Rebuilding Hope in New Orleans

Here's a little film I made of our trip. The poem is by Thomas C. Harris.

New New Orleans

Katie and I returned from our week of building a house in New Orleans yesterday. An amazing trip with members of Katie's church. I'd never had a hand in building a house from the foundation before and if that in itself were all I did than the week would have been fantastic. We did much more though. We ate Po'Boys and drank Dixie beer. We toured the devastation wrought by the Katrina floods. We all hung out at Domlise's near the Garden District. We threw our own Mardi Gras party. We walked Rue Burbon. We listened to WWOZ, the voice of New Orleans. We visited Cafe Du Monde at midnight. Best of all, we all shared an incredible time together and grew much closer because of it.

Katie tells me that one of the reasons she decided to go into ministry was because of the amazing mission trips she took with her church as a teenager. I went on similar trips with my school, and have come to believe that everyone at one time or another should goon a trip with strangers who over the course of the trip become friends.

That and GO AND VOLUNTEER IN NEW ORLEANS. There's still a TON of work to do.

See more pictures from our trip here.

T-Shirt Designs

Being a pastors "wife" I get called on for various creative tasks from time to time. Some are grand, like making a film about a trip to Africa, and some are interestingly mundane... One of the latter includes designing t-shirts for Trinity's various mission projects.

On Sunday Katie and myself along with 11 other Trinity members will be driving to New Orleans to help with the rebuilding of the lower 9th Ward. We will be building a house with the help of Habitat for Humanity in the Musicians Village. The project we're working on is named RHINO, or Rebuilding Hope in New Orleans. It is spearheaded by St. Charles Presbyterian in NOLA. It will be quite an experience I'm sure.

Anyhow, while were down there we'll all be wearing t-shirts that I designed for the trip, the images of which are above. I've learned that designing t-shirts is much different than designing other graphic art. Last year, when Katie asked me to design a T-shirt for another event, I came back with a full color logo with gradients and shadows and whatnot... The whole kaboodle. I learned quickly that such designs don't translate to a t-shirt. You have to use colors from the PANTONE pallete. You must export in EPS format, and use Illustrator in place of Photoshop. Also, full color is a no-no, best to go with two or three colors on a colored shirt for the desired effect...

Again, I'm learning as I go. It's really fun to wear something you've had a hand in designing. This might be what draws all the costume designers I've worked with into their trade...

06>>>>>07

Happy New Year 2007!

Katie and I spent last night with some good friends here in Atlanta, tasting the various and plentiful brews on tap at The Brick Store in Decatur, and lighting off some Georgia legal fireworks!

Resolutions for this year include but are not limited to taking better care of this website! I have several half finished podcast episodes lying in wait, and lots more to add to both the store and the theater sections. In 2006, a lot of this just fell to the wayside... No more!

I hope everyone reading this has a fantastic new year! Go Pats! Unless you play NOLA, in that case GO SAINTS!!!