First Week Back

Finally I am not ill anymore!  I'd had a virus for the entire 2 weeks that we were back in England.  Monday was my last day of not feeling well, so I seem to be over it now.  Thank goodness.  It's exhausting being ill for that long!

This week I was back in school for the summer program.  It was a nice relaxing way to get back into the school routine, although I wasn't very happy about it on Monday morning I must admit!  I was doing the program with two teachers from Early years who are lovely.  I took the year 3-5s and they had the Reception to year 2s.  My lot were doing the academic program for the week, so we did some Maths and English in the mornings (all with the theme of Spy Week).  In the afternoons, it was so warm, we bought two huge paddling pools and just let the kids play all afternoon.  On Friday, we went down the road for bowling, which was fun.  At the end of the week one of the Mums gave us each a box of biscuits to say thank you for the week - very sweet, and not usual for our school's parents at all, who are more likely to pick up their kids without saying one word to you!

Anyway, I have no photos from the summer school, so here are some photos from the last two weeks that didn't make it onto the blog yet.  The first ones are from my trip to Buckingham Palace with Louise, and the rest are of the cute pooch Lola in the garden.

We've had a nice quiet weekend, trying to stay cool in the 36-38 degree heat (which feels like it is doubled in our roof flat - I can't be away from the fan for more than 2 minutes).  We went to the harbour in Duisburg on Saturday for dinner and some lovely cocktails.  We ran into a couple of friends there, who ended up joining us for a few more cocktails, and it turned out to be a lovely evening.  We've just started watching a new series, House of Cards, set in Washington DC.  It's amazing!  We've spent most of Sunday watching that!

Back to work tomorrow.  I have a day of cupboard sorting to look forward to, then a first aid course on Tuesday.  We have an open day for parents and kids to meet their new teachers on Wednesday, then the kids are back in on Thursday and Friday.  Should be quite a nice week.