Team Changes

This year has proved to be a year of staff movements at Café Forever! We have operated on and off for several years with different team leaders, Tom Carpenter looked after us for  8 years, then Jason, Sammy, and in between we have not had leaders which has sometimes proved challenging. We are  quite an enthusiastic and passionate bunch and so it might not be that easy to find someone who wants to take that role. In March this year Gareth Jones, who used to run City Gateway has taken a role with us as team leader - brave! But he has already proved to be very considerate, likeable, passionate and fun, we are very glad to have his input.

In April Sarah who worked at Café Forever for 6 years handed in her notice, she was going to pursue her art career, and giving us 2 months notice we had some time to recruit a replacement. There were a surprising number of really good applications and we ended up selecting Justyna to replace her. It's always a challenge filling someones position, we tend to have a basic set of qualities that we are looking for in someone, but not necessarily a specific set of skills although we do have some requirements; working  with computers and an aptitude in the kitchen. Sarah had a passion for baking cakes and they were a huge draw-card for people, now we have to discover what is the secret passion or talent of Justyna!

Move over Sarah!

As soon as we had Justyna in place, Duncan handed in his notice too - he moved to Ireland with his family and they are all doing well if a little wetter in Cork than they were in London! With school holidays approaching and not a lot of time we had to make a plan fast, fortunately God has provided, long before we were even worrying about this, in fact 14 years before! Stevie, who used to visit the cafe daily when her mum (Jo) was working here as a schoolchild has returned to the Café as an adult and been working as a volunteer, showing great enthusiasm and appreciation for the work, so it was quite a simple process to get her to sign up for a temporary placement, we are hoping that at the end of 2 months with us she will apply for a full time place. Now Stevie, she has that cake makers love! She is often in the kitchen trying out a new recipe, in fact as I write she is doing her first baked cheesecake!

In all these changes we have prayed, hoped, and held on. Please keep us in your prayers, a new team needs time to bond. A huge part of this work is actually starting with ourselves - we need to be filled in order to prove fulfilling - this means dealing with our pasts, our own challenges, our weaknesses. We appreciate your joining in these prayers.