A somewhat challenging day!

I received a shock this morning when the bank texted me to say that Mum and Dad's account had gone overdrawn. I had cancelled the care home direct debit and told the manager of the home, but as the care home had changed ownership, the new direct debit wasn't cancelled. I hadn't seen it when I went into the direct debits on the account so I had to use the app to stop the payment. It was a nasty shock and something I really didn't need this morning! If I'd paid it, we would never have got that money back and Mum and Dad are now at the stage where their savings are protected and the council will have to step in.

It set the tone for the day, and Sheila informed me as I walked in that she had a job for me, and I could go off the phones for "half a day." The job was very complicated and involved putting on new sessions, taking off existing classes and activities and moving some around to different areas. One of our centres is having a whole new programme of activities for our 50-plus members, and at the other end of the scale, our youngest littlies are able to enjoy sessions of soft play two mornings a week.

I helped answer the phones for the first half hour and then turned my attention to the new activities. I also had to use our "contracts" page to block off areas for setting up and down (to stop people booking courts for badminton), something I don't do every day so I had to concentrate very hard! There was no way I could have answered calls at the same time! Over the day I managed to get everything on until the end of the summer holidays so we can have a bit of a breather! I went back onto the phones for the last fifteen minutes, annoyed to see that Shirley was deliberately not answering the phone, as she did last week just before the shift ended!

I sped off at 2pm and did some more cleaning and hoovering, and then prepared all the food. Keith went to the pub, Sophie came home and had a shower, and by 6.30pm the house was looking lovely, with lots of candles lit and music playing. Sue arrived as we were putting the finishing touches to the food and came armed with a huge chocolate cake and some non-alcoholic Gin. Her mother-in-law is very ill at the moment so she didn't want to drink a lot.

Michelle arrived, we cracked open the Champagne that Sue had very kindly given me earlier in the week, and had a good catch-up! Keith returned home and devoured half a chicken we'd put in the oven for him, and then he helped himself to some cheese and biscuits.

At about 10pm, just as it was getting dark, our little hedgehog appeared and stuffed his (her?) face at the bowl of food we'd put out. We also saw bats wheeling about and I felt very lucky we have such lovely wildlife visit the garden!