Friday 12 December 2008

Chaplains Christmas Meal

What a beautiful start to the day, although it was cold, the fields, the hedgerows, trees all covered in frost and the sun shining made the journey to the Church of England Retreat House in Pleshey a delight - in fact I would have said I was driving along in a Christmas card picture. It was one of those beautiful crisp mornings and I wished I had cameras situated all around my car so that I could snap pictures as I drove alone!!

Before leaving for Pleshey I took some photos in the garden - one of the daisy plant and one of Nigel's favourite plant both completely covered in frost.
I decided to follow the route on my SatNav, which is on my mobile phone, and it took me through some picturesque country villages with thatched roofs - around village greens - down narrow country lanes with fields on other side completely white with the frost - I really did enjoy the drive and what's more you wouldn't believe that Pleshey is about 10 miles from the City of Chelmsford and 15 miles from Stanstead Airport. On arrival you would think that you were in the middle of no-where because Pleshey is such a small village probably with no more than a 100 dwellings plus two pubs, one village shop and the church.

I arrived at The Retreat House for about 9.30am and took the following two pictures - the house from the small car park and the back garden which goes down to the stream.

After a short Team meeting and Secret Santa we sat down for our meal - unfortunately not everyone was able to attend but those in attendance enjoyed their meal.

Our teams consists of Chaplains for the Stanstead & London City Airports, Harwich docks, Head Office of the Essex Fire Brigade, Police, Shopping centres, Council offices, Royal Mail and the Olympic Construction Site.
"There has been only one Christmas - the rest are anniversaries." W J Cameron.

"Christmas is not as much about opening presents as opening your heart." Janice Maeditere

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

How beautiful are you pictures. They look like pictures you would see on postcards! It sounded like you have a lovely day which was very enjoyable. Love you and blessings!

Judith said...

Thanks Valerie - I took the photos on my mobile and I only wished I could have taken some as I was driving along as the scenery was just breathtaking. Yes, it's always good to meet up with my fellow chaplains and catch up.

Ali said...

Some real interesting posts in that lot. I bet there's very exciting stuff going on that you all spent hours gassing about. Apart from maybe voiceless Judy of course!

Judith said...

hahaha Ali - yes, for once, I did the listening!! but it was an interesting conversation - our topic yesterday was how the credit crunch is effecting the various workplaces that we visit. Is the Credit crunch having an impact in your area?