Reflections Blog

It is 9 lessons and carols at 18:30 this Sunday 21st December at St Ippolyts. Do come along and join us, there will be mulled wine and mince pies afterwards.

After our Friday Toddlers' service was over the group retired to Victoria William's home where Santa found the time out of his very busy schedule to make a surprise visit to give out a few early Christmas presents.

Wednesday 16th December

11:00 (St Ippolyts) The Revd Adrian Hinksman 

Sunday 20th December

08:00 (St Ippolyts) The Revd Melanie Crowley

09:30 (St Ippolyts) The Rt Revd Dr Stephen Veneer

11:00 (Little Wymondley) The Revd Austin Smith

18:30 (St Ippolyts) Howell Davies 

The parish profile has now been added to our web site and can be found in 'about'

Friday 11th December was Mrs Andrew's final day cleaning St Ippolyts Church. Jean started when she was 20 years old in 1950 and has been cleaning the church every week since then. Everyone is used to seeing her twice every week sweeping, dusting and polishing. Her cleaning is often congratulated in the church visitors book. Churchwarden, Michael Hooper, joined her for her last bout of cleaning and presented Mrs Andrews with a bouquet of flowers. She said that she had enjoyed her moments of solitude in the church where her only helper was "The Lord". We are all going to miss her cheery greeting on a Monday and Friday morning and her stories of things that have happened in the church over the years. Mrs Andrews felt it was the right time to retire as Cyril now needed looking after more as he approached his 95th birthday. The PCC and the Friends will both be making presentations to her over the next few weeks to show their appreciation for all her wonderful work. 

Judging from all the compliments we had from visitors it seems that our annual Crib Festival was another success. Visitors said how they enjoyed the variety of cribs from over 22 different countries. In all there were over 120 different cribs on display. The "Choose the name of the sheep" was won with the name STELLA. Congratulations to the winner of the excellent hand crafted crib, perhaps we will see it on display next year. 

A big thank you to all the helpers that gave up their time to be stewards, serve tea and cakes, move boards, man the door, sell quiz sheets, sweep up afterwards, make cribs, bake cakes, etc etc. The event was a financial success with £925 being raise for church funds and as some of this was gift aided the amount wil be even more.

If you missed the event this year make sure you keep a look out for our Crib Festival 2016.

The crib festival has been a roaring success with a steady stream of visitors all day Saturday. It is not too late to see the wonderful display of cribs we are open from 11:00 to 17:00 on  Sunday 6th December. Have a look at our gallery for photographs of the Nativity Crib Festival.

As there are no services in St Ippolyts church this weekend there is a MESSY CHURCH in the parish Hall . Do come along to this fun event especially for children!

A reminder that there are no services in St Ippolyts Church on Sunday 6th December due to the crib festival being set up. - BUT there is a Messy Church at the Parish Halln at 10:00

The Festive season started with a bang today with St Ippolyts Church PCC acting hosts for the annual Community Christmas Lunch in the parish Hall. A splendid lunch of turkey and all the trimmings followed bt Christmas pudding was enjoyed by around 60 people. Michael Hooper, Churchwarden,  thanked the PCC for all their hard work and admitted his task had been to be the official taster

The annual Parish Hall Fair was another great success with the ladies from St Ippolyts Church 'manning' a bottle stall. The children {and parents) seemed to like the sweets, toys etc inside the bottles and jars and as a result the afternoon was an excellent fund raising event for the Church and the Parish Hall. 

We have now received the faculty from the Registrar for the new lighting. Work will start on 4th January 2016

WATCH THIS SPACE  FOR MORE NEWS!!

"Thank you so much, all of you, who came down to Cranbrook for my institution and installation service. I am well and truly the Vicar of Cranbrook. It was lovely to have so many friends from all different places of my training and ministry and it was a truly wonderful service.

Thank you to Roger Cox especially for organising the coach and for hos words whe n he commended me to Bishop trevor.

My love to you all

Reverand Ann"

Barbara Thomas is interviewed in the December issue of "Hertfordshire Life" St Ippolyts Church Annual Crib Festival and explains all about our wonderful festival. 

The article in entitled '5 Minutes with Barbara Thomas, organiser of one of Herts' quirkiest Christmas events!

Well done Barbara, but quirky?

Come along on 5th or 6th December and see our 'quirky' festival!!