Home improvement — Dream project by LDS youths stuns North Ogden family
Hours-old sod in the front and back, a new trampoline, new wallpaper, new paint, new floors, new carpet, new furniture, new cabinets, new beds and new housewares transformed a 1940s-era prefabricated house into what now looks like a new home.
Talking about it later, Earl McKinley, who lives in the home with his wife and three grandchildren, was overcome.
"You sure know how to bring tears to an old man's eyes," he said.
It sounds exactly like the ABC show "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition."
This was an extreme makeover, just not the name brand.
It was the first-ever Mountain Ward Makeover.
This summer, many of the youths in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints will take trips with their respective wards to bond and learn from one another and their church leaders at youth conferences.
The 40 or so youths of the Mountain Ward in North Ogden's Coldwater Stake were content to stay right at home and sleep in their own beds.
But they rolled out of those beds before 7 a.m. every day for the past week to make over the 63-year-old McKinley home in their neighborhood.
The home was built in South Ogden in 1945 by the U.S. Department of Defense and moved to North Ogden shortly after.
The McKinleys added a second story and carport to the home but had never managed to finish it.
It had been known as the "half-blue house" for its sky blue wooden siding that only covered the exterior of the first floor.
The upper floor was covered in bare plywood, the driveway had sunk, and water damage had rotted away the subfloor in the kitchen.
Brian Glass, one of three grandchildren who live in the home with the McKinleys, had one word for it: "crappy."
"It was falling apart," Glass says.
Both of Glass's grandparents work full time — Earl at night and Lynda during the day — but they hadn't had the time or the resources to fix up the house.
Once the youths learned of the church's theme for its youth programs — "Be steadfast and immovable, always abounding in good works" — the youths decided they wanted to do a construction project.
Reed Mackley, the Ty Pennington of the project, persuaded the McKinleys to let the youths learn some construction skills while working on their house.
So the McKinleys and their grandchildren moved out for a week while the Mountain Ward makeover team rolled in, sometimes with volunteers working until 3:30 a.m. as another crew picked up where they left off.
Recent comments
I am so proud of the mountain ward for doing this project for this...
Cali | Sept. 8, 2008 at 12:51 a.m.
I have always believe in the power of our youth, they can change...
Niny June 21 08 rexburg id | June 22, 2008 at 9:56 p.m.
Way to go teens and leaders. What a great way to show your wonderful...
SAW | June 16, 2008 at 3:16 p.m.
