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Lovely living accommodation

Sometimes it can seem that hope here is fragile – there are challenges ahead aswell as encouragements. I need to keep reminding myself that the Lord is not fragile and that hope in him does not fade like a rainbow, but is living, secured by the resurrection of Christ.

In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope 1Peter 1v3

]]> http://thevicarswife.wordpress.com/2012/01/24/faintly-hoping/feed/ 1 The Vicar's Wife Faint rainbow http://thevicarswife.wordpress.com/2012/01/11/cheerful-chimney-sweep/ http://thevicarswife.wordpress.com/2012/01/11/cheerful-chimney-sweep/#comments Wed, 11 Jan 2012 13:53:54 +0000 thevicarswife http://thevicarswife.wordpress.com/?p=3166 ]]> The Vicar bought some chimney brushes last year. We’ve found it a very cost-effective way of  ensuring that we don’t fill the living room with smoke too much. I think the set cost about £30, which is already less than we’d pay to get a sweep in. Our chimneys are quite easy to sweep as everything is contained in the woodburning stove box when it descends, although the house is three storeys, so we had to get extra rods to reach the top. Everything keeps clean as long as black bin liners are judiciously applied. Here’s the happy Vicar in his sweeping kit, displaying some of the soot, which shows up very nicely on his peely-wally Scottish hands:

We have some hope that the mugger will be brought to justice – the police were able to follow up on the vehicle, thanks to CCTV footage. Now we’re praying for our friend’s recovery and for wisdom and enough evidence for the police.

And then yesterday morning the Vicar reports that our school was broken into AGAIN this weekend. This time they got into the office, although we’re not sure if anything was taken this time. Our site manager was talking about getting CCTV cameras in after last week’s break-in. Alas, I don’t think he’d managed to install them before the weekend.

I wonder if January, when people are feeling the pinch after splurging money at Christmas, is a peak time for crime? There certainly seems to be a wave of it here in the parish just now. Mind you, there was plenty of crime before Christmas too – typing our postcode into police.uk makes for depressing reading. In November there were 5 burglaries within about 200yds of our front door. Perhaps this is contributing to the rising numbers we’ve been seeing at church of late – seeing wickedness so close up can make you wonder about who’s in charge of the world and long for God’s justice.

• A break-in at our church school. The third in the last fortnight. They failed to get the data projector they tried to wrench off the wall. They did take the Queen’s mp3 pink player that she’d left there so her class could listen to the Creation Song from The King, the Snake and the Promise for their topic on space and the universe. We know she shouldn’t have left it in school, and she’s not that upset, thankfully. We’re seeing it as a lesson in not leaving things behind and are praying that the burglars actually listen to the Christian music (and sermons accidentally uploaded) that comprise most of her content. Apparently the Police think that lots of thieves are after data projectors to sell to pubs and clubs before the Olympics. Another local school had a few of theirs stolen over the holidays plus a load of vandalism to deal with.
• A mum on the way home from school told me how she’d watched the Police remove a load of cannabis plants from a house just up the road that had been raided and found to be growing weed. Another local cannabis factory scuppered, but I expect another will pop up very soon, given the local availability of the growing kit.

I wonder what I’ll hear about today? Never a dull moment on our patch…

• Apparently January is sadly the most popular month for people to file for divorce. Faithfulness Matters are campaigning against companies who seek to make money from breaking up relationships, specifically websites encouraging married people to have affairs.
• Make Modesty Wraps Law started after Mike Beecham found his local Co-op displaying Lads Mags where his kids could easily see them. This is a subject close to my heart after my success with getting my local Asda to move explicit magazines away from kids’ level view. There have been indications that the government is planning something like this, but it is definitely worth writing to MPs and others to encourage action.

I make this using Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference chipolatas. I’d recommend using good quality ones as cheap ones can come out rather spongey. And you only need to use a single packet to feed a family and can get that for about £2 if there’s an offer on.

The Vicar's dinner

Ingredients

• 1-2 onions, finely sliced
• Pack of sausages
• 2 cups (500ml) lentilles vertes or green lentils
• Bay leaves, mixed herbs
• Red wine (about a glassful) and stock
• Optional – tin of tomatoes, chunked carrots

Brown the sausages in your casserole dish and then remove them to a plate or bowl whilst you pop in a little oil or butter and the onions. Leave the onions to get nice and soft then return the sausages, chopped up into bite sized chunks, to the pan. Tonight I chopped the sausages with a spatula before I removed them and fried the onions, otherwise you can slice them with a knife once removed – I recommend pinning them to the chopping board with a fork rather than fingers (I speak from experience of burnt fingers and escaping sausages).

To the onions and sausages add the lentils, bay leaves and herbs and wine and stock (I use hot water and vegetable stock powder). This evening’s casserole also included a tin of chopped tomatoes. The liquid needs to be added to a generous level above the lentils and sausages – say 5cm/2″ in your pan. This gives space for the lentils to swell and liquid to evaporate.

 Bring to the boil and then simmer for at least 1/2hr on the hob, or pop in a slow oven at about 140ºC (Gas Mark 1) for a couple of hours or more. The slow cooking method has the advantage of keeping the Vicarage kitchen warm, so this is obviously my preferred option.

I tend to check the casserole every hour or so if it’s in the oven, just to make sure that there is still enough liquid. If you’re adding carrots it’s best to do so about half an hour before the end of the cooking time, otherwise they can get a bit soggy. Add salt and pepper to taste before serving and add a little extra liquid if needed to ensure a bit of sauce to soak into the essential accompaniment of mash.

As you can see, I served the casserole with mashed sweet and normal potatoes, and some braised red cabbage. This is a great winter warmer and excellent value for money. We had leftovers that will do well with a bit of chunky bread for lunches whilst the kids are at shcool.

What we do, of course, is go Geocaching. Which is using our satnav to go hunting for small pieces of plastic treasure (generally cracker gifts) hidden in small boxes in all sorts of locations. There are over 1.6 million geocaches worldwide and 13,062 in the UK on the day I checked. We visited the Clent Hills in Worcestershire where 32 caches have been hidden by enthusiasts. Some of the ones we found were hidden by Girl Guide troops. All you do is join the website (for free), log the GPS location of the caches in your satnav (there are also plenty of apps for mobile devices) and off you go.

Once you find your cache, you exchange a small item you have brought for one in the box, write your name in the log and rehide the box. We found four geocaches yesterday and managed to get the kids on a decent walk round the beautiful landscape and blow away some Christmas cobwebs.

Enthusiastic kids (honestly!) examining a geocache

Other than with our family and friends, the Vicar has also run geocaching sessions with the youth group at church and on our summer camp for 11-14s. As long as they don’t have to walk *too* far, the teens have loved it. It also seems to be popular with other clergy friends, if my Facebook feed is anything to go by. Free entertainment and a way to get the kids out and active, what’s not to like?

No daleks allowed in the Vicarage

But we’re not worshipping him.

Wish my Vicar could rap like this!