In Norton, with her boys at school, Mum could throw herself into the life of the parish and fully support Dad's ministry. She ran the Mother's Union and started a Young Wives group and did lots of visiting.
After a year or two she also began teaching part-time at St Andrews, a private girls school in neighbouring Malton. Mum always loved teaching and was involved with this school for 21 years until the owner closed it in 1985. She became a very respected Senior Mistress and is still in touch with several colleagues and pupils.
Always keen to learn in the 1970s she got O-levels in both Greek and German.
It was during this period that Mum and Dad were honoured with an invitation to attend one of the Garden Parties at Buckingham Palace. It rained and all the guests had to run into the Palace! In London they stayed at Lambeth Palace, the London residence of the Archbishop of Canterbury.
Mum's second-hand caravan gave us many
summer holidays and became well-travelled, e.g. to
Wales, Scotland, Ireland.
Our big country vicarage in Norton, built in 1904, was a far cry from our rented semi in York. There were 6 bedrooms on the first floor! (But only one bathroom!) It was more like a mansion for a rector with independent means than a family on a meagre C of E vicar's stipend. In winter the only warm room was the kitchen, with its labour-intensive Aga oven.
The gardens were generous and, not content with keeping chickens for eggs, Mum had the idea of breeding rabbits, which she sold to the local butcher. And once she had duck eggs which were looked after by a broody hen. But only one reached duck adulthood...