have volunteers come to Shekinah, I am absolutely blown away by the amount of work that can be accomplished in a short time. I am humbled by how slow it would take me to do the same jobs by myself or with just the Shekinah staff yet we finish the jobs in a few short hours with a volunteer crew. I hope these volunteers also got something out of spending their time here and I believe that the work we did was very rewarding. This certainly will not be our last volunteer days of the year so if you feel like this is something that appeals to you, stay in touch with us here at Shekinah and we can connect you with an opportunity to serve that suits your time and talents.

Hope to see you soon.

Curtis