LIGHTING up a life this Christmas and a ‘Festival of Firs’ in the Bodmin Street Methodist Church added to this year’s festivities in Holsworthy, writes Christine Williams and Zoë Uglow.

Bodmin St Methodist Church recently staged its fourth Christmas tree festival and was beautifully arrayed with 27 Christmas trees, cleverly decorated by churches, schools, organisations and businesses in the town.

The town council tree was decorated with a photo of the mayor and the faces of councillors beaming from baubles. Liz Squire’s tree was covered in spiders’ webs to depict the Eastern European folk tale of the legend of the Christmas spider. The laundrette’s tree had socks hung out to dry, a tree by ‘Reflections’ was hung with scissors and hairdressing implements and around the foot of the Holsworthy Library tree were several Christmas books.

There were 40 golden baubles hanging on Kelvin Isaac’s tree to represent the number of years he had worked for J E Stacey.

Apart from the trees there were wall hangings depicting the nativity by Shirley Barribal and the late Wendy Withall and under the title ‘Lest We Forget’ North Devon Hospice’s dress entirely made of red poppies, which was the winning window decoration for this year’s carnival.

This year the North Devon Hospice also donated a tree and held a ‘Light up a Life’ service. The Light up a Life tree, given by North Devon Hospice and Children’s Hospice South West, was switched on during a carol service on Saturday, December 10.

Light Up a Life enables people to make a donation in memory of someone. Anyone wishing to remember a loved one who has passed away can attend one of the many services that the North Devon Hospice hold across North Devon, and light a candle in their honour.

At the beginning of the service everyone was given a candle, which was lit and not extinguished until the service was over. The Rev Martin Keenan led the service and gave a short talk in keeping with the theme.

There were readings by representatives of each hospice and organist Martyn Squire accompanied the carols.

During the service, in memory of the lives of family members, friends and loved ones, the congregation were invited to place a card on a ‘Tree of Memory’, which will remain there until the tree is taken down. After the service there were mince pies and tea and coffee for everyone,

A spokesperson for the hospice said: “It’s a lovely way of helping people remember loved ones and making us realise that we’re not alone in missing someone at this time of year.”

Mary Barfett, the organiser of the festival, said: “We held our first Christmas tree festival in 2010 when we were celebrating the chapel’s centenary. It was so successful that we have repeated it every two years and invited local organisations to join us and transform the church for Christmas.”