Well....that was a long coffee break.

So much has happened in the last few months - I've retired - great but the run up was very hard work and tiring. I had to not only get all my work up to date, some of it a year ahead as exam work had to be prepared ready to go to the examiners next May/June, but I also had to train my replacement. Not easy as both he and I still had our teaching timetables so eventually had to spend a lot of time leaving copious notes and instructions on the computer.
Had a wonderful retirement party, lots of gifts and some lovely things said. Followed this by taking my teaching assistants out for a meal which was a nice finish to the term.
So forty years after I first stepped into a classroom as a teacher I said goodbye to my pupils and school. Quite emotional as you might imagine.

Next thing of note - had a brilliant week in New York with my daughter - my big retirement treat. Flew business class - what a treat- and stayed at The London NYC, very swish, had a suite and on our last night had a meal in Gordon Ramsay's Restaurant which is in the hotel. Excellent dining experience, staff were wonderful and I could spend the next three pages describing the food - enough to say that I could happily return as often as possible- but only if I wasn't picking up the bill. Did all the tourist things including a dinner cruise up and down the Hudson river which was great as we had wonderful night-time views of the city.

Finally - today was my induction day at Teesside University. I am starting an Honours degree in History next week, part-time, so that I still have time for me and hopefully my mojo will return. Have loads of crafty goodies I have gathered in the last few months which haven't seen light of day - including stamps and Copic Sketch markers which I bought while in New York.

So I hope I now manage to call in and add to my blog on a regular basis, preferably with some cards and scrapbook pages to show you and have time to call in on the forum and on member's blogs.