Service

Combined service today…Nick had a Sankey’s service, with all four of the hymns from the Sankey’s hymnal. We came out for Sunday School after the prayer, before the sermon. I had 8 kids and just enough chairs around the table. I think the teaching went well – I asked the boys later in the day what they had learned, and they got the point, so I’m guessing the other kids did too. We made the apple and seed craft, which was quite nice. Either Nick preached for quite long, or my lesson was much shorter than I thought, but we had quite a lot of time afterwards, so I instructed the kids to colour in, giving them scrap paper and plenty of felt tip pens and that sort of thing, which I always have on hand in the diningroom. Finally at about 12.20 Nick came bounding through the kitchen to say they were finished. The kids scattered like clouds on a hot summer’s day, needing no further invitation to get their hands on the finger lunch! Nick had arranged the tables in a long line down the middle of the schoolroom, with chairs or benches on either side, forcing everyone to sit at the tables and face someone. We didn’t have an ice-breaker, but I think it was good not to – the format of the tables was a great idea. Plenty of food, as always. We had probably about 40 people stay to lunch. Unfortunately the newspaper was advertising the usual service times at the country chapels instead of the combined service, so a couple of people weren’t there who should have or would have been.

During the late afternoon we took the boys to Longwood to play for a while. Man, was it ever cold out there! I was wearing a jersey and jacket, with a beanie, and wasn’t quite warm enough. It wasn’t particularly windy, but actually just wintery cold, gloomy, and grey. After Longwood, we drove out towards Flagstaff as far as we could go, until the road became a dead end in a cul-de-sac. We were hoping to get closer to the windmills!