Family

Ellie’s operation

Ellie gave us a bit of a scare earlier this year.  What started off as just a niggling pain in the chest turned out to be gall stones, which was at times crippling and meant she had to avoid anything even remotely fatty for several months.  She found that change of diet difficult, what with not being able to eat cheese or chocolate.  Still, the operation went very smoothly and she was back on her feet and eating naughty things soon afterwards.  My biggest confession here is that I’m still ever so slightly jealous at how quickly she healed after her operation, compared to me and my hernia (which is mostly fine now, incidentally).

Peter leaving home

This year my littlest brother flew the nest, finding a lovely little church in Uffeculme to go and be a trainee youth worker at.  I went to his induction service, which was a great way to support him as he began his new ministry, and an opportunity to meet (albeit in passing) others like him and also the vicar he’s working with, who seems very nice.  Unfortunately, despite booking a date in with him, we didn’t get to actually visit Peter on-site this year (more on that later), so hopefully we’ll reschedule that for early 2012.  It does leave Mum and Dad’s house somewhat empty though; apparently their food bill has roughly halved now that Peter’s moved out…

Read Peter’s blog.

France holiday

Apart from a weekend in Weymouth, we as a family have never had a holiday until this year.  Ellie and I have been married for 4 years, and that was all we had managed.  This year we took advantage of Ellie’s Dad’s holiday home in France, and had a lovely week with them.  We had a fantastic day on the beach, generally enjoyed chilling and not doing too much, and although it was short it was much appreciated.  The travel was an adventure – driving on the wrong side of the road isn’t actually too hard at all, although the weather on our return journey made the ferry crossing quite uncomfortable (not that Samuel seemed at all bothered by that).

Samuel’s visit to hospital

Not to be left out, Samuel also necessitated a trip to the hospital, following a very high temperature that caused him to have a brief seizure.  That was a huge worry for us at the time, but thankfully it wasn’t anything to worry about in the end.  Apparently these things happen with young children, because their bodies aren’t able to deal with the heat as well.  No lasting damage, I’m pleased to say.

Grandma’s funeral

Ellie’s Grandma sadly passed away this year.  It wasn’t entirely unexpected, as she was very old and increasingly unwell, but it was still something unpleasant we all had to go through.  She had been growing increasingly senile, making conversation difficult, and although we’d managed to persuade her to move out of her bungalow and into a flat where she’d have people to help, she actually only lived there for a matter of weeks due to prolonged visits to various hospitals.  It was one thing after another, what with falls, blood pressure, infections, and so on.  In the end she had a fall while in hospital that led to a bleed on the brain which, in addition to everything else she was going through, was just too much.  Thankfully we happened to be visiting Ellie’s Mum at the time, so we were on hand to support her through it.  A useful bit of planning on God’s part, methinks.

Cars

Tow bar fitted to the Zafira

We have a trailer tent sitting in the garage.  We were given it by Ellie’s Dad, but we have yet to actually take it anywhere.  We drove it back from Gloucester, attached to our Ford Escort, but since then it’s just sat there.  So to ensure that we would be able to take it out when the opportunity finally presented itself, we got a tow bar fitted to our Zafira with 2 power points just in case.  It may not usually be recommended, but I reckon with judicious driving and selection of gears it should be easily possible to tow a trailer tent with a 1.6 litre engine!

Ellie’s driving test

I’m very pleased to report that Ellie is now on the road, having passed her test in November.  It was only her second attempt, and she had to take the test in our car because her instructor had double-booked himself, and it was in Dorchester rather than where she had been learning, so all things considered I think that’s pretty good going!  It’s already proved to be very useful, with Ellie frequently dropping me off at work and having the car during the day so she can do shopping, take Samuel into town, etc.  And of course long journeys can now be shared out between us, which was very much appreciated at Christmas time!

Zafira written off

Unfortunately, exactly a month after passing her test, Ellie had a bit of an accident.  Nothing major, which was a relief, especially given the sort of accidents new drivers tend to have, but sadly it was enough to make the Zafira a complete loss.  It was just a collision with a parked car, but it took out the steering rack.  Our insurance company was very good though, and helped us through the process very well.

Our new Focus Estate

So having lost the Zafira, we went looking for a new car.  We hired a little Corsa for a weekend (which was surprisingly affordable, courtesy of Enterprise) and went touring the local area for potential cars.  I was originally aiming for a Ford Focus hatchback, which would be a lot smaller than the Zafira but about the same as our Escort, so should be manageable.  Not ideal, but it would do.  The first Focus we saw turned out not even to have a valid MOT, so I refused to take it out for a test drive.  It would have needed a lot of work doing on it anyway.  The second, while in much better condition, still didn’t feel right.  In the end though we found a Focus Estate that was just right, and it’s really proved its worth over Christmas.  It’s got a slightly bigger engine at 1.8 litres, making it a bit more powerful, and the gearing is taller too making it much more comfortable on the motorway.  And it came with a tow bar, so we’ll still be able to take the trailer tent out when that opportunity comes round…

Church

Creating the Facebook page

For those who don’t know, I’m on the PCC at church.  That’s basically the committee that makes the decisions regarding the running of the church, working on behalf of the whole congregation and beyond.  Those who know me will know that I’m not a sit-quietly-and-wait-for-someone-else-to-do-it person.  I saw a need for us to be on Facebook, so I proposed it, explained a few times what Facebook was, and was finally given the go-ahead to set it up.  It’s now live, and although it’s not a hive of activity, at least it’s there and being used, which is a step in the right direction!

Visit the Facebook page for St Peter & St Paul’s.

Designing a new church logo

I’m also on the Outreach Focus Group, which is like a sub-committee of the PCC in charge of outreach.  While I was thinking about outreach and how we communicate with the outside world I got to thinking about creating a logo for the church to use.  So I created a potential design, got very positive feedback, presented it to the PCC, got even more positive feedback, and was then told to put it on hold until the new vicar arrived.  Which was frustrating.  I can see where they’re coming from though, and hopefully this year we’ll be able to move forward on it.

Our new vicar

When we first moved to this area and started going to St Peter & St Paul’s there were 2 full-time clergy and a curate, plus a whole load of retired clergy itching to get involved.  Now, I’m sure it’s nothing to do with us, but not long after that we lost Dave to another church, and a bit later Liz took early retirement, leaving just the curate, who should have been busy training really and not running a church.  Despite being promised lots of support from the diocese, and the promise of being fast-tracked through the process, we still had to wait a good 18 months before David started.  It was a tough time for the church, and a lot of people had to work a lot harder to fill in the gaps and keep things running, but clearly God was saving us for just the right person.  I’m pleased to say that I like David a lot, and I think he’s just what our church needs.  He has already made a big impact, already challenged people’s expectations, already begun giving us focus and direction.  And we’ve already ensured he’s got the right impression of us – since he’s arrived we’ve had 5 fancy dress outings, the first of which was on his first Sunday and I dressed up as Cruella Deville…

Youth Praise talk

I was asked to do the talk at the December Youth Praise service.  I’ve done them before, but this turned out to be the talk that made me most nervous.  There were a number of factors at play: it was the first sermon our new vicar would hear me preach, and my parents were visiting that weekend so they’d be there too.  Oh, and I ripped a page out of my Bible.  Now, before you write me off as a heretic, I ought to explain the context (and back myself up by stating that I’d checked with the vicar that he was okay with it).  The running theme of the talk was that of “one continuous story”, bringing in the fact that although Jesus was born of Mary he actually existed long before then, and was present at creation.  And although the words stop being printed at the end of the book of Revelation the story itself continues and includes all of us today.  So to make the point, and to reinforce the idea that the Old Testament and the New Testament are not two separate stories, I ripped out the divider page between Malachi and Matthew, making it literally one continuous story.  Now, obviously I don’t condone people ripping pages out of Bibles as a general rule, but it got the point across, and I had some very positive feedback afterwards, which was encouraging.  There was more to the talk than just that, but that was the bit that required the most thought and prayer!!

Fancy dress

Pyjamas

To raise money for Children in Need this year our Youth Praise service at church decided to come in pyjamas.  I have to admit I’ve never worn pyjamas in church before.  It would have been cold had it not been for the addition of a dressing gown and slippers.

No pictures I’m afraid.

Cruella Deville

We don’t tend to actively encourage Halloween in church circles.  I personally find it a tough concept, mainly because the whole event trivialises something that is very real and dangerous, which can be a very risky thing to do.  But nor do we like to appear to be sticks in the mud, so we arranged for a Halloween-alternative party for our young people to come to, and it had been decided it would be fancy dress.  After much work (mainly by Ellie), I turned up to the party as Cruella Deville from 101 Dalmations, accompanied by Ellie as a dalmation, and I was decidedly the most scary person at the party.  I wore a long black dress, black bra (with socks for padding), tights, knee-high boots, a black and white wig, black gloves, plus makeup and accessories.  And, I have to confess, it was surprisingly good fun!

Butler

A little more conventional this time; Ellie and I appeared as a maid and a butler (respectively) at the church youth group’s Christmas meal.  We waited on them the whole evening, staying in character the whole time, which I think unnerved a couple of people!  It was tiring work, especially on the feet…

Root of Jesse

At the December Youth Praise service we were encouraged to come in fancy dress again, this time as something from the Old Testament.  I was doing the talk, so I didn’t want to be wearing anything too distracting, so I just brought a carrot.  It’s a root vegetable.  Root of Jesse.  Geddit?

No picture available for this costume I’m afraid.

Wolverine

I’ve been Wolverine before, at Anne-Marie’s birthday party a few years ago, but I brought it back out again this year (something I prefer not to do, I don’t like to repeat myself) for a special occasion.  The work Christmas party this year was themed as “A Night at the Oscars”, and we were all encouraged to come as a film character or actor.  A lot of people opted for the easy option, which was to come in a fancy ball gown as if they were walking down the red carpet, but thankfully there were also plenty in fancy dress.  I was Wolverine from X-Men, in a tux.  My claws were made from cardboard, coloured with a silver pen, held in place by untwisted paperclips taped to the back of my hand and hidden by fingerless gloves.  It worked very well, and I got a few comments from people at the party.  The muttonchops also went down a treat.  The most surprising comment though wasn’t about any of that – “is that your real hair?”  Yes, it was my own hair, just gelled.  I’m still not sure whether to take it as a compliment or not.

A photo does exist, but it’s not mine and it’s on Facebook.

Christmas Elf

Another Christmas party, this time for the younger children of the church.  In absence of Father Christmas himself, I manned the grotto as an elf, wearing bright red trousers, green t-shirt, red waistcoat, green hat, and proper elf ears.  And yes, I was in character too, making sure I was smiling and jolly the whole time, which was incredibly hard work.  I gave presents to all the children, did a little dance (for which I still need to exact my revenge on Wendi…), and afterwards tried to convince the kids that it wasn’t me and that it must have been a real elf.  I don’t think they believed me.

Again, no pictures that I’m aware of.

White Rabbit

This was my second-favourite costume this year, for our New Year’s party.  It was a group of friends from church, all of us with children, so we started at 5pm, had some dinner, played some games, and then bundled all the kids upstairs and told them to go to sleep while the rest of us stayed up.  That plan sort of worked, eventually.  Anyway, it was fancy dress but with no particular theme, so we decided to go as characters from Alice in Wonderland, which is a theme we’ve somehow not covered before.  Ellie went as the Mad Hatter, I went as the White Rabbit, and Samuel was the Dormouse.  Ellie made the most enormous hat, and Samuel looked very cute with his mouse ears and teapot.  My triumph was the teeth I made from a plastic pot cut to shape, which simply slotted between my gums and upper lip and, with a little effort, still allowed me to speak!  Obviously I still had to take them out to eat and drink, but it was good fun nonetheless.

Music

Rediscovering the cello

Earlier this year I had a free evening, and Ellie was out, so I decided to dig my cello out.  It had been buried in the corner of our hall since we’d moved in, and hadn’t been played in years.  I hadn’t even checked that it had survived the house move.  So it was with some apprehension that I opened the case, but found to my surprise and delight that not only was it all still in one piece and in working order but that it was still perfectly in tune!  Not only that but I could still remember how to play the thing.  Admittedly not to the same level as when I was on top form, back in my final year at school, but I was still able to play The Swan without any difficulty, which is somewhere in the grade 6-7 range I think.

Album update

Unfortunately this year has seen little in the way of progress on my album.  I did some more editing, and regrettably decided that one of the tracks that had been causing me difficulty was actually too fast and needed to be re-recorded at a slightly slower tempo.  I also did some minor tweaks to some of the levels, and re-recorded a couple of the guitar bits to make use of the effects pedal I got for Christmas last year.  But there is still a fair amount of work yet to do, what with re-recording bits and adding more depth in a few places.

Worship at camp

Camp was by far the biggest musical input of this year, as I was leading the music and worship for the whole week, which is quite normal for camp but still a lot of effort in a condensed period of time.  I found it quite hard work this year though, partly because I wasn’t quite in the right place, spiritually, to lead as effectively as in previous years (in my opinion).  It was also harder because I didn’t have my core group of musicians that I had got used to – Sarah had double booked herself so couldn’t make it, and Greg was needed on another camp and the dates clashed.  The musicians I actually worked with were brilliant, but it was just a lot harder work having a different group of people each evening and not having an opportunity to gel as a band.  Still, it was good fun overall and I’m looking forward to next year!

That’s a quick summary of 2011.  Well, not “quick”, but summarised nonetheless.  Bring on 2012!

So, here are the words to the song, “Jesus your name is higher”.  I don’t have the music written out yet, but when I do I’ll try and make sure that finds its way onto here too.  

Jesus your name is higher

Verse 1

Wake us, revive us,
shake us, inspire us to believe.
Take us, mould us,
change us by your transforming love.

We are your hands and mouth and feet,
your great commission we’ll fulfil:
to tell all the world of all you’ve done.

Chorus

Jesus your name is higher,
Jesus your grace is greater,
Jesus your love has defeated our sin.
Jesus your church is listening,
Jesus your church is reaching,
Jesus, your people declaring your name.

Verse 2

Teach us, renew us,
inform us and change the way we see.
Fill us, empower us,
prepare us and send us to your world.

We are your hands and mouth and feet,
your great commission we’ll fulfil:
to tell all the world of all you’ve done.

Chorus

Words and music copyright (C) Matthew Dawkins 2009

It’s deliberately quite a simple song to learn, which makes it great for a worship slot, but the tune is also quite catchy and a good congregational anthem.  Thematically it’s about individuals coming together as the Body of the Church, empowered by the Holy Spirit, with the aim of actively demonstrating God’s love in the world around us.  God’s commission to us to spread the gospel isn’t a passive one; we need to be showing people God’s love through what we do every day, telling them of God’s passion through what we say in normal conversation.  We need to rise to the challenge and be God’s hands and feet in this land.

I use my blog to tell people what I’ve been doing recently.  My readers are usually friends and family, unless a passer-by happens to stumble across something via Google that interests them.  My posts are generally about things I’m interested in, things I’ve done, things I meant to do but didn’t, or things that I want to rant about.

But now I’ve fallen in love with Twitter, my Twhirl client always running on my desktop, ready to accept my latest status update as and when I feel led to bend the world’s ear with my 140 characters of insight.  No logging in, no pressure to write unnecessary paragraphs of fluff, just a short blast of information.  No time like the present.  The result is that I feel like I’ve told the world what’s going on, despite the noticeable absence on my blog.  So I apologise that I’ve not posted more here in recent weeks.  Blame Twitter for being so darn addictive.

In fact, so addictive and successful is Twitter that I have all but forgotten the existence of Facebook.  Remember Facebook?  I used to use it to find all my friends and keep in touch with what they were doing.  But once all my friends were found it sort of lost its attraction.  I logged in occasionally to check the news feed to find out what people’s latest status updates were, and that was about it.  Don’t even try persuading me to take interest in an application, I have absolutely no desire to clutter my life with anything else.  Once I started using Twitter I realised that the status bit was all I was using Facebook for, and Twitter was just better at doing that.  So I suppose another apology is required for Facebook aficionados.  No time like the present.

So, an update, then.  Yesterday (which was Sunday) Ellie and I went to church.  Four times.  We went to the 9:25am service, which is the more traditional one, where we sang surprisingly few carols given it was the second Sunday of Advent and the first Sunday in December.  Then we hung around for the 11am service, which is a more contemporary and informal service, a bit like the old Chaplaincy services of yore.  While we were there they were advertising the Meditation service that was happening at 5pm, and we thought “why not”.  No time like the present.  So after lunch and an hour or two that I remember very little about, we headed out to church again.  The meditation was candle-lit, and was actually quite useful in getting my head focused on God again and taking Christmas seriously.  Then, after a few cakes and refreshments we headed over to the Salvation Army for The Gathering, which is an ecumenical Churches Together service with some singing and prayer, where we ate more cake.

And now we’re waiting.  Still waiting.  Our baby is officially due today, Monday 7th December, but I don’t think anyone’s told the baby.  We keep trying to persuade it that it’s much nicer out here, that it’ll have more room to move, that there’s more to see, and that there’s no time like the present, but so far there’s no indication of anything happening.  In all honesty we’re both getting a bit bored of all this waiting.  They say you should cherish each moment, because you’ll never get those ‘just the two of us’ moments again.  But then they said that about a lot of other things too, and we don’t believe them.  We want a baby.  We ordered it, we were told the delivery date, and it hasn’t come yet.  Maybe we should contact DHL and see if they have a tracking code for it…

Oh, and our house is all Christmassy.  We were thinking about it last week, and that with the baby due any day now we ought to get the decorations up sooner rather than later, otherwise they may never be put up at all.  No time like the present, after all.  So I dug out all our decorations from the garage, and we decorated the tree.  Trouble is, our house has grown.  That is to say, this house is significantly bigger than our previous house, and our decorations don’t go as far any more.  So on Saturday we went to Tesco to find some more.  We were very disappointed at their range of decorations, truth be told, and came away with very little.  So in the afternoon we went to Dobbies Garden World to see what their Christmas range was.  They had a huge range of stuff, but it was all rather expensive and arty, and we didn’t pick up much their either.  Turns out we have a much cheaper, tackier approach to decorations, and neither of those shops catered to people like us.  We managed to find some cheap tinsel in Focus though, and our house is now a lot more Christmassy than it was.  And in years to come I’m sure it’ll be even more heaving, what with paper chains and home-made decorations and suchlike.

That’s all from me for now.  Things to do.  No time like the present, so I’m told.

Second Life.  Remember that?  It was all the rage a few years back, when it pioneered the idea of a virtual reality platform for online community and economy, and if I recall correctly there was a lot of hype around at the time.  Of course, I’m no sheep, so I steered clear of it at the time.  After all, I wasn’t a loner with no ‘real’ friends, so I had no need for an additional life to maintain.

So why is it that I downloaded the software last week?  Why have I been wandering around the Second Life worlds, exploring interesting locations, listening to music, chatting to people, dancing…?  I guess part of the cause is how cut off I’m feeling at the moment, having moved away from my circle of friends.  Sure, we’re living in a land of bliss, surrounded by beautiful countryside, the smell of cow dung floating on the breeze, and glorious hills to gaze at.  But we don’t know anyone.  Well, not many, and not as well as our ‘old’ friends.  I miss AM and Sarah, and the Phil(l)s, and my youth group at church, and my badminton partner, and all those other ex-uni folks who dropped in all the time.

Which leads me to an interesting muse.  What makes a friend?  And why is it important?

Facebook, like so many other online technologies, has its downfalls as well as its bonuses.  I has worked really well at bringing people together, reuniting friends, and allowing people to share with others what’s going on in their life at the moment.  Twitter has taken inspiration from that, with its focus on the “what I’m doing right now” aspect, but that’s slightly less interesting to me.  What I find fascinating is how I get really excited about finding old friends on Facebook, and then never actually talk to them.  Most of my uni friends are on FB, a lot of my family are too, plus people from church (x3), my secondary school, even my first primary school (in particular the first friend I ever made).  I have well over 100 ‘friends’ on FB, which is a reassuring and ego-satisfying list to read through.  But here’s the rub – I hardly ever actually talk to these people.

How is it that I can supposedly call these people friends, and yet have little or no communication with them at all?  How can I legitimately call myself a friend if I never speak to them?  Part of this comes down to a shortcoming in FB, where the only relationship possible is a ‘friend’.  According to FB, there is no distinction between my best and closest friends and some random girl I was in a class with at school a long time ago.  As fun as it is to have Becky on my friends list, I have absolutely no interest in what she’s doing, because she’s a very different person to me, and she’s very different to when we were at school together, and to be honest we were never really friends at school anyway (if you’re reading this, Becky, please don’t take it personally, I’m just using you as an example).

At the other end of the scale, I met a guy called Dave at church on Sunday, and came away thinking “there’s a potential friend there”.  We had spent so little time together, we know so little about each other, but his is a personality I think I could get along with quite easily.  I’ve known him a matter of hours, and he’s already more of a friend than a lot of people I’ve got on Facebook.

I know exactly why I signed up and downloaded Second Life.  It wasn’t to try out the technology or join in the community spirit.  It was to find new friends.  I’ve reached a point in my life where I need more people.  Unfortunately, Second Life proved to be the wrong place to look for friends.  To all intents and purposes, it’s dead.  I’ve spent hours wandering around SL, and found many beautiful locations, but very few people.  And none that seemed particularly interested in talking to me.  The only place I found that had people there were the ‘welcome’ worlds, where there were avatars constantly sat around (probably part of a team, on a rota) waiting to welcome new users to SL and answer any questions they had.  A fantastic resource, sure, but not exactly the best way to actually make friends.

To my disappointment, there is nothing for me on Second Life.  Facebook seems to be the best way for me to keep in touch with old friends, but it’s not going to find me new friends.  I’m hoping to be able to force myself into making better use of Facebook (ignoring all the annoying apps), and will try to contact people through it more often, but that’s more of a maintenance task than actually enjoying a friendship.  I guess what it comes down to is that, despite the wonders of the internet, I need to see people face to face to really call them a true friend.

Many of you will know that I am a keen musician.  I blame this partly on my parents, who insisted on taking me to a brass band concert before I was even born.  I didn’t stand a chance.  Church helps too, there’s always music there.  And so it was that I started taking up musical instruments left right and centre, starting with the piano, moving on to cello, and not stopping thereafter.  The list isn’t exactly endless, but it’s fairly sizeable.  The main problem with this, though, is being able to afford the instruments themselves, which don’t come cheap, especially if you want something decent.  So for many years I have had to get by without certain things, in some cases just the accessories, but in some cases the instruments themselves.  I’ve never owned a saxophone, for instance, much as I’d love to.

My first bass guitar was a pink (probably used to be red, but faded in the sun) Squier with a warped neck, which made playing anything but open strings uncomfortable and bone-jarringly out of tune.  Still, for £100 it wasn’t bad, considering it came with a whopping 80 watt amp.  The bass was replaced several years ago, thankfully, with a wood body Aria (I’d give the actual model, but since it’s a “Research and Development” model I think it’s more of a one-off, so comparing it to the mass-produced model that resulted from it might not actually be particularly useful).  The Aria is a dream to play, and has a lovely warm tone to it.  The amp, however, was always pretty ropey, so it wasn’t a huge tragedy when it stopped working.  It was something electric, I know that much, and it just played a very loud humming noise while it was turned on.  So I left it turned off, gathering dust in the garage.  Until just before we moved, when I took it to the dump.  Sad, but somehow very therapeutic at the same time.

Imagine my joy, then, now that I have a working bass amp again.  After much research and reading of reviews, I finally bit the bullet and bought myself a Laney RB2.  It’s only 30 watts, so it’s by far the smallest and least powerful bass amp I’ve ever used, but it should serve my purposes.  To be honest, I’ve always thought it odd that whenever I’ve played bass it’s been using a 60 or 80 watt amp, and never needed to turn it up beyond 2 or 3 on the volume dial.  Always seemed a waste to me.  So, a 30 watt amp it is, and it’ll be used properly too.  Sure, it’s not the most powerful box in the world, but it’s got a DI out so it can be plugged into a PA system, so it only really needs to be loud enough for me to hear myself on stage over the drums and the rest of the band.

The real test will come at the end of this month, when I take the amp to camp.  It’ll only be used in a relatively small theatre, seating around 80 people, so hopefully 30 watts should be enough.  We’ll see.  It sounds promising in the lounge at least, which is encouraging.  It’s got a fairly good tone to it, assuming you whack the gain knob up a bit, and while the built-in compressor isn’t quite as powerful as it could be it does work and gives a nice bit of punch to the sound.  The EQ controls are good too, and allow me to play around with sounds and tones a bit more, which is very nice indeed.

So, that’s the amp.  There is more though.  I may be in demand again as a musician, now that we’ve settled on a church.  Yes, that’s right, after several weeks of ‘church hunting’ my wife and I have finally decided that St Paul’s Shepton Mallet will be our church.  On Sunday we ended up going to three services, confirming our choice.  First up was the 9:25 Parish Communion service, which was fairly traditional (includes sung liturgy and a procession and everything).  Not quite my usual worship style, but that’s no bad thing – variety in worship is always a good thing in my opinion.  After a quick tea break we were off to the 11am service, which was very relaxed and informal, and featured a few worship songs, a ‘sharing’ time where people talked about what had been going on that week, and then a group discussion time.  Very different indeed.  But quite similar in feel to some of the Anglican Chaplaincy services we did, so not entirely unfamiliar.  Then in the evening we went to the 6pm youth service, which was led by the young people.  Apparently they do that every month, and thoroughly enjoy it.  It’s amazing, it’s an evening service that actually works, and people want to come!  How refreshing.  The music was good, and the sermon (preached by an 11-year-old) was surprisingly inspiring.

Discussions after each of those services inevitably revealed my collection of music instruments, and Ellie’s drama background, and we were both pleased to hear that they were in need of what we could offer.  Eyes widened in excitement when I said I could play drums and guitar, and Ellie’s dramatic heritage was greeted by one person physically jumping up and down.  I think they like us.  We certainly like them.  We’ve already been invited to a birthday party, so that’s got to be a good thing.

Finally, I would like to announce that I’ve finally got myself onto Second Life.  Yes, yes, I know, that’s so last year, but it always takes me a year or two to accept new technology, which is why everyone else was on Facebook before me.  I’m still trying to get to grips with how it works, and while I’ve found some interesting places I’ve yet to actually get into a conversation with anyone.  Not least because I’ve struggled to find anyone there at all.  Maybe I’m just looking in the wrong places.  Or maybe it’s because everyone who plays is in America and is therefore asleep when I’m online.  Anyway, if you happen to be on Second Life, let me know and maybe we can meet up and laugh at each other’s avatars.

It was a superb day, bathed in glorious sunshine and with not a hitch in sight. Other than that of Ian and Lucy, of course. Getting hitched, I mean. The service at St Botolph’s church in Colchester was lovely, with plenty of warmth and a sense of the usual level of excellence that tends to follow Ian around. Everything had been intricately planned and was well executed from start to finish. Ian and his two best men looked very smart, though respectfully upstaged by Lucy’s gorgeous wedding dress, and the bridesmaids’ dresses were sumptuous too.

I actually sang in the choir too, which was good fun. In the invitation to the wedding Ian and Lucy had asked whether anyone would like to sing in the service as part of the choir, and following my offer I was sent music for the two pieces we were to sing during the communion and signing of the register. They were both beautiful pieces, though both unknown to me. Thankfully my voice was in good nick that day, and despite not sight-singing anything for years I managed to get to grips with both by singing along to YouTube the day before. The acoustics in the church are fantastic, so the choir sounded superb.

After the service we went outside on the bit of green next to the church for photos, and after that piled into cars or the coach Ian and Lucy had laid on and drove to the reception, Kersey Mill, about half an hour’s drive away in Suffolk. For those who don’t know that part of the country particularly well, it’s in the middle of nowhere, so you’re unlikely to find it unless you’re lost. Still, it’s a lovely place to get lost in, lots of windy country roads and little sign of civilisation… Anyway, I digress. The reception was very smart, and we were constantly topped up with an assortment of beverages, in varying degrees of alcoholicness.

After a while stood in the foyer we were eventually ushered upstairs to the hall, where the tables and chairs had been laid out for the wedding breakfast. And yes, they did actually refer to it as the ‘wedding breakfast’, which we thought was quite fun. The food was all very posh and tasted lovely, though there was the traditional hour’s wait between courses, which was my only complain. Then again, it wasn’t the sort of meal, or occasion, that needed to be rushed through. The food was there to be savoured, not devoured, and although there wasn’t masses of food it did adequately fill a space, especially the incredibly rich chocolate pot we had for pudding, served in a shot glass.

Then came the speeches, cake, toasts, and more chit-chat, before we were encouraged downstairs while the staff rearranged the room into a dance hall for the rest of the evening. They had a live band playing for most of the evening, playing a mix of modern and more classic hits. About half way through the band took a break and Mr Phill took over on the decks; I desperately wanted to sit down and rest my tired feet, but the tunes he brought out were just so infectious I just couldn’t stop dancing! Nice one Phill. After about 25 minutes the band got back up and started playing, and Ellie and I decided it was time to call it a night.

Oh, and we had Andy C sleeping on our floor too, which I think he appreciated. He was back off to Germany this morning though, so it was just a flying visit. It was good to see people at the wedding, although most I either didn’t know at all or saw fairly regularly anyway. The only exception there was Katie, who I shared a house with for two years and haven’t been in touch with since! It was good to see her too, though we didn’t get much chance to catch up properly.

Photos of the day are now online, so check them out if you’re interested.

So, first of all, a general introduction.  Many things have happened since my last blog post, including (but not exclusively): two trips to theatres, some significant developments on the business front, a somewhat extended birthday, Neddy going to the garage a couple of times, a couple of additions to the Dawkins household, an above-average number of requests to lead worship, and a general realisation that Ellie and I are taking over our church.  That’s quite a lot to write about.  I’ll try to keep some of it brief.  Just to demonstrate that, you’ll notice the lack of information in the spaces between words.  Every little helps.

Glass Menagerie

This is a show Ellie has been working on in Ipswich, which finished last week.  She managed to get a couple of tickets for the penultimate show, and I quite enjoyed it.  A little random in places, but that’s all good and familiar.  Some fairly convincing American accents, plenty of imagery, clever lighting, and rather eerie music.  Not much to report really, but it was a good evening out.  Ellie and I joined the cast and crew afterwards for drinks, so that was a good opportunity to meet people and put faces to names.  And if I was lucky I got the right name with the right face.

Keeping busy with business

A couple of Saturdays ago I met up with a group of Christians in Colchester working in internet business, whether that be hosting, web design, SEO or general management.  It was a good meeting, lots was discussed, and it looks like I’ll be getting a little more work out of it.  One of the other guys is trying to get rid of all his clients (in the nicest possible way), and it looks likely that he’ll pass them on to me to look after.  Not a lot of work involved really, just annual billing for hosting and the occasional request for updates.

The major development, though, is a business link I’ve made with another web design company based in Hornchurch.  It’s run by a Christian chap, and his company deals mainly with high-flying businesses, so quite a different clientele to me.  He’s been rushed off his feet recently, and is really looking to find someone he can employ full-time.  Clearly I can’t give up my current commitments to my existing clients, so that wasn’t really something I could consider, but he’s now outsourcing to me and passing a fair amount of work my way.  It’s nice to have some variation in my work, and doing business web sites involves a very different approach – whereas churches spend forever thinking about things and passing everything through PCCs and committees and suchlike, businesses want it all done yesterday and are prepared to pay for the privilege.  It’s been quite exciting, and I’ve been doing a fair amount of PHP as a result.  All good stuff.  And it pays well too.

I’ve got a brand new combine harvester

Sadly I never did manage to find that song on the internet for free.  Ah well, never mind.  I had plenty of other folk music to satisfy my taste and provide a background ambience to my birthday party.  Yes, for those of you who didn’t hear (and therefore weren’t invited – sorry), my 25th birthday was celebrated this year with a fancy dress party (no surprise there) on the theme of ‘farmers and country folk’.  It was a good laugh, with people dressed up in chequered shirts and flat caps, eating home-made cakes (courtesy of my lovely wife) and kettle chips, drinking tea and cloudy lemonade (not at the same time), with Devonshire folk music in the background and a dog curled up in front of a roaring fire.  Yes, you read that right.  It was cheating a little, perhaps, in that the dog was a toy and the roaring fire was a screensaver on my computer, but the effect worked well.  Photos are up on Facebook.

Present-wise, the highlight was most definitely the radio-controlled Mini I got from three of my friends who clubbed together.  So much fun!!  I’ve driven it round the lounge more than a few times already, and had fun doing handbrake turns and powerslides and all sorts of things you’re not really supposed to be doing with radio controlled cars.  I also got some chocolate and another guitar strap.  Ellie’s present to me didn’t arrive in the post though, so I had to wait for that.

Gee up, Neddy

Neddy, my Mini Sidewalk, has been feeling considerably under the weather just of late.  Acceleration has been rather sluggish and uneven, he’s been leaking oil, and the fan belt has been slipping very conspicuously.  I had every intention of getting the work done myself, as none of it is particularly difficult.  But, as the lateness of this blog entry testifies to, I just never got round to it.  In the end I resigned myself to the fact that I was going to have to pay someone else to do it for me, and ended up taking my Mini to Wivenhoe Garage.  Last week they replaced the top engine steady bushes, replaced the oil and filter, and fitted a new rocker cover and gasket (which should stop the oil leak).  Yesterday Neddy went in for stage two, which involved replacing the alternator (bearings were gone, and it turned out to be cheaper to buy a new one than get the bearings replaced) and flushing the coolant.  Neddy is also lined up to be given a closer inspection by a tuning garage next week, which will involve interrogating the ECU to find out just how happy it is, and may involve putting it on a rolling road to get it properly set up – the new alternator has certainly helped a lot, but I’m fairly sure more power can be eked from the 1275cc block yet.

Diamond and Pearl

No, we haven’t been splashing out on fancy jewellery.  Ellie and I went to a pet shop on Saturday to buy some bird food, and ended up going back on Monday to buy some gerbils.  A little spontaneous, perhaps, but definitely worth it.  Expensive too, given that we had to buy everything in one go, but they’re apparently very cheap to keep after that.  We’ve got a fantastic cage, with a plastic bottom which gives them plenty of room to dig around in the bottom without sending sawdust flying out into the lounge, and a barred cage on top giving them two further levels to explore.  They’re so much fun!  And very cute, too.  I really must take some photos of the girls soon.  They’ve settled in really well already, and we’re beginning to introduce our hands to them and encouraging them out so they can play.  All good fun.

I have not forgotten you

Leading worship is one of my many passions, as my friends and family will know.  I’ve been a keen musician for years, and it’s been a natural progression from there to leading worship.  I led worship at the CU, I led worship at the Anglican Chaplaincy, I led worship at Orchard Baptist Church.  Pretty much everywhere I went, that was my focus, my responsibility, my blessing to the Body of Christ.  Until I came to St Margaret’s, that is.  Apparently they have a policy of not letting anyone ‘new’ lead worship, at least until they’ve been observed and checked out for at least a year.  It’s been over six months now, and I was beginning to think that maybe God didn’t want me leading worship any more.  Then, within about a week, I had two requests to lead worship.  One was a Christian event organised by a friend from the CYFA camp Ellie I go to in the summer, which sadly I was unable to agree to since the event fell on the same weekend as my birthday.  The second I did agree to, though, and that was leading a short worship slot for the Lent Course on Tuesday evening.  It was only 10 minutes or so, so only three songs, but it was still the first time I had led worship at the church, and despite what Christians generally say I’m pretty sure they were all judging me.  The response was good though, which is reassuring – I’ve been learning to lean on God a lot recently, and it was so wonderful to be given the chance to serve again.  So it sounds like they might ask me to lead again.  God apparently does still want me leading worship after all.  So much for the year of waiting!

The Great Dawkins Takeover Bid

In addition to being told that I wouldn’t be asked to lead worship for at least a year, when Ellie and I first started coming to St Margaret’s the vicar was quite insistent that we wouldn’t be asked to do anything in the church at all in the first year of our marriage, telling us to focus on our marriage first.  As we expected, and as I think our vicar is beginning to understand now too, that was never going to happen.  Ellie and I are both the sort of people who like to be active in the church community, always happy to be doing things.  Very soon after joining the congregation Ellie found herself leading one of the youth groups, and I quickly got myself into the worship band playing guitar and bass.  Ellie also does sidesman every now and then, and we’ve also done teas and coffees after the service.  Ellie has been asked to work the projector in a few weeks’ time, I’m down to MC an evening service next month, and both of us are on the rota to preach in the near future.  We’re not complaining, it’s what we love doing, but it just seems funny how little of the church is left for us to get involved in!  Not bad for being at the church for almost seven months.

Birthday part 2

Remember I said that Ellie’s present to me was delayed by the post?  Apparently that was a rouse.  The postal service wasn’t involved at all.  Ellie wasn’t going to work yesterday at all, despite what she’d said.  About lunchtime yesterday I got a text message informing me of the treasure trail she had planned, and told me where to find the first clue.  In the middle of a book in our bookcase I found the first clue and some instructions, and before I knew it I was hopping on a train to London with no idea where I was going or what I was going to do when I got there.  Once I got to London I followed a set of cryptic clues, sent by text message, which led me from one location to another on a route from Westminster tube station, along a whole load of roads I’ve never been down, through China Town, and eventually found my wife at the end of the trail, who took me round a corner and revealed my birthday present – there, a little way down the road, was the theatre showing Les Miserables.  It’s a show I’ve wanted to see for a while, and I really enjoyed it.  The treasure trail was superb though – a little random, but lots of fun.  I did feel a little conspicuous running through London looking all around for random objects, then stopping and texting on my phone, and then waiting for the next clue to come back before setting off again.  It was like being a secret agent, following some obscure set of clues.  Les Mis was superb – very sad, but very good.  Especially given the main part was being played by the understudy that night.  I won’t give the story away for those of you who haven’t seen it, but I would encourage you to go and see it if you’ve not already – some fantastic music, a very dense plot, some heart-rending moments, some funny bits, and quite a powerful resolution.

So thank you, Ellie, for a wonderful birthday present.  Suitably random.