Thursday, June 4, 2015

Dedication of the Upland Kingdom Hall......

Well as you all know the Upland Kingdom Hall has been a part of our life for about a year now.
We have seen it go from a building in ruins to a beautiful house of worship
thanks Jehovah and his holy spirit directing all of the willing
volunteers who have lovingly given many long hard hours to
this project.

One of the most satisfying jobs that I was given (besides working along with the friends in Safety and First Aid) was to direct the work on the mosaics for the exterior of the Kingdom Hall.
This was the hardest thing that I have ever had to do.
But thanks to Jehovah, I had so much help!
This could not have been accomplished without the willing volunteers who came
and worked tirelessly on these beautiful mosaics.
Many of them have never worked in glass before but they were quick learners and
very natural at it!

Then Kim got the call from one of the Elders in Upland inviting us to the dedication of the Kingdom Hall!
This was so bitter sweet for us
 because
 there were only two tickets for us.
We wish we could have brought along everyone of the volunteers that helped on this project.
But the brothers reasoned that there were thousands of volunteers who actually worked on the hall in Upland however, only a fraction of those volunteers were able to attend the dedication.

We were able to come together once again with Dale Crotts who was the Overseer of the project in Upland and reminisce about where it all started and how beautiful the building came out.

One of the highlights was having Brother Splane of the governing body give the dedication talk.

This is the lobby when you first come into the hall.

You know we couldn't leave without getting a picture with brother Splane!

Mary and I go a long way back...... She not only attends this Kingdom Hall but she also was one of the volunteers who helped on the mosaic.

Lori and Scott Williams are also friends that we have known for probably 25 years.
Lori (in my opinion) should receive a medal for scheduling volunteers for Safety for all of the RBC-4 projects that were going on at the time.
I volunteered to help schedule volunteers for the month that she was gone and thought to myself HOW DID SHE DO THIS!
Tough Job!


This is just a remnant of the original mosaic that was installed on the exterior of the Kingdom Hall.
And now the next mosaic is complete and will be installed after our Regional Convention
 (see next post)
So keep checking and I will update you when we install it....

Finished Product, Ready to Install......

Well, today we taped up the completed mosaic to prepare it for the installation!!!
Isn't is beautiful!
The volunteers should be very proud of what they have accomplished with this mosaic.
We really won't appreciate how beautiful it is until it is installed on the exterior of the Kingdom Hall in Upland.
Once it is installed and grouted it truly comes to life!
So the next step will be flipping it over and gluing the mesh to the back of it.
Then we flip it back over and prepare the board that it will be mounted to permanently.
Then we apply the mosaic onto the board just like a giant tile.
Once it is dried then we install the board with the mosaic attached to it onto the exterior
of the Kingdom Hall.
Then once it is secured, we will grout it the same day.
Due to our Regional Convention we will probably install this piece after the convention at the end of this month.
So I will keep you informed and share the pics of the installation day.