Most of you know that I am a member of and also on staff at a United Methodist Church. My husband's maternal grandfather was a Methodist pastor. On this trip, we learned lots of things about John Wesley and his family. John Wesley was an Anglican priest. He and his brother, Charles, were members of the Holy Club at Oxford University. They were "methodical" in their approach of Christianity and out of that . . .came United Methodists (methodical - method).
On Friday morning, our buses headed to Epworth to see the home where John Wesley grew up.
I want one of these chairs - I love the shape haha!
John Wesley was very interested in natural medicine. He wrote Primitive Physick: Or an Easy and Natural Method of Curing Most Diseases. The gardens in the back of the house were awesome.
Below are some drawings of the gardens and plants.
Of course, I had to slip through this opening.
I actually bought my first "gift" here. My sister-in-law (married to Mark's twin brother) loves the natural English garden and has a riot of flowering plants. I bought seeds for her to plant (from the Wesley's garden) and a tiny garden sign.
It was a big house with very steep steps.
The three of us have a picture similar to this from our trip to Egypt. We were recreating it! Once again, it is so fun traveling with good friends.
Since both tour buses couldn't descend on the house at one time, we went to the house first while the other group toured the church. We walked from the house down to the church and passed by a statue of J Dub himself.
In the little town, there were bras everywhere. Rather than go "pink" in October for breast cancer . . .they had garlands of real bras. I loved it!
This is the Market Cross in Epworth - another place where John Wesley preached outside.
The Red Lion Coaching Inn was across the street from the Market Cross. John Wesley stayed there. It was closed or we might have stopped for a beverage.
Mark and our friend, Randall. We had such a good time together.
This little lady from the church was adorable. She taught us a few English phrases - natter or nattering is one of my favorites. She said it wasn't gossiping . . . haha! This was the Wesley Memorial Methodist Church (or Epworth Memorial Church).
Both buses were able to join together for a time of communion.
This was our first group photo. Yes . . .that would be our senior pastor on the floor in front of the group.
Old churches are just beautiful.
After communion, we were invited downstairs where the ladies of the church had made lunch for all of us. The tables were decorated with fresh flowers. There were women and men who served us and their hospitality was wonderful.
They served Coronation Chicken sandwiches, Cheese and Tomato (like pimento cheese made with VERY sharp cheddar) sandwiches, an egg mixture (sort of like egg salad . . . but not quite), turkey and cheese or maybe it was ham and cheese (with buttered bread - loved it). I think there were at least one or two more types of sandwiches. They served potato chips alongside. You could have tea or coffee or water. They also served homemade desserts. I didn't eat any, but they looked delicious. This lunch was so much fun.
We had pretty napkins and pretty plates - they thought of everything.
I love this photo of the door. I may use it as one of my mixtiles when I order some from this trip.
For some unknown reason, I thought it would be warmer that day. Well, it was not, and I was freezing. My friend Debbie let me borrow her hat. Isn't it fun?? I was laughing so hard, and another friend snapped a photo and sent the one of me in the compression socks and the one below to our daughter. She said something like . . . "look at your mother."
We then headed to St. Andrew's church in Epworth. When John Wesley was forbidden to preach inside the church, he stood on his father's grave to preach. Two sweet members of the church told us about the history and allowed us to look around.
Brian (senior pastor) brought along a new guitar that is made for traveling. The neck goes down inside and it fits in a custom backpack. We sang a hymn by Charles Wesley.
Membership records are stored in this chest that is hundreds of years old, and it takes two people with separate keys to unlock it!
The baptism font was lovely.
We headed outside where a storm started to roll in.
I love this fall view - an old cemetery with leaves on the ground.
This is the view when looking back down the path toward town.
We beat the rain . . .it may have blown over actually. We went back to our hotel and then walked to a local pub.
I ordered a cider that was on tap, and it was delicious.
People kept coming in and we expanded our circle. Y'all . . .I really love the pub life.
This was such a fun night! We headed back to the hotel for dinner and crashed again! We actually had to pack up first . . .and we couldn't get our shower to work even though it had worked the night before and earlier that day . . .the sweet girl at the front desk came up. It was operator error. I guess we were suffering from a little jet lag (plus we are old haha!).
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