During the Gillingham Festival in 2008 another "Families' Weekend" was held at St. Mary's.

A 2 year old's viewpoint:

Mummy, Daddy and I went to St Mary’s Church on Saturday 19th July. It was a special day because they were doing teddy parachute jumps from the church tower. It was nice and sunny, so the teddies would not get wet or cold.

I took Spencer Bear with me so he could go on a parachute.

When we got to church I took Spencer Bear to the parachutes and he had one put on. He was too little for a harness, so they put clips on his ears so that he would fit on the parachute. I don’t think it hurt him much. Spencer Bear went high up to the top of the church tower. When he was at the top he was let go and he came down very fast. I ran over to see if he had hurt himself, but he hadn’t, so I gave him a big hug. He was very brave and I liked watching him fly down on his parachute. He was given a certificate for being so brave. I went inside the church to get Spencer Bear’s name written on the certificate by Daphne.

Inside the church there were lots of things to do.

Grandma was reading stories in the Story Corner, so I went over to see her and she read me a story, which I liked very much. After Grandma had read me a story I went to see what all the different craft activities were. There were lots of things to make, but I chose to decorate a teddy. I put glitter all over the teddy and stuck lots of little pompoms and stickers on her. I also used the crayons to put some different colours on her. She looked very pretty. We went outside again and some children were playing ‘splat the rat’ but I was too small to have a go at that.

I had a lovely time and my favourite bit was when Spencer Bear went on the parachute. I took him to the Family Service the next day so I could show him where he had jumped from.

Thanks

To put on an event such as this requires many willing hands and we would like to express our thanks to all those members of St Mary’s who made it possible. We thank those who co-ordinated each aspect of the weekend and all those who rallied to their call; the Rector for his unfailing support and encouragement and not least for his willingness to have wet sponges thrown at him; and finally to all those who joined in the fun with us, who made spiders and teddy bears at the activity tables, listened to a story in the story corner, took part in the competition, enjoyed the refreshments on offer (all of which had been made and donated by St Mary’s members), played games on the lawn and worshipped outside with us on a lovely, if somewhat windy, Sunday morning.

Helping the Sudan

The Families Weekend was not intended to raise money but due to the generosity of people in donating refreshments and not asking for expenses it did! It was decided to give the surplus of £218.50 to help with educational needs in Lui in the Sudan that Bishop Dolli told us about.