My first ever blog post

By Sharln

So last summer I went to the Bahamas. Not on a grand vacation, but on a mission trip. The island of Eleuthera is so breathtakingly beautiful, but poor. The locals were the most amazing, gracious, kind, and generous people you could ever meet. My job on the trip was to supervise a group of youth who were leading a VBS for some local kids. But I also had another job that week. I knew I’d be making a sign for a local playground. The playground was built in memory of a young person who was killed in a traffic accident. (An aside for a second… there are no hospitals on this island. There are some clinics, but nothing that can handle trauma cases. You’re on an island, you have to pay for a helicopter to take critical cases to Nassau. It’s not affordable, or quick. Despite all the issues with the US healthcare system, I’m so thankful we still have access to hospitals and critical care).

I knew going into the week that I needed to cut some letters for this playground sign. It was to replace a sign that was installed when the playground was built. I knew I couldn’t bring a six foot piece of lumber on a plane to the Bahamas and I couldn’t bring tools. So all I could do was cut and paint the letters and hope we could source some lumber on the island. It is a fact when they say everything is on “island time.” It took several days to source the board and some paint to seal the wood. In fact, the sign didn’t get installed until the literal last minute before we had to leave the site.

So, I cut some letters and painted them. I bought some liquid nails to bring with me. I packed it all up so nothing would break and trekked to Eleuthera (with 30+ teenagers).

I was making a sign to say “Shane’s Playground”. Stepped foot on that beautiful playground with a beautiful view of the Caribbean Ocean and realized it was SHAYNE’S PLAYGROUND. One of our youth teams was constructing a roof on a house. I had to scrounge up some wood, borrow a jigsaw from a local and make an extra Y. And then somehow match the color with the only paints I had - acrylic craft paint.

Another chaperone and I spent hours mixing and matching paint trying to match the colors of the already painted letters. I think we ended up with a passable Y.

Getting that sign installed was an incredible moment. These letters weren’t the most amazing things I’ve ever made, but they sure made me happy. I pray the locals love it too.