Sunday ringing for a very full church with the bells half muffled. One muffle did disgrace itself and come loose but after adjustment we continued. Thanks to Steve for finding time to put them on.

Very busy practice night with the two new learners no longer being our newest. Sean and Jack are now competent ringers of rounds and Sean can now ring down in peal too. Further new learners are now progressing fast as both tackled ringing both strokes together with some confidence. Despite ringing lots of rounds and some call changes, It was very profitable evening and its been a long time since we have had nine local ringers in the tower. If you fancy joining our growing band of learners do come along and join us.

Our learners Sean and Jack both passed a learning milestone this evening as they managed to ring a bell on their own in basic rounds. Their handling is good and they are quite competent on their own. It is good to get some new fresh ringers who will soon be able to swell our numbers on a Sunday morning.

We welcomed a number of Coleshill ringers tonight to welcome Rev Becky Stephens, as their loss is our parish's gain. We rang several times covering some very good rounds and call changes as well as a few courses of Plain Bob Doubles. It was lovely to have a choice of ringers. The service was well attended with a lot of visitors including the Bishop of Aston. During the service the new Rector has to ring a bell and the number of times it rings is reputed to be the number of years that she plans to stay. So watch this space in eleven years time.....

Rang for a wedding today which finally gave us a daylight chance to adjust our new ropes. Particularly the heavy bells were getting rather ridiculous in the height of the sally and the long tails. Opportunity whilst the bells were up to measure how much to move the ropes around and then once down these were reset. The result was a few nice neat ropes now fixed around the wheels all of which are now looking much tidier.

We rang all six bells to welcome the close to 100 tired walkers back at the end of todays Rogation walk. 

Rang for the joint parish Sunday service today which was taken by the Bishop of Aston, the Rt Revd Anne Hollinghurst. Nice to be able ring all six for a special service such as this.

Finally an event which some of our number thought they would not live to see. Tonight all six new ropes have been fitted to the bells. With the third rope being broken beyond repair and no spare tail end available we have splashed out and fitted new ropes to all the bells. This is the fourth set of completely new ropes to be fitted to the bells since they were hung at Nether Whitacre in 1976. However these ropes have had the longest lead in time being bought when the rope makers were offering any length up to 80ft for £80. So we have plenty of spare top end wrapped at the moment about the wheel spokes. We now just have to let the ropes settle in but we hope they are not too springy after such a long time being hung up, treated and stretched.

Sunday morning nearly ground to a halt when the tail end on the third rope started to fray. Much to the relief of the ringers this was taped up and the rope lasted till the end of the ringing without issue. Does this mean that our new ropes will finally be fitted after over 15 years of "stretching" in the tower.