Annual leave, Ofsted and a birthday

I've been on annual leave for most of the week......did end up going in on tuesday because Ofsted are doing an inspection and my manager rang to tell me on tuesday morning that they are looking at one of my cases.....a quick dash to the office to check my case notes were fully up-to-date was undertaken.  Wednesday was lovely weather so I sat and stitched and read in the garden in the morning then daughter number two and I went for a drive to Knowle and sat outside the pub enjoying the weather and eating a leisurely lunch - it feels like we are having summer in March.  Yesterday was my birthday and it meant a trip into the city centre as I was in our team focus group to see the ofsted inspectors, rather than struggle to find somewhere to park I got the bus in and had forgotten the ease of letting someone else do the driving: I'd do it everyday if it didn't take five times longer than me driving to work!

Today I went for lunch with both daughters and youngest grandchild (the other was at nursery).  The girls surprised me with a lovely sunny bunch of flowers which was very thoughtful of them. 

I'm off for a cut and colour tomorrow at the hairdressers as the grey roots are definitely showing.  Before I know it monday morning will have rolled around and I'll be back to work......oh well only ten weeks to my next lot of annual leave and a 'Take That' concert!

First day of annual leave and I decided I need to make comfort food so cottage pie it is!

exotic cakes

Had a couple of bananas and a mango in the fruit bowl that needed using up so added them and some sultanas and coconut to my usual sponge cake recipe and hey presto the result three exoctic fruit cakes.

The paint is still wet!

Went along to the' Handmade Market' this morning had a wander around and spotted these.  I'm not usually known for buying paintings but as these are some of my favourite flowers and I love the colours I just had to buy them.  Luckily the artist accepted my offer for the two together and as I had walked to the market, had to carefully carry to still wet paintings home!  I've got to decide where to hang them now

Work in Progress

Busy week thankfully the weekend is here!

Well that was a busy week but at least the weekend starts here.  Went to the theatre on Monday night, a local small am-drama theatre The Talisman, 'Ladies Night' (the production) made me chuckle so was worth the trip. Tuesday night was a trip to the leisure centre after work, 30 lengths of the pool, the steam room and spa pool did the trick of getting rid of the stresses of the day.  Wednesday night I went along to a local craft group 'sewmakebelieve' where I got a chance to do some work on my teddy cross stitch, the members seemed friendly and I shall definitely go again.  Thursday night I had planned to start a meditation group but was just a wee bit shattered, I will try and get along to meditation next thursday. I've managed to give away most of my copies of 'Northern Lights' from World Book Night which is great.  After a busy week at work; the knowledge that my bank balance is rapidly depleting and the thought of all the boring stuff (housework) that I need to do, I wasn't looking forward to the weekend that much but as tonight's news is full of the earthquake and tsunami in Japan I'm determined to be thankful for all the good things in my life.  I shall tackle the housework tomorrow morning I can then spend the afternoon sewing, knitting, reading, baking or generally doing whatever takes my fancy.  There is a craft market in a local church hall during the day tomorrow so I may walk along there just to have a look and get some ideas for craft projects.  I'm having my beautiful granddaughter on Sunday so have a feeling we may be making pink playdough!  My manager has asked me to bake her a cake for Monday which means I shall be baking on Sunday, I think I may do iced chocolate loaf sponges.  It's hubby's birthday on Monday so I shall bake a birthday cake too.  Sunday night is acoustic night at the pub so I think an evening of live music and real ale may turn out to be a good way to round off the weekend before the mayhem of social work starts again on Monday.