Abi & Izzy - the next 5 years

Izzy's birthday has finally come around - it feel like it takes forever to get here every year. Instead of the big joint disco she was due to have with one of her friends, she had the pleasure of our company.... again. Despite not having a party, and not getting some great big shower of gifts, was incredibly pleased with all she did get and said on more than one occasion "I feel very loved" - that's worth more than any present. It's the 5th weekend of lockdown and we did our best to make it special for her. She came down to balloons and presents, I completely let go and allowed the two of them to eat chocolate birthday cake (purchased from M&S I'm ashamed to say) for breakfast, and we had take away pizza from our local pub for tea. In between we did what we've done every weekend for the last month - walked, played in the garden and made the most of time together as a family - something we are all (well, me and the kids) enjoying immensely. There ...

Someone is definitely loving lockdown It's clear I'm going to have to deviate from how I've been titling these posts as it's likely to become a tad monotonous the way things are going. This week will mark the end of a month in lockdown and I think we are all going a bit stir crazy. Thank goodness the weather has turned back to sunshine as the 2 days of rain we had at the back end of the week were truly miserable for me. It was not so much the fact that I couldn't get out (of course I did), but that the kids morphed straight into fair weather slugs and took to their beds for the entire day, coming to life only when we were thinking about bedtime. I ended up posting on FB about it - I wasn't seeking inspiration as to how to motivate them (other people's ideas on this never seem to go down well), but instead I was looking for some sort of reassurance that even if it weren't for lockdown this might be completely normal for a teenager / pre-teen on a rain...

We are living a surreal existence at the moment. In the outside world, deaths from Coronavirus in the UK alone topped 10,000 today and BoJo has just been released from a week in ICU, apparently in a much worse state than anyone was prepared to let on. Worldwide more than 112,000 people have died and most of Europe (and elsewhere) is experiencing some kind of lockdown. Shops and schools remain closed, there are stories daily about PPE and critical drug shortages, even though we've stood up whole hospitals in less than 10 days. We clap for the NHS every Thursday evening but we have no idea what the exit strategy is, or when it might come. Staying at home is saving lives, but it's hard not to be worrying about how we can balance this with saving livelihoods. This will be the next task and by far the harder one to tackle. So that's the outside world. In our little bubble however, where I've been in the car once in the last 3 weeks (I went to Boots last week and vowed I ...

20 degrees but we can still have a fire! So we come to the end of week 2 of lockdown and its fair to say there have been ups and downs. on the one hand, we've all been hugely grateful for the fact that we are hardly slumming it - with an enormous garden and plenty of open spaces around us that are sparsely used, we have been able to walk Bertie and get out for exercise safe in the knowledge that we will be able to maintain a good 2m+ of distance between us and anyone else we might meet. I've been taking Bertie for a long walk at 6:15am every weekday morning and if we are (un)lucky we might meet 1 or 2 other walkers who have ventured out at that time. Given we walk in pretty big open spaces even then it will usually be someone in the distance. Glenn has been doing his normal long bike rides (no change there of course) and again, we see relatively few people given where we live - lucky us. Unfortunately it seems there are a fair few idiots who have not yet sussed that the o...

Abi doing her history while Izzy relaxes having finished  her lesson early (I think) It's the end of week one of lockdown and we are living in a whole new era. After a weekend of lovely weather and less than acceptable behaviour from a small but significant sector of the population (ignoring the guidance to stay a safe distance away from each other and flocking to national parks and the beach in their droves), BoJo had his Churchill moment and told us in no uncertain terms that we now needed to follow the rules. Until further notice we can only leave the house for essential purposes; work that can't be done from home but can be done at a safe distance, shopping for food or medicines and limited exercise once a day. Pretty much every shop other than supermarkets, pharmacies and essential goods (including DIY which would have been good if our staff were prepared to work) has now been closed, as has everything else. The stock market has experienced another week of freefall...

Bake Off - we are not getting out of this any skinnier! Can it only be 2 weeks since I last wrote the blog? In such a short space of time it seems like the entire world has changed. To date nearly 300 people have died in the UK and over 14,000 worldwide. Almost every country in the world has reported a case and in some countries, Italy and Spain in particular, the death toll has risen incredibly rapidly. We are at war with an invisible enemy and while we frantically wash our hands as our main form of defence, the global economy has dropped through the floor. Markets have been in free fall, companies are reeling from the impact of the pandemic and whole populations are in lockdown. What seemed a bit silly initially now feels very real. For the UK we are in unprecedented times. We know this as Boris Johnson and two of his advisers stand in front of the country every evening at 5pm and tells us so. I can't remember the last time I heard him say "Get Brexit done". I mis...

As the world gets increasing panicked by the threat of Coronavirus, it is beginning to take over my life - at work at least. This week I had the dubious pleasure of being appointed the Group's Crisis Coordinator and so my already packed diary got shunted right as I stood up various working groups,  dusted off continuity plans and realised that we, along with most other organisations, aren't really equipped to deal with a mass shut down if it comes. On the one hand I can see the impact and so (from a professional perspective), we are taking it very seriously. We are trying to remind people to keep things in perspective, while also pointing out that washing your hands regularly is never a bad thing to do. On the other hand, I'm trying not to ask the obvious questions - like why is this so much more scary that normal flu (which kills 100s of thousands of people annually worldwide, Measles, which we have a vaccine for and people still choose not to use it, or obesity, which w...