Thank you for the acoustic panels and the new lodge room floors.
Earlier this year we asked for two things for the lodge: acoustic panels to quiet a dining room that gets painfully loud when it is full, and new flooring for all ten lodge rooms.
You funded both. The panels have arrived and will be installed this fall by volunteers. We estimated the acoustic project at $23,000; the final cost came in at $18,000. The new floors go in before the end of the year, and about $2,000 more will finish the rooms with new bedding, lamps, and fixtures.
The lodge opened in 1997. Since then it has been where Mount Carmel eats together, sings together, and gathers for classes, retreats, and celebrations. Thirty years of use shows, and these two projects are how we are getting the building ready for the next thirty.
The acoustic panels answer a complaint we have heard from many guests. The new floors were chosen to last another thirty years or more, and they go in before the year ends.
We are excited to see them used for another thirty years.
Table conversations can be heard clearly again, even when the lodge is full and buzzing with life.
Guests with sensory sensitivities can take part fully in meals and community life without being overwhelmed.
Year-round groups, retreats, and classes will be more comfortable for everyone who gathers at Mount Carmel.
Retreat guests, visiting teachers, and families who stay in the lodge get rooms that are brighter and more comfortable.
Floors built to last another thirty years, so the next generation of guests finds the lodge in good shape.
The Joy, Hospitality, and Christian Community that define Mount Carmel are easier to offer when people can hear one another and rest well.
Volunteer labor is part of why the acoustic project came in under estimate. Installation happens this fall in all four rooms. If you have the skills for careful, finished work and a day or two to give, we would be glad to have you on the crew.
To volunteer, email Derek Smith, our Operations Manager.
Panels will be installed this fall in the dining room, conference room, Lakeside Room, and canteen.
Projects like these are paid for by gifts set aside for them. Here is where a gift this fall does the most good.
The floors are covered. About $2,000 more buys new bedding, lamps, and fixtures, so the rooms are finished when the flooring goes in.
Insulating cabins for the cold months. Gifts for this work are being received now.
Staff, meals, heat, and programs run on the Annual Fund. Mount Carmel needs about $100,000 in giving before December 31 to finish the year in a healthy position: enough on hand to carry the winter months without borrowing.
Name the project when you give online or in the memo line of a check. Gifts without a designation go to the Annual Fund.