First Lady Michelle Obama's Extreme Support for a Military Family

First Lady Michelle Obama, along with Ty Pennington and the "Extreme Makeover Home Edition" team, watch as Barbara Summey Marshall, center, a 15-year Navy veteran,and her family get the first look at their new house in Fayetteville, N.C., July 21, 2011. (Official White House Photo by Samantha Appleton)

FIrst Lady Michelle Obama joined three thousand military and civilian volunteers last week in Fayetteville, NC  to give one selfless Navy veteran the surprise of her life.

Barbara Summey Marshall, who served 15 years in the Navy, shares her home with the Steps N Stages Jubilee House,which provides shelter, support and services such as mentoring and life coaching, to homeless female veterans. Marshell's intentions were impressive, but the modest, 1,600- square-foot ranch house was in need of major renovations.

Fortunately, the volunteers working on the home renovations were overseen by a team that has some impressive experience of their own: Ty Pennington and his crew from "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition". In one week of 24 hour days, Marshall's humble home was replaced by a two-story, 5,000-square-foot house with plenty of space for her family, and for the women she has dedicated her life to helping.

This project, and Marshall's own devotion to her fellow veterans, is exactly the kind of service the Joining Forces initiative is designed to celebrate. “This campaign is about all of us -- all of us joining together as Americans to give back to the extraordinary military families who serve and sacrifice so much every day so we can live in freedom and security,” Obama said during an event earlier this year.

First Lady Michelle Obama films an episode of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition about Joining Forces with Ty Pennington and crew on the South Portico of the White House, July 27, 2011. (Official White House Photo by Samantha Appleton)

The "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition" show featuring the Jubilee House is scheduled to air in October.