Day 816 & Day 817

Another couple of days together...

Day 816...Monday

The day started with an early morning walk of 2.3 miles in 48 minutes and whilst it was a tad grey it didn't stop us enjoying our new normal.

The morning was spent catching up on a few jobs around the house until lunchtime. It was around this time that I received a text message from preschool letting me know that they'd had the dreaded Ofsted call! This meant that tomorrow would be inspection day and they wanted to know if I could be available.

Being part of the early years education sector means that all settings are inspected by Ofsted every few years. We'd been waiting for our next inspection ever since we moved into our new premises over 2 years ago, so whilst it didn't come as a surprise it still left everyone feeling nervous and anxious.

We have a fantastic team at preschool who all do an amazing job with passion and care but as soon as inspection gets mentioned everyone tends to self doubt themselves. This is only natural as the thought of someone who you don't know watching every thing you do and firing random questions at you can be enough to cause even the most confident of people to falter.

I then received another text asking if I could pop down in the afternoon to just go over a few things. So I jumped in the car and spent just under a couple of hours with them to reassure and answer questions to help get them ready for tomorrow.

Back home and Simon and I could resume our plans which was to run a couple of errands, one of which involved a trip to Lidl - whoop! By the time we arrived home it was quite late in the afternoon and so we decided to get a little exercise in. Simon jumped on the exercise bike while I concentrated on my body-weight exercises.

And with that Monday was done.

Day 817...Tuesday

So rather than getting out for a walk today I was up and out early to go into work to assist, where I could, with their Ofsted inspection.

I spent the morning with the team and my time was mainly spent interacting with the children which is something that I haven't done for quite a long time now. The inspector was lovely and spent lots of time talking to the staff and observing various activities. But around 12.30pm I had to make my excuses to leave. I spoke briefly with the inspector in case there was anything she needed me for, or any questions she had for me in my new role of committee chairperson, but all was good.

I needed to get home to play taxi service for Simon as he had an appointment at the fracture clinic at Derby hospital. So after a quick bite to eat for lunch we headed off to the wonders of Derby hospital. I had to kick Simon out of the car as the queues for the car parks were so long. It took me almost 25 minutes to get into a car park and get parked up. I then had the fun pastime of waiting for Simon in a rather warm car while writing this blog.

It was when I received messages from Simon telling me that a lady he was sat next to had been there an hour and forty minutes that I began to be a tad concerned as to how long we would be there for. Think we'd been spoilt by the efficiency of our local walk-in centre last week who'd been able to assess, x-ray and cast Simon's wrist in about 40 minutes straight!

Well after I'd been sat in the car waiting for about and an hour and a half I decided to go for a wander, stretch my legs and get out of the rather warm car. I managed to find a bench that was in partial shade and with a little breeze that was way more comfortable than sitting cooped up in the car. I messaged Simon to see how things were progressing and ten minutes later my phone was lighting up with a ton of messages from him, and just as I was about to reply Simon appeared at my side. It would appear that being in the depths of the hospital meant that the messages he'd sent hadn't physically been sent until he'd moved away from the fracture clinic and consequently they'd all arrived in my inbox at once!

Simon is now sporting a very smart looking, slimmer and less awkward cast in black! The consultant was happy with how the break was looking and it is now a case of keeping it in cast for about 4 weeks and hope that when he goes back all will be healed.

By the time we arrived home I'd received an update on the proceedings at pre-school. We will know the result in a few weeks time but until then it's a waiting game.

As Simon had missed a few hours of work this afternoon he spent a little time catching up this evening before we finally settled down with a cuppa to watch some TV.

See you tomorrow.
xx