Hello and happy Monday.

It’s been a big old first week of December! There’s been meetings, pastoral visits, Sophia’s nativity, our toy service, the memorial service and, of course, preparation for the season! There’s also been lots of washing up because the dishwasher isn’t draining properly… is anybody getting dejavu?!

Mum life: has been pretty good, despite some coughs and sneezes. Sophia’s nativity play was so cute and I did cry – are we surprised? She stood there singing the songs and doing the actions so well, and she looked very gorgous in her wings. I was also moved to see so many little kids singing songs with so much Christian content! Jesus Christ Messiah the Lord, and all sorts! I was very impressed.

Ministry is very busy but really great. We had a cracking first few Chrustmas events and services. Sunday was a full day, and very much a day of two halves. The toy service was full of joy and got everybody in the Christmas spirit, and the memorial service in the afternoon was a very different space. We put a Christmas tree next to the book of remembrance and invited people to add personalised baubles and to write messages on gift tags. We prayed over the tree in the service, and it seemed to go down well.

Our day off: was quite chilled because Sophia developed a cold. Nathan and I went out to an anniversary party in the evening, which was really nice.

Sophia had clearly been thinking about Aidan moving nursery and asked ‘when Aidan moves, will he still get day off?’ We both reassured her that we will still get Saturdays together and thought it was so sweet for her to think it!

She also spent the week calling Angel Gabriel Angel Ba-babriel.

Aidan woke me up one morning by giving me a kiss. I sleepily said ‘ahh, kisses’ to which he said ‘ahh sissess‘ and proceeded to kiss me again! I’m one lucky Mummy.

This week I am especially grateful for a night out in Liverpool with Nathan. We went for an all you can eat steak, which was delicious! We laughed so much, and we people watched over a cuppa afterwards. It’s so unusual for us to get time together, let alone in December! We really switched off and chilled out. Strangely, though, it made picking up parenting responsibilities again all the more difficult!

Coming up: toddler group Christmas party!