In June, Monday 10th to Sunday 16th, the Exeter churches will be running Joyfest, a week-long initiative to practice spreading joy across the city. The idea is that thousands of small acts of kindness and joy will have a big impact on the city and reflect something of God’s love for the city and the people that live here.

About this time five years ago we arrived in Exeter. I remember it being a strange time. We didn’t know anyone and we had virtually no responsibilities. The weather was great, the London olympics were on and we enjoyed exploring Devon. We had no idea how the whole ‘church planting’ thing was going to work out, but we were excited.

As a big part of challenging how we live our lives, we’ve been thinking about Lent. What is it? What’s it’s purpose? Do I really need to give up chocolate?

Chris and I are living in a lovely area called St Thomas. It is over the river from the main town centre and I have been asked a few times ‘why did you choose to live over the river?’ It appears that the river is a natural divider of Exeter and living over the river is not so desirable.

It’s hard to believe but after years of dreaming and planning we have finally landed in Exeter.

With amazing help from great friends we loaded up the van and hit the road. After a scary trip in a death trap van we arrived safely in Exeter and moved into our new home. The house is really beautiful, we feel so blessed to have such a great place to live and in a really good location.