Galilee Centre Arnproir and the National Guild conference April 21 to 25 2010

Well I survived my first Guild conference! I had been hearing about the annual conference for years so finally decided to go. St. George's chapel CFB Petawawa was the host Guild. Doris Graves our Guild President was attending her 19th conference so she held my hand through the process. Paul Graves drove us down from Petawawa with a full truck load of goody bags, a camp fire, several cases of bottled water and juice plus our own suitcases. We stopped at the Timmies in Arnprior for lunch. We arrived at proximately 2 pm to spend the next couple of hours delivering goody bags, room names labels and water to 30 plus women form across Canada.
The noise level increased as groups arrived from Ottawa, Gagetown, Greenwood, Shearwater, Edmonton, Winnipeg, Trenton, Bagotville, Kingston. The evening Meet and Greet was also part of our host duties so several members of our Guild drove down from Petawawa for the evening.

Connections through the ages

It was windy in Pembroke today. My new walking friends had planned to meet at Cafe Ole then walk along the river front. However we decided to find shelter from the wind by walking through town. We walked up one of the cross streets in downtown Pembroke-Moffat and kept on walking to the end. Moffat starts off downtown in the commercial area then crosses close to a couple of churches and winds its way along the Indian River. It is a peninsula on both sides of the river- an oasis of older homes hidden away from the downtown traffic. I had heard via some mutual friends that Suzanne Nadon and Rick Metcalfe, a United church minister couple, had purchased some land at the end of the street and were planning on building their retirement home, insulated with strawbales. Well the rumour was correct as we found them hard at work. One of my walking friends actually knew Suzanne many years ago so they caught up and we had a tour of their property as we climbed over the tree roots and admired the country in the city!

Showcase 2010

Petawawa Grannies had a booth at Showcase, our annual home show in Petawawa. We focused on selling Pashminas, Cashmere Shawls, Grandmothers' Necklace, Traditions, Kids say the cutest things! and tote bags. We also promoted the house concert at Jean Ostrom's home on Sunday May 30th at 7:30 pm. Jean has invited St.Barnabas Church Music team to perform a concert to benefit the Stephen Lewis Foundation. It will be a fun event at her bed and breakfast at 928 Rantz Road Petawawa.
The Showcase is an idea place to network! I met people whom I had not seen in years and was teased by Bob MacKenzie, known as Scouter Bob or Santa Claus.

East er Weekend 2010

Where were you? was a common question as Bruce and I played hooky Easter weekend and went to Ottawa for the first time on Easter weekend. We stayed overnight at Jocelyn's house in Glouchester. Friday evening we took Jocelyn to the Met Bible church for her practice then went for a quick supper to a nearby restaurant. We returned easily in time for her 6 pm concert on "The Power of Grace". WE were impressed by the number of musicians that contributed. AS we are from mainline churches we only knew two of the hymns! Amazing Grace -with chains we knew part of .
AS we drove back to Jocelyn's place she phoned some friends of ours, the Grahams who invited us to drop by. We enjoyed a quick visit with Wendy and Jim Graham and a late snack of 1-1 pizza!
Saturday was spent touring Westboro, trying out the driving range in Orleans and making a family dinner for Jocelyn and her two room mates from Mexico and Egypt. We had some interesting discussions around the supper table. WE ended the day by watching the latest Harry Potter movie.
On Sunday we drove to the church for the early 9 am service. It was packed in the sanctuary and they had to ad chairs in the open area! Again- only knew a few hymns but were impressed by the number of out reach programmes in the church. I looked up the book that Pastor Rick Reed quoted: The Resurrection of the Son of God" by NT Wright and found out it was written by an Anglican bishop of Durham!
The church reminded me of the one Jocelyn went to in Red Deer, "Living Stones" and also the large modern Mennonite ones in Steinbach.

In the increasingly secular world it is encouraging to see the number of people who attend the service. However I still prefer singing some of the old favourite Easter hymns such as Jesus Christ is risen to day!

WE drove to another friends for lunch. Ada and Bill Hallett live in New Edinburgh, on Springfield road, near the Indian Embassy on one corner and a Second cup on another. WE had a lively discussion about different types of religious denominations. The Halletts attend an Anglo Catholic church in Ottawa: St. Barnabas, in the centre of the city, near the old Met Bible church building. Bill said the church has a good choir that may win a major competiton. He enjoys the incense and old fashioned service. Their church is also growing. They have members who drive in from Shawville.

We completed our weekend in Ottawa by driving Jocelyn back to her church for another choir practice then driving home to Petawawa. During the weekend we also visited an aunt who was in the St. Vincent centre for rehabilitation. It seems we touched on the extremes in present day Christianity: a very conservative church, a very modern church and also connected with people who compromise and go to a combined Anglican/United church. So there is room for all points of view within our family as we try to be tolerate and open to different ideas.