The clocks have gone back, it's Sunday night, that means only one thing in our house.......hide & seek in the dark!

This has kind of turned into a routine tradition over the last few years, that through the winter months we play hide & seek in the dark.

When we first did it a few years ago the kids were all a lot younger and it was really good fun, and as parents, you know, you humour them and allow them to continue with these little games.  The kids are now 16, 14, 11 & 7 and it is on the 7 year olds insistence that we play, she counts down the weeks to the clock change, and now everyone is doing a little humouring.......although it still is fun!

Now ordinarily our house would be a death-trap if you tried to walk around in it with the lights out, but herein lies the beauty, if you want to play, you have to have picked everything up! And they do, they really do, so once a week our house gets a good pick-up done, all that remains now is for me to give it a clean through on a Monday.  We'll see.

The counter is chosen by whoever needs the loo first. We count in the bathroom and usually play within an hour of having our Sunday roast.........

With it being dark, you don't have to be too imaginative with your hiding, so I can choose my favourite spot, laid out on the sofa, and still be joining in.

Usually the only thing to give away our hiding places is our inability to contain our bodily noises, I know what you're thinking, but I'm talking about the odd cough or sneeze of course.

Anyway although some of us groan a little at what has become a 'tradition' and we all make out we're really only playing along for the little one, it is one of those things that the kids will talk about when they're older to their kids, it's a memory maker, of course it's not our only memory maker, but it's probably one of the more routine ones.

Any family bonding habits within your household?

Church At The Beach

When I was a child, Sunday was Sunday.  You missed 'Church' (it was called 'the meeting') for no reason whatsoever.

Sunday’s followed the same routine in our house week in, week out, perhaps not that unusual to other households, but to me it felt like we were very different and unusual.

There were no day-trips on a Sunday, no party acceptances on a Sunday, no loud shrieking and playing outside on a Sunday, no t.v. on a Sunday.....you get the idea.

Occasionally on a Sunday afternoon my Dad would take us out for a drive, we lived in a beautiful area of the countryside and I did enjoy those rides out and about “there and back again to see how far it was”. I loved taking in the greenery all around me that stretched out as far as the eye could see, and the higher we climbed as we drove, the more majestic the view. I took in the shapes of the trees as their silhouettes grew higher towards the sun.  The clouds that could make any object you could imagine from a dinosaur to a footballer. The hedgerows as they separated the blankets of bright greens and yellows.

What I appreciate now, but did not in any way realise or appreciate then, was that I was surveying God’s creation, this environment I adored was made for me, by the God that I also felt very annoyed with at being significant enough in our family, for me to be dragged to the meetings to on a very regular basis.

So.......last Sunday and this Sunday we didn't get up and go to Church, no, we took advantage of the glorious weather (and by that I mean it wasn't raining) you have to when you live in England, and we headed off for an hours drive to the beach.

Do I feel guilty?  No.  Am I less of a Christian?  No.  Should I have said to the kids, "I know today's the only day we have free, but you know we have to go to Church on Sunday?"  No.

God created this beautiful world, and I personally never feel closer to Him than when I am outdoors. Genesis 1:9,10 And God said, Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear. And it was so. God called the dry ground land, and the gathered waters he called seas. And God saw that it was good.

Also I spent good needed quality time with my husband and kids, and whether they liked it or not, I pointed out God's goodness that was surrounding us to them!

Matthew 18:20 "For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them.”

What have you 'missed' Church for lately?