Hooray for Friday! For Nathan and me, it’s just 2 big sleeps until we are on annual leave!

This week: 8/10.

Once Nathan had finished his service on Friday night, we drove along a wet M62 to Retford for the service at All Hallows the next day which celebrated the 25th anniversary of female priests. It was just wonderful, with lots of people, especially women priests, in attendance. The liturgy was beautiful and there was a lovely atmosphere of celebration.

Whilst in Retford, we called into a local shop to see how our long-awaited monks bench was coming on (not that it’s taken long to be made, just that we took ages to order it!). It turned out that the bench had been delivered the night before- what good timing! So we took it back with us and it now has pride of place in our hallway.

On Sunday, I had a wonderful morning visiting St Luke’s, Crosby. Their vicar is away and so I was asked to take their two morning services and preach too. I was nervous, but they gave me such a warm welcome and I settled in really quickly. It’s given me a confidence boost to know that I can go and do stuff in other contexts and really enjoy it!

Monday to Wednesday was fairly normal, involving time in the office, two home communions, a PCC meeting, Alpha, lunch with a friend, a meeting at school and two services.

On Wednesday afternoon, I drove to Ashton-under-Lyne for my quarterly retreat with my Cell Group. This group consists of Ross (curate in Oxford diocese), Jenny (vicar in Northampton), Ben (curate in Manchester diocese) and myself. We trained together at Vicar School, meet up 4 times a year and support each other in prayer in between. We’re also good mates, love food and share a fondness of prosecco! Time with my cell group is always precious, but was especially so this time because we got to meet Ben and his wife, Bekah’s, baby boy, just 4 weeks new.

Last night was the third Starting Theology session, and it’s great to see the group starting to bond. This morning I have been preparing for Nathan’s Uncle and Aunt to come and stay, as well as getting some admin done!

This week, I would like to pick three weekly stars (my Mum, my Dad and my sister), but I am going to be restrained and just pick one, and save the other two for another time. This week, my weekly star is my Dad, Paul. Even after a long week working super hard, he still stepped up and did loads of things that needed doing in order for the service at All Hallows to run smoothly. He isn’t warden anymore, but I don’t know how so much would happen at All Hallows without his (and Mum and Isabelle’s!) input.

The highlight of the week for me has been the response to the new St Michael’s Facebook page. Within 2 days, it had got over 100 likes and follows!

This week I am praying for all people who are facing big changes.

Chao for now!