On 17 September 2010 more than 40 of us set off to Abbot Hall, Grange over Sands for our Church Family Weekend and what a great weekend it was.
We started on Friday evening with Rabbit Gill and Duck Jackie M setting the tone and theme for the weekend with a wonderful sketch about the light ribbon, and then Jackie D got us into teams for a game about promises.
The Nooma Shells video formed our morning devotions on the Saturday followed by a session "Our promises" when we explored the covenant service. Meanwhile the children were preparing their story of Noah. The second session of the day "Something of promise" got our creative juices flowing as we split into groups to develop something from nothing. One group got crafty and made bracelets from recycled materials, one group developed a worship dance, another group wrote new lyrics to "Somewhere over the rainbow" and a fourth group looked for readings and prayers. The children enjoyed a treasure hunt in the grounds.
After spending Saturday afternoon at leisure we had a charity auction and a silent auction of promises including baby sitting, baking, gardenings, reflexology and lots more. All in all we raised over £250 and had a lot of fun in the process. Quizzes and party games followed, and, of course, no Thackley social evening is complete without the silly hat game!
As we gathered to watch Nooma Noise, we couldn't believe how quickly the weekend was going. In our final session "Living the promise" we looked at the new covenant, how we could relate that to a contemporary world and then reflected on what promises we could make as we continue living in a covenant relationship with God. Meanwhile the children created a wonderful picture of Noah and the rainbow.
We celebrated a wonderful weekend together with morning worship drawing on the products of our "Something of promise" session and what a wonderful service it was, full of love and fellowship.
Thank you to everyone who participated.