Bank Holiday, Midwives Day and RCM Conference!

May started as a pretty busy, jampacked first half. I had my dad visit to help with some gardening, celebrated IDM, visited my second oldest sister and took a trip to Liverpool for the RCM Conference. 

Click here to watch the video or see below. 

The month started with a little half day visit from my dad. I had some gardening I needed a little help with as I honestly was just really overwhelmed, and wanted to have a base to start from to then be able to continue. We started the day with a delicious brunch at one of my favourite local spots, bringing some cake home for an afternoon snack. 

Whilst I did the weeding, artificial grass vacuuming and blowing at the back, dad did the de-weeding and mowing at the front. After he left, I headed to B+Q to get a replacement for my jet wash that suddenly wasn't working, and I had managed to get a full refund of the old one, plus I unexpectedly bought and planted some plants to brighten up both the front and the back. I have also since spent three days painting the fences We cut down a big bush a couple months back so it's needed a big paint job. 

International Day of the Midwife celebrations happened on Sunday 5th May and I've shared a separate post all about it, which can be seen here. 

After leaving work, I headed to my second oldest sister's house to see her and my niece. My dad also gate crashed the visit and decided to come at the same time, but was only there for a few hours whilst I stayed over. The next day, we headed to the nearby farm. We had brunch at the farm, before having a lovely walk around in the sunshine. We left just in time, before the rain started to pour and then my sister made a mac and cheese type pasta bake, which was delicious. 

The next day, I drove back to Nottingham and headed straight to the hair dressers. My hair is so long and thick, and right now I'm pretty desperate to chop it again, but I would also really like it long for the four weddings I've got coming up this summer, so I'm trying my best to wait. Instead, I got 4 inches cut off, layers added back in and then it thinned by roughly half. I wish I'd have taken a picture of the floor in the salon because it really looked like I should have had no hair left. 

I then got a taxi to the train station, ready for a little trip to Liverpool. I had a small snack of cake and a drink at a cafe near Hannah's flat whilst waiting for her to come back from work, and then we headed out for a lovely meal at maybe my new favourite restaurant, Rosa's Thai Cafe! It was beautiful. 

The main reason I went to Liverpool was for the RCM Conference which I have shared a separate post about. In the evening I went back to Hannah's flat to pick my bags up. Her partner came to meet us, and then we walked to The Botanist for another yummy meal before saying goodbye and going our separate ways. 

I walked about 20 minutes in the opposite direction and it was lovely to see Liverpool at dusk. I walked past The Tate which is currently closed, but you can still see most of the statues outside, then I met with the Beatles before getting to my hotel. I think I'll share a full review again, but I stayed at The Z Hotel, which is a chain I now regularly use. 

The second day of the RCM Conference started bright and early for me as I had an early Shared Governance meeting at 0700 on MS Teams. It was meant to finish at 0900, but as usual, we over ran and didn't finish till gone 0930, so I ended up packing straight away and then calling at Costa for a late breakfast, early lunch on my way to the conference. It turned out to be a beautiful day but because I hadn't wanted to pack my boots, I ended up looking more dressed for winter. 

I was a little disappointed at how early the conference finished, thinking we'd be able to go to the exhibition and network after the sessions finished, but security made everyone leave the premises very quickly which was a shame. I therefore had a couple of hours to kill before going to my train. I took a last leisurely walk through to the Albert Docks and then went to the hotel to do some work, before getting to the station early and calling at M+S for tea on the train. 

As I'd been away all week, I felt knackered, but I then had 3 night shifts to go to and it made me laugh watching my ring doorbell camera footage, before spending the evening after painting my final coat on the fence panels and mowing my grass for the very first time.