After a year in the planning, Wendy's 'madcap' idea of holding a 'Pink Summer Ball' was pulled off in magnificent style.

It was held at the Calcot Hotel and the room was fantastic, so much work had gone into it by Wendy , Lesley and Sara.

140 people all there for one cause.... to raise money for Breast Cancer Care.

The food was lovely, drink flowed and all the women looked lovely and the men scrubbed up well too!

On arriving at the hotel we booked in and I was given a lovely bouquet of flowers from Wendy, Sara and Lesley...they are so thoughtful and kind.

I had my make up done by Amy and Katy, it looked fab and so professional. Jon looked fab in his DJ too..

When I got to our table there was an envelope at my place setting....a lovely card with lovely words from my best friend...made me very emotional..

Wendy got up to do a 'thank you' speech and again said some lovely words which made me all teary again...

The dancing started and the band were great...Rock 'n' roll, disco after and lots more to drink!!

I had such a wonderful time with wonderful people.

The evening ended at 2am when Jon and I finally gave in and staggered back to our room!!

I'm extremely lucky to have such lovely family and friends....

Love Clare xx

That's it.....

Went in to work today to do things officially...

My employment has been terminated after 3yrs of being off 'sick'.

I had 4 options to chose from and really it was a no brainer (well I thought it was anyway):-

1. No work no pay but keep pension and benefits
2. Go back to work
3. Be dismissed on grounds of being incapable of doing the job
4. be dismissed on ill health grounds and take ill health early retirement- subject to the application being approved by the Pension Trustees

It's all signed and has been sent off and I was officially retired from 1 May 2009.

Without the help of my 1st line and 2nd line managers I doubt it would have ever been sorted out. They have been 'on the case' since last June!! as they knew that it needed to be sorted by the end of April this year...only 3mths late but it was worth the wait...(it was all very complicated due to a Company takeover last April)

Now I am free to enjoy Jack (and of course Jono) without the worry of work hanging over my head.

So thanks to Spencer and Clive for sticking up for me and ensuring I was treated fairly and getting a result that I am extremely happy with.

Love Clare xx

Finally been given the go ahead to take ill health early retirement...

Spoke to the Pru who need to send me new pension quotes and then said it would take 10 working days...are there really that many people retiring from the Pru that it takes 10 days to get a quote out??? - I don't think so as most of the now work for Capita....silly woman even asked if I was still wanting quotes under ill health retirement...Felt like saying "no I've made a miraculous recovery from an illness that your Trustees deemed bad enough to grant me ill health retirement"

At this rate I'll either be an OAP or dead before it's all sorted out!!

Have to go in to see my manager next week so hoping we have some figures to work on by then.

love Clare xx

Had a lovely time in Spain....

Jack really enjoyed his first plane trip, so much so he fell asleep about 5mins after take off!!

Arrived at Malaga, greeted by the car hire rep and taken to the car...all quick and painless...sat nav programmed and off we went...

Ihr 20mins later we were sat outside a bar with Paul and Janys having a beer or two!!

On to their house and to unpack.

The changes they've made to the house are really great, new bathroom in the upstairs house, new kitchen in the downstairs house and lots of different bits and pieces to make it really Spanish and homel...oh and of course Sky for British television!!

Had a very lazy week really, a couple of trips to the beach, a visit to Gibraltar to get cheap(ish) booze and a lovely afternoon spent at Janys and Paul's friends enjoying their jacuzzi, pool and proper Spanish paella.

My diet wasn't really scuppered as I had a mouth full of ulcers for most of the week so couldn't eat or drink as much as I would have liked - think I only put on about 3lbs.

Jack was good all week and only had one meltdown moment on the last day (possibly due to too many late nights and the heat).

Back home now and back to normality...

Looking forward to Oasis next Saturday and 'The Pink Ball' the Saturday after....

Love Clare xx