Finally Friday

Day 422...

And finally we have got to Friday. It has felt like a long week I think because we had a short working week the week before.

But it was a full day in work for me and I had plenty to keep me occupied. We decided to have a change around of the room and it seemed to work really well. At first my desk was out of the way and I was missing being part of the room so a little adjustment and I was back in the thick of it.

But I had the usual emails, banking and admin to do. Each Friday we go over the plans for the coming week and I then draft an email out to parents to let them know what's happening, I then make sure this gets posted to our website, our Facebook page and our online learning journal. I had some prep work to complete for a new starter in a few weeks time and then some data input for a 'virtual school' system that we use for a few of our children. It was the first time using this system for me and so it was a matter of learning how to navigate the system and make sure everything was updated as I have a meeting scheduled for next week.

At one point today I even got involved 'on the floor' and found myself hosting a story time with all the children...much to the staff's amusement...I thought I did pretty well as it's not something I get chance to do that often, if at all, anymore!

After getting home I did a little prep work ahead of recording this weeks Disney Dream Girls podcast with my co-host Michelle, and then it was time to do the recording. We managed to not only record this weeks show but also an extra piece for our Patreon supporters.

And that was my Friday and I am now ready to put my feet up and embrace the weekend.

Take care.
xx

Say Goodbye to Lockdown Hair

Day 421...

Today was the day that I got my hair back and said goodbye to my lockdown look!

But that was later in the day. The morning was spent in work and a big chunk of it was spent in a video call with a local speech and language therapist as she helped us with one of our children. I will admit to being a little sceptical with the video call approach but it actually worked really well, and the good thing was the call backed up everything we had been doing so far and pointed us where we need to go next.

I had a quick catch up with banking, admin and emails before heading home at lunchtime via a local supermarket. As Molly is having her 'girls' around on Saturday there were a few 'party nibbles' that needed picking up for the belated birthday celebrations.

Once home and shopping packed away I had time to get changed, grab a quick bite to eat, a couple of coffees and a few more emails responded to before heading off to the hairdressers to get rid of my lockdown locks! So I went from...

to this...

Yay the old me is back and I feel sooo much better for it!

And well after three hours at the hairdressers it was home to cook dinner, write this blog and drink wine!

Take care.
xx

Birthday Celebrations

Day 420...

We have reached the middle of the week and today it has been Molly's birthday and she is no longer a teenager - eek! Yet again Molly has another birthday in 'lockdown' and while this year the lockdown is easing it is still not a proper birthday for her. She is having some friends around at the weekend but they will be outside in the garden as unfortunately the next installment of easing restrictions does not happen until Monday!! So frustrating!!

We had the customary opening of presents and cards this morning before the working day began. I have had a full day in actual work and have been kept busy once again.

Lots of admin, banking, phone calls, emails and a newsletter to issue. Then myself and my deputy got together as we are working our way through a couple of pieces of legislation to make sure that as a pre-school we are doing everything we need to be doing in the best way possible. As an educational establishment we have a curriculum to follow, which will be changing in September, and we are also inspected by our governing body, Ofsted. So as the management team it is our responsibility to review all of our practices on a regular basis to ensure that all that we do is meeting all of the requirements. We also review to ensure that we are as efficient as we can be and that the level of education that we offer is second to none; we are very passionate about ensuring that children attending our pre-school start their education journey in the best way possible.

Not long after I'd arrived home me and Molly had to nip out in search of a parcel that had supposedly been delivered today. On inspecting the tracking information it looks like the parcel has been delivered to the same street name as ours but in the wrong village...this is something that has happened before so we decided to investigate. Unfortunately no-one was home when we called but with a little investigation work I have worked out that the person who lives there is actually related to a friend of mines husband (small world or what!). So I am now in the process of enlisting my friends help to ascertain if the parcel has in fact been delivered there in error!

Home again and I had a couple of work emails to deal with, a little research for pre-school and some time looking for some specific photos ahead of another birthday tomorrow!! And then as it's Molly's birthday we decided to celebrate with an Indian take-away for dinner, so no cooking for me tonight! Oh and of course birthday cake that Molly made herself!

And today means it is now just one more sleep until I get my hair cut and coloured...it's been a long wait since the 21st December and I am so looking forward to a complete refresh.

Take care,
xx

Day 419 - Busy Tuesday

Day 419...

Well it's been another busy day.

My morning was spent in work and there was plenty to do. The usual banking, admin and emails to deal with. Invoices to chase. Uniform to organise. There was a long email sent to Jon at Asda to see if he could help us with a few bits. Now the email was prompted after I'd bumped into Jon yesterday but I think he may regret it when he sees the long list of things he could help us with!! I also had some prep work to complete for Father's Day at the request of my staff. Now it isn't until next month so I presumed we were being super organised but it then transpired that the we'd added Father's Day to this months planning by mistake - oops! Oh well no harm done we will just be ahead of ourselves next month.

I then dashed home at lunchtime so that I could be ready for an online leaders and managers meeting via 'Teams'.An hour and a half later and I think I had come away with just two pieces of information that were of any use. But while I was 'attending' the meeting I could at least click on all the links we were provided with to ensure that I'd already got them bookmarked, which I had! I was also able to deal with a couple of emails as they came in.

Once the meeting was over me and Molls popped to see my dad, to check-in with him and make sure he was doing okay and he also had a birthday card for Molls as it's her birthday tomorrow. When we arrived back home Molls set about assembling and decorating the cake that she had baked this morning, a three tier cake that she has made for her birthday - bless her!

While she sorted the cake I jumped back online to deal with a few more emails for work as well as add to a newsletter I am currently drafting. I wanted to add an extra piece and needed to link in to an existing document. But when I found the document I wanted I realised it was actually out of date, this then meant having to source the newer version and amend it to reflect our pre-school. A worthwhile exercise just not one I was expecting to do.

And then with a clear kitchen and Molls & Simon down our 'gym' I decided to attack the ironing pile; I've got a lot of things happening over the week and knew that today was the best, and probably only, day to get it done. 

So we have reached the end of the day; lots of work stuff done, meeting attended, dad visited, Molls has sorted her birthday cake, documents updated, ironing done and dinner cooked...now where's that glass of wine! Phew!

Take care whatever you are doing.
xx

Day 418

Day 418...

Well we have had another productive day. 

Monday is our non-working day of the working week and it started with the usual collection of our grocery shop. While we were collecting the shopping we bumped into one of the store colleagues, Jon, who we know through pre-school.  It was lovely to catch-up with him and he offered his help to pre-school once again.

Once home, and with all the shopping packed away, we then had a parcel to drop off at the post office and a car full of rubbish to take to our local recycling centre. This was all the rubbish left over from the fitting of the floors last week...enough to fill the car!

And then the rest of the day was spent with a little more organising of Simon's workspace as well as going through our DVD and Blu-ray collection. There were a number of films that we had on both DVD and Blu-ray, we even had two copies of the same format of one film and quite a few that we just haven't watched in forever and have no intention of watching any time soon. So we were quite ruthless and went through everything throwing some straight out and keeping others to sell on Ebay.

We even discovered some old VHS tapes, there were a few Disney ones, quite a number of Prince videos as well as some tapes of stuff that we had recorded from the television decades ago! Suffice to say it was a combination of bin for some of them and Ebay pile for the others.

Although at one point we did get rather confused when we couldn't find the Disney Blu-rays we thought we had and then Molly remembered that they were still in the garage in a storage basket - oops!

But by the end of the day we had them all sorted, and put back into the cupboards from which they came. And just in time to play taxi service for Molly as she had her kickboxing class tonight.

Oh and yes our government have given us the go ahead to hug people as from next Monday but we must do it carefully...for goodness sake we had four deaths in the whole of the UK today from Covid I think the time for hugging people is now! We had more deaths in the UK from cancer, heart and stroke conditions and more deaths from suicide alone than Covid today...really don't get it anymore!

But take care and I'll see you tomorrow.
xx

Day 417

Day 417...

After a very busy day yesterday we took things a little slower this morning and enjoyed a lazy start to the day.

The main focus of today was to get Simon's workspace back up and operational ready for work on Tuesday. So although we had managed to get his desk and chair into his workspace he now needed to get everything else back up there and more importantly connected, plugged in and working.

The space he has is up in the rafters and so he has to contend with slopped ceilings and only a couple of double electrical sockets. He has an awful lot of kit that needs to be connected and it is a mammoth, and complicated, job. But he is using this opportunity to make sure he only has what he actually needs and streamlining where he can. This is the ethos that we are taking as we 'put back' our rooms, to take a moment to reflect and ask; Do we need it? Why are we holding on to it? Is it useful anymore? Does it serve a purpose? Do we even like it still?

While Simon battled with technology I spent an hour or so online with my podcast co-host Michelle as we recorded this weeks Disney Dream Girls show. Ordinarily we would have recorded a show by now but what with all the work happening here this week, and Michelle just having moved house, today was the first opportunity we had had. 

We did take a little time out late this afternoon for a short walk; a quick 1.9 miles in about 38 minutes. And we were back in time for our weekly Disney quiz via Zoom...I say weekly but it has been a couple of weeks since we last hooked up so it was nice to see what are now very familiar faces, and this week I won! This does mean that I now get the honour of setting the questions for the next quiz which will have to be in a few weeks time as next week it is Simon's birthday and the week after we are away for the weekend...staying in an actual hotel...for the first time since March last year, which is just ridiculous.

So as we start to see restrictions being eased I spot a cousin on Instagram post her wedding photos...a scaled down affair because of the restrictions still in place, with a comment that they will celebrate with family later in the year...so sad! And then we have the promise from our government that we will be allowed to hug people from different households in a weeks time but that we have to do so 'carefully'...unbelievable we are now being told by our government how to hug each other...I am a grown woman I will hug who I want, when I want and how I want, I don't need politicians telling me how!

And with that I have a martini, a husband to hug and time to chill.

Take care.
xx
 

Soggy Saturday

Day 416...

Well today has been rather busy and rather wet!

We started the day with rebuilding our bed...we had assembled it last night but had realised that one side was lower than the other. Well, it was good enough to sleep on last night but it did mean that this morning we had to take it all apart again and re-assemble it!

It was then a wet car drive to take Molly to her Saturday morning guitar lesson. While she strummed out we hit the coffee drive thru', the very slow coffee drive thru'...it must have taken half an hour just to get a couple of coffees. Although to be fair we had nowhere else to go and it wasn't like we could have sat inside the coffee shop as we are still not allowed to 'dine' inside!!

And then the rest of the day has been taken up with trying to get our living room and Simon's work space back to normal, and as I type we still have work to do. The biggest challenge was getting Simon's work desk back into his work space which is actually on a mezzanine type floor with a very narrow staircase. The desk was a self-assembly piece of furniture that was assembled in place many years ago. We had managed to get it down in one piece by lowering it down but we were not sure that we would be able to manage the same in reverse. But with the combined strength of me, Simon and Molly and a little ingenuity from Simon we managed what I had thought was a lost cause. I'd even suggested to Simon earlier in the week that we might have to buy a new self-assembly desk because I thought there was no way we would manage to get it back into the space. But I am so glad I was proven wrong.

Once Simon's desk was were it was needed we then focused on getting everything else back into the house from the garage where it had been stored these last few days and then deciding whether we actually wanted them back in the living room and if so where. We have also had the job of placing soft pads under all the furniture so that it doesn't mark the new wood flooring.

We are taking the opportunity of having an empty room to refill it with a fresh pair of eyes. When we revamped our bedroom last year we took the chance to 'Kondo' the room and our clothes and so we are taking the same approach with our living room; do we need it? Do we still like it? Is it serving a purpose? It is quite fulfilling to re-examine what you have always had and make those decisions that perhaps ordinarily you would not make or would put off making.

So it is almost nine o'clock on a Saturday night as I write this and Simon is busy sorting the speakers for the audio system so I better go and help!

Take care out there, see you tomorrow.
xx