Twice a month · Marston Moretaine
Messy Mornings
Breakfast, craft, prayer, and a Bible story you can hold in your hands — for grown-ups and their under-12s, together. And bi-monthly, its bigger seasonal cousin: Messy Church.
What it is
A morning that doesn’t mind the mess
Twice a month on a Saturday we open up the Pavilion, put breakfast on the table, get the playdough and the craft out, and tell a story together.
It is built for grown-ups and their under-12s in the same room. Not children dropped off while the adults wait in the car — parents, grandparents, carers and children making the same mess at the same table.
About an hour, give or take. Come late, leave early, bring the baby, bring a neighbour. Nobody is watching the clock and nobody minds the noise.
Can we come?
Almost certainly, yes
The honest answers to the questions parents actually ask us.
Children up to about 12, with a grown-up. Parents, grandparents, childminders, carers — whoever brings them.
You don’t need to be religious. Plenty who come aren’t, and nobody will put you on the spot.
You don’t need to book. Turn up on the morning. Breakfast is included.
Babies and toddlers too. Younger brothers and sisters are part of it, not a problem to solve.
If sitting still is hard, that’s fine. The story is built to be joined in more than one way — see below.
Everyone working with children is DBS-checked and safeguarding-trained.
The part we’re proudest of
A story you can touch
Most children’s work asks children to sit down and listen. A sensory story does something else entirely.
Every line of the story has a sensation attached to it — something to hold, smell, hear or do. The story arrives through hands and skin as much as ears.
Which means a child who cannot yet read, cannot sit still, or cannot speak isn’t watching a story happen to other people. They are inside it. So is the grown-up beside them.
Here is one we have told — Jesus calming the storm
The script we work from has a line of Albanian pencilled into the margin.
Shared with Tek Ura, AlbaniaSensory storytelling isn’t only ours. Our partners at Tek Ura in Albania tell Bible stories the same way with disabled children and adults, many of whom will never read the text for themselves — and the two sets of notes have started travelling in both directions. It is one of the most pioneering things we do, and it began with a simple question: who is being left out of the story, and what would it take to let them in?
Bi-monthly · seasonal
Messy Church
Bigger, louder, and deliberately tied to the seasons.
Messy Church runs bi-monthly on a Saturday afternoon at the Forest End site of the school: craft everywhere, games, a Bible story and food round a table, for all ages at once. It usually draws around forty people.
We keep it seasonal on purpose. It marks the turning points of the year rather than becoming one more thing in an already full diary — so when it comes, it feels like an occasion.
“There are families in Marston finding community through Messy Church who would not find it anywhere else. And community, over time, is the soil in which faith grows.”
Letters on Mission in MarstonLend a hand
Could you help?
Both of these run on ordinary people giving a couple of hours. There is almost certainly a job that fits you:
- Breakfast — get the toast, fruit and tea out for a roomful of families.
- Craft — set a table up, then sit at it and help small hands.
- Sensory kit — gather the bits for the story: the fan, the water, the soft things.
- Welcome — stand at the door and make sure nobody walks in feeling like a stranger.
You don’t need to come to church, and you don’t need to commit to every one. Email annie@valecommunitychurch.com and we’ll find something that fits.
Finding us
Two mornings, two buildings
They are not in the same place — worth a glance before you set off.
Messy Mornings
Marston Pavilion, Bedford Road, MK43 0LD
Bedford Road, Marston Moretaine
MK43 0LD
Get directions →Messy Church
Forest End site, Marston Moreteyne VC School
Great Linns, Marston Moretaine
MK43 0DD
Get directions →Not sure which one is on this week? Email annie@valecommunitychurch.com and she’ll tell you.
Come along
Bring them as they are
Unbrushed hair, wellies, a toddler who will not sit down. That is exactly the crowd we built this for.