Yard, friendship bloom in 'Extreme Makeover'

By Jennifer Lloyd
Seattle Times staff reporter

BRIAN CASSELLA Drew Schmoll waters new plants yesterday while Linda Scott and others work on gardening and cleanup chores at the home of Jeffrey and Jennifer Newell.

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Weeds were growing, ivy was taking over and shrubs were hiding the sidewalk outside the red-brick house when family and friends came to the rescue of Jeffrey and Jennifer Newell, who weren't home during the makeover.

When she went on vacation to Boston last week, 34-year-old Jennifer Newell, who suffers from rheumatoid arthritis and no longer can do such chores as gardening, had no idea her family and friends were going to enact their own version of ABC's "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition."

Her husband, National Guard Capt. Jeffrey Newell, 36, is stationed at Victory Base in Baghdad, Iraq, and is not scheduled to return home until April.

"This all started when I felt so badly that Jeff had to go over there and leave his family behind, and I just felt that he needed a lot of support and that Jennifer was going to need a lot of support also," said Jan Moser, a friend of the Newells' who came up with the extreme-makeover idea.

Moser, a supervisor at Costco.com, and her co-workers have been sending care packages to Jeffrey Newell in Iraq, including coffee, telephone calling cards, newspapers and magazines.

In honor of his temporary location, the volunteers have named the renovated yard Victory Base Garden.

They planned to surprise Jennifer Newell with their handiwork when she returns to town this week.

"Everybody brought their own tools and flowers," said Moser. "It's just our own bodies, our own work. I even had plants left at my house anonymously. I would come home and there would be plants left at my door."

The group set to work with more energy than gardening expertise.

"We're not plant people," said Moser. But those involved were determined to make a difference.
 
Jennifer Newell is working as a dental assistant only one day a week because of her arthritis and in order to care for her 18-month-old daughter, Grace.

According to family members, Newell had decided to keep up just the lawn and to let the rest of the yard go.

Her brother was helping her mow the grass.

"Jennifer tries to do what she can, and it just got past her," said Dennis Newell, father of Jeffrey Newell and one of the organizers of the yard makeover party.

Planning began about three weeks ago. Jennifer Newell's mother was in on the secret, as was Jeffrey Newell, through e-mails to Iraq.

The volunteers also have made the yard friendlier and safer for Grace — one of them built a gate that will complete a fence in the back yard. Others moved a rosebush that was close to the toddler's play area.

Moser said she looked all over to find a pink flamingo. "I tied a yellow ribbon around its neck. It's really going to be for Grace 'cause it's small and the wings move up and down in the wind."

Jamie Barger, a seventh-grader at Meridian Junior High School in Kent, was working alongside her mother yesterday, mulching flower beds and planting impatiens.

"My dad was in the Navy, so I know what it feels like to have a dad go away," she said.

When Jennifer Newell arrives home, she won't be met by a hyped-up crowd or glitzy TV personalities. But her family planned to light up the yard with floodlights to surprise her with their goodwill and her newly groomed garden.

Jennifer Lloyd: 206-464-2113 or jlloyd@seattletimes.com