A GOOD START TO THE WEEK...

...for some!  It was our Church Breakfast this morning, which is overseen by members of the Pastoral Care Team - and their husbands in some cases.

We got there just after 9 o’clock, to get things ready but things didn’t get off to a very good start.  Vicki - in the top left photograph - knocked on the door, which in turn startled Heather - in the green gilet - who was inside just moving the various jugs to get them ready for coffee.  Heather dropped two jugs, one which broke completely - see the shot next to Heather and the other had a damaged handle - so far, not so good!

The top left shot shows Vicki, looking “Vic”torious -awful I know - because she found the key to the electrics for the oven and dishwasher straightaway!  No mean feat when there are lots of keys on the keyring, so she asked Mr. HCB to hold the key and then she found something to tie on it so that it could be easily identified in the future.  I think he felt quite important to be holding the key!  It did get better!

We were all getting on with our jobs quietly in the background - and Peter, Vicki’s husband grabbed a plate of pain au chocolat and promptly dropped one on the floor.  Bearing in mind the “5 Second Rule” he quickly picked it up, and said he would eat it later!

The next shot is my breakfast, just after 10 o’clock - half a banana and a small glass of orange juice.  I was very pleased to see that the scales were down 4¾ lbs this morning, so was determined I wouldn’t eat any of the “pains” or the croissant and am pleased to say I didn’t!

Carrying on down the collage, in the smaller shots, you can see the back of a sweat shirt worn by one of our young people - which reads “Always Positive Forever”. I thought she had it on back to front, but she assured me it was absolutely on the right way!  We need to remember this for 2024. 

I have said enough about the broken coffee jugs - but after the mishap, we only let Heather touch things which couldn’t be broken, like stainless steel jam dishes and although it was a nuisance to have to manage with two less jugs, we did cope but it did cause some amusement and I have no doubt we will remind Heather of this at sometime in the future.  

The penultimate shot at the bottom left is Mr. HCB with a tea towel in his hand - he is a dab hand at loading and unloading the dishwasher, but inevitably, there is some water to be dried off the tops of cups and glasses.  He does sterling work, mostly on his own, but I think he prefers it that way - we just keep bringing out the used plates, mugs, glasses and cutlery and he just keeps loading the dishwasher.

The last, large shot on the right, shows Rani and her Mum from Sri Lanka - Rani has leprosy and our Christmas Appeal is for the Leprosy Mission so that someone can go into the schools in the villages of Sri Lanka and give the young people with leprosy the tests and medication they need and also to educate other children and their teachers about the disease.  Children are often ostracised and bullied both in their villages and at school, but with the donations from our Church members of just over £4,000 at the moment, it will enable 62 children to be helped.  

It was a great service with some good worship songs and a thought-provoking sermon for the first Sunday of 2024 - which Jamie finished by saying he hoped we would live to serve God faithfully throughout the year.

Hope you all have a great week and whatever you do, remember, BE KIND!