My long Easter weekend started a day before the weekend, actually.
It was fun but exhausting. That’s probably what I’d say about the majority of the fun times in my life. Because I’m rarely one for planning just one event to keep me entertained. I always seem to believe I can do more in a day than the average Joanne Bloggs. (See what I did there?)
Anyway, Thursday included a few hours of tutoring in the morning followed by a speedy spa stop at Beauty Tonic in Chorlton. I would highly recommend it! They fit in myself and JT despite us only booking that morning and their treatments were relaxing and professional. I selected a facial – because my face is breaking out like a temperamental teen’s – and JT enjoyed a much-needed massage.
The rest of Thursday was filled with food and chatter – for a late-lunchtime cake and coffee (soy hot cocoa for me) with JT to finish the relaxed early afternoon spa break, followed by an Indian for dinner with Amina (who I haven’t seen since September 2016) at Scene Indian Street Kitchen in Spinningfields, Manchester. DE-LISH-USSSS! (That’s ‘delicious’ for those who may tell me off for the spelling error.)
What I ordered:
Starter – Chicken Samosas (authentic pastry); Chicken Wings – they came with a chic pea curried sauce, which was divine. I added the chic pea sauce to the madras main.
Main – Pilau rice; Lamb Madras; Garlic Naan
As if tutoring, spa, cake, Indian, and socialising wasn’t enough, we ended our night with a movie I’ve been desperate to watch for the longest time upon the recommendation of almost everybody I know who has watched it – Logan. Must-watch. Tear-jerker in parts, slow and fast-paced (not sure how that works, but it does), lots of action and gore, unexpected scenes throughout. Overall, the hype is real!
Friday featured much the same busy social action, but this time with family – buffet dinner at Peachy Keens in the Printworks, Manchester, followed by…oh wait, I’m out of order – the buffet was on the Saturday evening for my sister and cousin’s joint 21st birthday celebration.
In between Thursday’s busyness and Saturday’s family food festivities, Friday was spent just outside York on a residential retreat with Audacious Church Young Adults faction – about one hundred and fifty of us housed at the beautifully magnificent Queen Ethelburga’s School (the pictures do not do it justice). Two words: Culture and connection.
Culture because I love to march along the York walls singing ‘The Grand Old Duke of York’, and to take in the history of The Shambles, York Minster and the city itself; and connection because I deepened old relationships and engaged in brand new ones. Connection did not just happen on a horizontal level between me and others, but I also reinvigorated my vertical relationship with God. It was great to connect with like-minded, Spirit-filled, on-fire-for-God Christians; to love and pray and praise together.
And to end my weekend in the House of God at Audacious Church on the Sunday, in near-matching skirty outfits with my best girls was a double-bonus.
The long Easter weekend did not disappoint! I even managed to read and complete a few books. Reviews are coming soon, but if you can’t wait, I read ‘Driven by Eternity’ by John Bevere and ‘The Four Loves’ by C.S. Lewis – both Christian Literature, fitting for the Easter weekend. All-in-all, restorative, relaxing, and required!
How about your Easter weekend…What did you get up to?
