You may have thought I had written my last letter in the September edition but these really are my final words as Vicar in the Preston Newsletter. I will no longer be around in the parish in October but I am pleased to be able to write to you just one more time.

We had a really good time at Holiday Club again this summer.  Almost thirty children participated with nine adults and seven teenagers in support.  There is some beautiful art-work displayed at All Saints’ Do visit if you can.

The words ‘last’ and ‘final’ are cropping up a lot this month: my last visits to school, my final services at Lime Tree House and Sue Ryder-Stagenhoe; my last Harvest Festival, Auction and Supper, the last baby to be baptised here.  All these events are and will be enjoyable and it’s emotional too as I recall all the other such happy occasions here in St Paul’s Walden and Preston.

On the weekend of 29/30 September there will be a joint service at All Saints’ at 11am. And on the Saturday I am honoured to be leading a memorial service for a previous Vicar.  Tim Lewis Lloyd left in 1978 and continued to serve in this diocese until 2001 when he retired as Vicar of Sawbridgeworth. Tim’s wife Frances died before he retired and her ashes are interred at All Saints’. It will be good to welcome Tim’s family here for the service after which his ashes will be interred with Frances’s. Do join us.

I will always remember with great joy the time I have spent in the parish and all of you too. I have made a great number of friends here. We are to remain living in Letchworth and I’m sure I will continue to come across you in the area especially in Hitchin where I do most of my shopping.

And I assure you all of my continuing prayers and good wishes

Elizabeth