January...

I have realised that keeping up with my blog is not one of my strong points. I feel, however, that this is because I'm so busy with life and

other things, so that's OK.

I have been in Watford for three months now - unbelievable! It has very much become one of my homes and I love my work, friends and life here so much.

Going back to Lörrach for Christmas was lovely, if stressful at times. The snow decided

to mess up my travel plans, resulting in many a cancelled flight for the Hunkler girls and myself, meaning Jess and I had a few

unexpected extra days in England with my relatives. However nice it was to spend that time together, we definitely could have done without it! We made it home just in time, arriving very late on the 24th. I had just over a week at home, which I spent enjoying every second I had with my family and friends. Being back with them, having been away, reminded me so much more again as to how

ridiculously much God has blessed me with them. I have such an absolutely amazing family who I miss so much being away from and friends who I wouldn't want to have to live without.

Settling back to life in Watford was harder than I expected, mainly due to the lack of a routine and structure, but God taught me so much during that first week being back. After normality was restored, everything felt a lot easier. It's been a busy month, but lots of fun.

Just last weekend was insanely busy, but oh so worth it! We had our monthly live music event for the youth, 'Live at the Barn', on the Friday night with hundreds of young people packing out the warehouse, making it an great night.

Then Saturday night. Every month we put on the Soul Survivor Saturday Celebrations at our church here and last time in November over 1000 people came. We had to send many of them

out of the main venue to the next door warehouse, the overflow venue, because there were too many peopl

e in the main venue. This obviously was not ideal, so this month we put on two, one at 5pm and one at 8pm. It was an amazing night with over 1600 people attending and God showing up in massive ways. Tim Hughes gave the talk and it was the first time I had heard him speak and I was definitely very impressed. The whole even

ing was a huge success, a total team effort and is obviously growing, so once again the problem is what to do next time so it can be expanded...

Andy has been away in New Zealand for three weeks, so we have had teaching by Ali Martin on communication. This included looking into the reason for preaching, how to prepare a talk, content tips and what to look out for when actually delivering the talk. Th conclusion of this has been each of us giving a 10 minute talk and being critiqued on it afterwards. I did mine yesterday and I loved it and it seemed to go really well.

My placement on the youth team is going really well with lots to do; an after-school club, leading a cell group for years 12 & 13, mentoring, youth social events, an all night lock-in, girls nights as well as meetings and admin...

God has been doing so much in me in the last few months. My prayer was for Him to destroy, rebuild and renew me, and that He has...I have been discovering new gifts, been challenged and am being changed.

Looking into February, the pace is not about to slow down: next week I'm off to the University of Plymouth for their mission week with Andy and two of the CTL guys, we have February's Live at the Barn, we're taking the Youth on a retreat to Devon, we're helping at the Naturally Supernatural Conference...lots and lots to do but so much to look forward to! I can't wait!

I feel so amazingly blessed to be here and sometimes I think I take for granted the great opportunity I have here a little bit. It really hit me when there were people on Saturday night who had travelled from all over the country to Watford just for one of the celebrations. Someone said to me they wished they could just stay and live here and didn't have to go home and I just thought that's what I get to do! It's so cool!

I have gained a second family and get to do what I love in an awesome church!

I'm loving life and I hope you are too!

With love

xxx