This week we are in St Hughs C of E which is pretty much next to Ambergate.

We arrived at 6.40am, unloaded and have set up in their hall. We were just about ready on time although could have done with a bit more of a soundcheck. We had Year 10s first of all for a Soaps lesson, then Year 7s for a Values lesson. After break was Year 8s for an Abi Lesson and a Year 10 Assembly. Ate with the students at lunchtime, my best compliment was from one girl who said I didn’t look or sound anything like Abi! After lunch we had a Year 7/8 Assembly where myself and Ben ran the Adverts Quiz which was so much fun! After school we had a bit of sorting out to do, then our daily trip to Asda (stock up on Wispas) and back to Dave and Les’s to watch a recording of Abi from last week, debrief and plan tomorrow.

After dinner we spent some time praying as a team. We seem to be under quite a lot of stress so your prayers would be greatly appreciated. Personally, I’m quite tired and in danger of getting grumpy and snapping at people so pray that I don’t! Also been having stomach pains (am on medication for it) which I could really do with not having!

Tomorrow is a full day seeing Years 7,8 and 11.

Ambergate was brilliant!! The kids were just amazing, so friendly and just wanted to do anything to help you. They absolutely loved having us there and wanted to spend time talking to us. We saw everyone for at least 4 lessons so got to know them quite well. They all saw Abi, the year 10s and 11s being particularly vocal during the play! We did a gig for them today before lunch, about 40 of them squashed into the room, got pretty hot in there! They got involved and had a really good time and a lot of them gave us letters after which was really sweet, I’ll put up some highlights from them later.

We had lunch (the dinner lady was the best ever because each day she saved me a small bowl of salad without onion in!) with the kids and then packed down all of our gear, finally sweeping up and leaving just after 3. Then for our daily visit to Asda (I bought some new boots yesterday) and a Vanilla Latte in Costa.

Tonight we were at the youth group in Grantham Baptist, playing some games and doing a condensed version of our Values Lesson. Tomorrow we are running a Check It Out group in the morning and then heading to Nottingham for a chill out!

It’s been a time of eventfulness since my last post!

Saturday 12th was the commissioning/celebration in London. We arrived early and set up in good time. It was really good to see SammyJ, Matt and Ollie again as well as some of the other Optimum Volunteers from last year. The service itself went well and everyone worked really well together on our first event!

Sunday I went to church with Tricia, first time of being at her church – LWCC. It was really good!! A really relaxed atmosphere, everyone was really friendly and I loved the fact that the children were allowed to run around, play instruments and make noise during the singing…basically allowed to be children! I felt free to worship and enjoyed the lady who spoke. Hopefully be able to go back again soon! Then we had a ‘last year’s touring team’ meal at the Toby Carvery in Brentwood. Unfortunately SammyJ and Ollie weren’t able to make it…but Matt was there! We had a good time together. Then myself and Keel got the train to Chelmsford, met Dan and Jeni and went to CGC in Chelmsford. Really enjoyed the worship and they had visiting missionaries from Brazil which was interesting! We went out to the pub after and then I got the train back to Braintree, met Ian from the days of getting the 352 to school…was good to catch up!

Monday was a rather difficult day. I don’t need to go into details but Lewis and I broke up.  It’s all amicable and everything, I guess we just both need some space for a bit.

The rest of the week was hard. I found it really difficult to concentrate and focus on what needed to be done. It was a week of rehearsing, training, meetings and lots of chatting and drinking coffee with people! Wednesday was a good relaxing day…Me and Becca went and got our hair cut while the boys went to PMT in Southend (Music Shop!) and then got their hair cut. We spent the afternoon putting blond in Jack’s hair and watching DVDs of Andy and Joy back in the day’s of Double Check. Some pretty hilarious outfits/hairstyles! Then dinner as a team at Andy and Joy’s house which was amazing! Friday we spent some time with Den, going through Abi and him giving directing advice which was brilliant. We only had 3 hours so only got through 5 scenes but could have spent so much longer!

My weekend was good. Saturday I met Becca for coffee in the morning, then Lois in Chelmsford for lunch (Boots Meal Deal in the Park…oh yes!) and good girlie chat! Also a bit of shopping…£3 DVDs in HMV is such a bad thing! And I bought the jumper dress I’ve been eyeing up in Peacocks for a while! Watched Strictly Come Dancing in the evening…it just annoyed me. Such a waste of 2hours. I love the dancing, its all the rubbish around it I can’t stand. Perhaps I’ll Sky+ it and then I can ffw all that stuff and it’ll be over in 20mins!

Sunday – Happy 40th Wedding Anniversary Mummy and Daddy!!!!!
Went to Shotgate Baptist in the morning as Lois was doing an interview about her time in Peru with fellow team member Matt. Russell and Becci and co picked me up from there and we went to the Green Dragon, Gt Leighs meeting up with the rest of the family to celebrate Mum and Dad’s Ruby Wedding Anniversary. We had a really lovely time, good food! Back to Mum and Dad’s for champagne, then Russell and Co dropped me back in Wickford on their way home!

This week is more rehearsing, training and meetings and our photoshoot on Wednesday!

Sunday was a sofa day. I thought I was better…but then i felt a bit more poorly. Lewis came to look after me, he brought me a goody bag of grapes, smoothie, Ribena (yay for cosy juice!) and chocolate for when i’m fully better! So I was better in that I had migrated from bed to sofa…but still couldn’t be upright for too long. Thank goodness for Sky +. Watched some of the Girls Aloud Show from the O2 and then on Comedy Central it’s Sofa Sunday, with Scrubs all day. I watched Scrubs from 1pm-6pm, and then they started to repeat the episodes…what’s that about! Then watched Saturday’s X Factor and then bed. Wasn’t really up for eating much although I knew I should have been.

10 and a half hours sleep is amazing. Straight through. So I had been told not to go into work but knew I would go nuts! So I watched Jeremy Kyle in the morning, got ready and went into work for 1pm. Despite the ‘What are you doing here?! Go home!’s I felt very welcome. 1pm-2pm: Lunch Break; 2pm-3pm: Staff Meeting; 3.15pm-4.45pm: Meeting with Dan over Coffee in the Bistro; 5pm: Hometime! A nice relaxing intro back! The evening I spent catching up on Neighbours and Home and Away and worked on ‘All About Abi’.

Now it’s Tuesday and we have much sickness in the team…please pray for us!!! Ben has Shingles and a Cold (which we have decided is flu, purely so we can say he has Flingles), Andy has been at the Doctors this morning with stomach pains, Claira has been signed off work for another month and I’m still recovering. We would muchly appreciate your prayers as we continue to rehearse!

So the end of the first week.

It has taken some adjusting to but it’s great! We’ve spent the week in the office rehearsing, having training sessions, times of Bible study and prayer, as well as scheduling in personal time to pray and reflect.
Taste have been learning songs and Diversion have been re-writing and learning All About Abi.
We’ve bonded really quickly as a team, spending Weds and Thurs (Happy Birthday Ben!!!) evening together socially has really helped. I’m very excited to have another girl on team, me and Becca have already had a good girlie chat over coffee in the Bistro! We’re starting to create our own ‘in jokes’ as a team…but us second years can’t help boring the first years with stories and jokes from last year (we miss you guys!).
See the beautiful new team on my CIO Team page.

**So today in PTO (personal time out) we were looking at Romans 12. 20mins so isn’t long enough to process all that is in it! The bit that really got me was verse 10 – in the NIV it goes something like this ‘Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. Honour one another above yourselves.’ What does it mean to be devoted? How do I do that? In my every day life, how do I consistently honour everyone else above myself?**