Nativity puppet service Christmas Eve 4 pm in church

Transcription

1 Nativity puppet service Christmas Eve 4 pm in church Dec 2012-Jan 2013 No MERRY CHRISTMAS

2 christmas is so much more C hristmas should be a time of great joy and real celebration for everyone. But lots of people struggle through it - getting into debt, feeling pressurised or stressed, guilty or lonely - and unable to focus on the meaning of Christmas. And all the emphasis on shopping and consuming can take a huge amount of effort and time. Take Christmas cards for example. When your first card drops through the door on Dec 1 (mine is invariably from the Church Commissioners!) do you 2 eagerly open it with joy and thanksgiving, murmuring a prayer for the sender, or do you silently scream at the thoughtless Miss or Mr Perfect for reminding you how hopelessly disorganised you are yet again this year and how there's no way you're going to get all the Christmas cards and presents done in time for Christmas? (Or is it just me?) If you do find Christmas at all stressful, ask yourself these questions: Is sending Christmas cards and giving presents a chore? Do you give cards and pre- sents just because people expect them? Do you give yourself time to stop and wonder at what it s all about? Cards and gifts are really important. At a time like Christmas it is important to show those around us that they are loved and valued, but how often do we go through the motions by buying something the person doesn t need or even want?! If we have unwittingly locked ourselves into a particular way of doing Christmas why not do it differently this year? Some ideas: Arrange with family and friends to give something that you each own to each other and give the money you would have spent on presents to charity. Buy some presents from charity shops - buying second hand is as important as giving away your old things to the shop (you could even end up buying last year s presents back!!). Give hand-made presents - and think or pray about the person as you make it. Ask people what they want before you buy them something that they don't need! Give gifts of charity; you can send someone a card saying that you have given to World Vision so that they can immunise a child, or buy a voucher for the school's (and the church's) link village in Malawi. We are raising money to help develop the literacy of the women in the village more details from Vicky at leybournecharity@gmail.com Give theatre tickets or dinners out. Get up half an hour earlier during Advent to meditate or read an inspirational book. Christmas doesn t have to be the shopping rat race ; the birth of Jesus is so much more than that! With all best wishes for a relaxing and inspiring christmas. Fr Matthew PS: Normal services - Christmas Eve: 4.00 pm Puppet show and pm Midnight Mass. Christmas Day: 10 Family Eucharist with blessing of Toys. 3

3 Retired? Semi Retired? The Third Age is a time of creativity and fulfilment, a time to learn new skills and interests and to share your knowledge with others in a place where learning is informal and fun. A new University of the Third Age - U3A - has been formed in the area and monthly meetings are held on the first Thursday of every month at 2pm at Kings Hill Community Centre (near ASDA). Just come along and find out more! Contact Mark Richards at khad.u3a.membership@gmail.c om. Phone or Visit The University of the Third Age a focus for knowledge and experience. 1920s Monte Carlo Evening at Leybourne Castle Friday Dec 7, 7:30 pm. The evening starts with carols round the Christmas tree & mulled wine, so please dress warmly. Then we move inside the Castle for a fun 1920's Monte Leybourne Church will not be selling Christmas trees and wreaths this year. Carlo evening. The Rochester Round Table are providing the fun tables in aid of their charities for a small donation. The rest of the events proceeds go towards the Leybourne Church Improvement Fund. As usual we will have our customary raffle at 5 an envelope. You will need no other money apart from the raffle and possibly your taxi ride home! Tickets 35 each, including a cold fork buffet with a choice of main dishes, salads and desserts as well as wine, beer and soft drinks throughout the evening. Carriages at 23:00. Parking available on Castle top lawn. Dress code: 1920's or black tie. Sorry, no stilettos on the Castle floors. Please give your cheque made payable to "Leybourne PCC" as soon as possible to Sarah Kitchener at 46 Baywell, Leybourne, West Malling Kent ME19 5QQ to book your place. Church Warden surgery: From Sat Nov 3 church wardens Patrick Tootal or Martin Luton will be available between 11:00 am and 12:00 noon in church every Saturday to answer your questions. These sessions will continue while Fr Matthew is posted to Afghanistan. Bulky Waste: The council truck will be outside the shops on Little Market Row: Dec am Dec am Please don t leave items on site if the truck is not there. You are responsible for putting them into the truck yourself. LEYara (Leybourne Active Retirement Association) is a club for retired and semi retired people over 50. The main Club meeting is on the second Thursday afternoon of each month at the Village Hall where we have an entertainer or speaker. A second monthly meeting has now been added (the third Thursday) where Arts and Crafts, Card Making, Sketching, Bridge, Board games and Watercolour groups meet. In addition to the meetings there are monthly coffee mornings, lunches, rambles, visits to interesting places and theatre outings. In addition there is a weekly line dancing session every Monday at 4.30pm. and a weekly short mat bowls every Friday at 3.30pm. Why not come and join us? More details from David Fillery on Ss PETER & PAUL LEYBOURNE Leybourne Church seeks to serve God through prayer, worship, action and example in the wider community. Please contact the Parish Priest or Church Wardens on any parish matters. PARISH PRIEST The Revd Matthew Buchan matthew.buchan@dioceserochester.org CHURCH WARDENS Patrick Tootal Martin Luton CHURCH ADMINISTRATOR/ Sarah Kitchener leybournepa@googl .com PASTORAL ASSISTANT Mary Bierbaun Do you run a community group or activity and want people to know about it? Contact: LEYBOURNE VOICE 40 Castle Way Leybourne, ME19 5HG 4 5

4 Ss Peter & Paul Church Social Committee present: Burns Supper Leybourne School Hall, Saturday Jan 26 Bar Opens 7.00 pm, Haggis Piped In 7.30 pm. Three-course burns Dinner followed by ceilidh and Dancing. Evening Dress, Black Tie or Highland Dress. (no stilettos Please) Tickets: adults, 7 children (under 15) Name:.. Address:... Phone:.. Adults. (inc Veg.) Children (inc Veg.) Cheque amount:.. (Cheques payable to Leybourne PCC) Please return to: 54 Bridgewater, Leybourne 6 Sing carols with Grange Park W est Kent Health Needs Education Service caters for young people who are too ill to attend their mainstream schools. This may be for physical, mental or emotional health reasons. The pupils are taught either in their homes or in one of our centres at Leybourne, Pembury or Seal, where they come by taxi. Since September 2010, we have been based in the school buildings formerly occupied by Grange Park School. We now have access through Leybourne Chase and we are within Leybourne Parish. We are very keen to develop links with our local community, especially since few parents live in this area. We plan to sing Carols in Leybourne Church on Friday 21st December at 11.00am. and we would welcome anyone from Leybourne who would like to join us then. We have recently set up a Friends' organisation for WKHNES. If you would be interested in learning more, then please marianne@allshallbewell.me.uk. 7

5 Leybourne at Dickens Come and support Leybourne Church Choir as they sing carols on the stage at the Dickens at Christmas festival in Rochester on Sat Dec 1. 8 Barham Small Animal Hotel 5 star luxury boarding for your small animals. We are a very friendly and experienced family run business for all your pets needs. Pets boarded:- Cats, Rabbits,Guinea Pigs, Hamsters, Mice, Lizards, Tortoises etc We now also offer a Home Visit facility for those pets that you would prefer are looked after in their own home. Please contact Hazel on for further details. Malling Road, Teston Maidstone.Kent.ME18 5BH - barhamcats@aol.com 9

6 Raise Money by Leybourne Christmas Shopping patients a voice ch Giving Midnight Mass churc Online You can raise money for Leybourne church by doing your Christmas shopping online through Just by visiting your favourite shopping websites through the easyfundraising.org.uk website, some of the money you spend gets redirected to Leybourne Church. Visit the website and register your donations to Leybourne paraochial church council (note the spelling mistake in the registration), and an average of 5p of every pound you spend will go to Leybourne church. Happy shopping W 11:15 pm Christmas eve C All welcome A est Malling Group Practice, which consists of surgeries in West Malling, Kings Hill and Leybourne, now has a Patient Participation Group (PPG). This group joins some 50 other groups working with their GP Surgeries and the newly forming Clinical Commissioning Group in our area. The PPG has been formed to promote patients active interest in their healthcare and encourage input to decisions made within the NHS which would directly affect our community.every patient of the West Malling Group Practice is an automatic member of this group. The aim of a Patient Participation Group is to be the link between patients, the GP practice and the new Clinical Commissioning Group. Would you like a chance to influence or suggest ideas that can help shape local services provided to you and your family in the future? We are planning to organise some open evenings and workshops to include speakers on various health aspects. As a result of a patient questionnaire completed earlier in the year several improvements have been made within the Group Practice and more are in the pipeline. With your help we can continue to influence GP, community and local hospital services. For further information on the PPG, whether you are interested in becoming involved with the group or whether you would like to know more about the talks and open meetings, there are notice boards in each surgery. You can contact us by on wmgpppg@gmail.com, or view the Practice website at westmallinggp@nhs.uk. Photo: Chris Haines 11 13

7 Leybourne churc ch Midnight Mass 11:15 pm C Christmas eve A welcome All Photo: Chris Haines 12 13

8 Do things at the right time, with the right tools: that s the Christmas advice from wise man of the garden, Adam MacKay. I m not known for my generosity at Christmas time. Samantha and I don t have children, although we now have Monty, our chocolate Jack Russell who I m sure will get spoilt rotten. But, as long as I can remember I ve just given token presents to friends and family, like a candle, chocolate liqueurs or a bottle of wine. Well to be honest whatever my wife buys. I think you get the picture! But this is all about to change as I m going to bestow you, the reader, with gifts. Shall we say a gardeners gold, frankincense and myrrh. Ok, maybe that s a little OTT. But I m going to give you some gardening tips that I m sure will have you enjoying your garden more. Firstly, if you wish to buy gardening tools for the gardener in your home then buy the best you 14 can afford. You get what you pay for in the horticultural world. Take for example secateurs, mine are Felco no. 8 and cost around I keep them sharpened and clean and they are as good as new 5 years after I bought them. Remember, I use them nearly every day. Yet a 9.99 pair from any DIY store would do well to last a summer. I also have a wonderful nonbend fork and a bog standard fork, the difference in price is The non-bend fork is still going strong after 3 years but the cheaper fork lasted 3 months. One quality tool is better than a dozen broken ones. Nearly everyone wants a low maintenance garden but, what is a low maintenance garden? Is it mostly a lawned area? No, not in my opinion, as grass needs to be cut at least once a week from March to late October. Most gardens have a lawn as their main feature with a measly 50cm border for a few shrubs that give little interest. Now, if those borders were Continued overleaf 15

9 In the garden with Adam Continued from previous page one to two metres deep, you could put in a mixture of perennials and shrubs of various heights, textures and flowering times to make the garden much more interesting. Also, making the borders at the far end of the garden deeper than the ones nearer the house will make it seem like your garden is longer than it actually is, as it deceives the eye. So how is this lower maintenance? Well each shrub or perennial you plant only needs on average one hour of tending a year, honest. This includes watering (in its early stages), pruning (to shape shrubs as they get bigger), staking, mulching and dividing (perennials, every 3 years). That isn t much, spread over a year is it? It s so much more enjoyable to look at a deep-filled border with flowers and foliage than a green rectangle that needs constant care. I won t profess to have the knowledge of the three wise men but, my one piece of horticultural wisdom is that anyone can garden but not everyone can be a gardener. Why is this, and what separates a gardener from someone who likes to garden? It s just one word, patience. Yes, there are pruning techniques that seem to mystify the majority, and us gardeners seem to talk about plants in a Continued overleaf 16 17

10 18 In the garden with Adam Continued from previous page foreign language (Latin, which I promise to devote a column to in the future). But patience in my opinion is the difference, waiting for the right time to prune instead of when that shrub eventually gets in the way of your path once too often! Or sowing seeds and waiting 28 days for them to germinate, then another 14 days until the true leaf appears to prick them out, and another 28 days or so to nip the growing tip off which means the flowers/fruit take longer to arrive but you get a bushy and more vigorous plant in the long term. Yes, patience to wait until the end of May to plant out bedding and not in the Easter time when they go on sale! Or when a new plant doesn t seem to be growing as well as you like. It may well be settling its roots in and next year it will show you what it can do. And lastly what would I buy the budding gardener in your home? It has to be a camera and a diary, to take photos each month of the borders (helpful in many ways especially bulb planting), and to record tasks as they are done and thoughts as they come. And who knows, a gardener may yet be born! So it just leaves me to say thank you for your kind comments during the year and to wish you all a happy festive season and a brighter New Year! Adam McKay 19

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12 December January Sat 1 10:00 Choir at Dickens Festival, Rochester Sun 2 First Sunday of Advent 09:45 Sunday Club in the school hall 10:00 Parish Eucharist 16:15 Carols Under the Tree, Castle Way Mon 3 13:30 Toddler Praise in Church 18:00 +NRG Tue 4 10:00 Book Club, Castle Lake Wed 5 20:00 Prayers by Candlelight Thu 6 18:00 RESPECT 19:30 Pub Night, Castle Lake, topic prayer Fri 7 19: s Monte Carlo Madonna and Child (c 1460) Night, Leybourne Castle Sun 9 Second Sunday of Advent 10:00 All Age Word Toy Service Mon 10 13:30 Toddler Praise, Church 18:00 +NRG 20:00 PCC 20:00 Home Group Tue 1110:00 Book Club, Castle Lake Wed 12 20:00 Prayers by Candlelight Thu 13 18:00 RESPECT 19:30 Pub Night, Castle Lake, topic prayer Sat 15 08:30 Breakfast with Santa, Leybourne School 11:00 Churches Together in Malling Carols at local supermarkets Sun 16 Third Sunday of Advent 09:45 Sunday Club in the school hall 10:00 Parish Eucharist 18:00 9 Lessons & Carols Mon 17 13:30 Toddler Praise in church 18:00 +NRG Tue 18 10:00 Book Club, Castle Lake 18:00 School Nativity in Church, years 3-6 Wed 19 18:00 School Nativity in Church, years :00 Prayers by Candlelight Thu 20 18:00 RESPECT Fri 21 09:30 Leybourne School Church service 11:00 The Grange School Church Service 14:00 Church Christmas clean Sun 23 Fourth Sunday of Advent 10:00 Parish Eucharist Mon 24 Christmas Eve 16:00 Crib Service 23:15 Christmas Eve Eucharist with Incense Tue 25 Christmas Day 10:00 All Age Eucharist with blessing of toys Fri 28 15:00 Wedding Sun 30 First Sunday of Christmas 10:00 Parish Eucharist JANUARY 2013 Sun 6 Tue 8 Epiphany with Bishop James 10:00 Parish Eucharist with Bishop James 10:00 Book Club, Castle Lake Wed 9 20:00 Prayers by Candlelight Thu 10 18:00 RESPECT Sun 13 Baptism of Christ 10:00 All Age Word Christingle Service Mon 14 13:30 Toddler Praise in church 18:00 +NRG 20:00 Standing Committee 20:00 Home Group Tue 15 10:00 Book Club, Castle Lake Wed 16 20:00 Prayers by Candlelight Adoration of the Magi (1470) Hans Memling Thu 17 18:00 RESPECT 19:30 Pub Night, Castle Lake, topic prayer Sun 20 Third Sunday of Epiphany 09:45 Sunday Club in the school hall 10:00 Parish Eucharist Mon 21 13:30 Toddler Praise in church 18:00 +NRG Tue 22 10:00 Book Club, Castle Lake Wed 23 20:00 Prayers by Candlelight Thu 24 18:00 RESPECT Sat 26 19:00 Burns Night at School Sun 27 4th Sunday of Epiphany 09:45 Sunday Club in the school hall 10:00 Parish Eucharist Mon 28 13:30 Toddler Praise, church 18:00 +NRG 20:00 Home Group Tue 29 10:00 Book Club, Castle Lake Wed 30 20:00 Prayers by Candlelight Thu 31 18:00 RESPECT 22 23