Where the hell have I been?

"Unleashed" by Mr Littlehand - CC Licenced

For the past few months I have been offline – not really on twitter, facebook, linkedin – or attending events, contributing to crowd sourced resources, commenting on blog posts, … For those of you who know me, you’ll know that this is quite odd behaviour.

This sabbatical is coming to an end – and before my work life starts again (slowly) I thought I’d explain why I have been so quiet:

1 – Moving on from my last role! Starting up a company as exciting and creative, and engaging with communities of practice as I did for the past 2 and half years has been a 200% commitment. SO, … having a chance to chill after that, and renew my creative juices has been much needed.

2 – Death of my iPhone 3GS – I was gonna wait for the new iphone (5) but as the date of it’s release pushed further into the distance – I gave up and have been happy not having the whole world (and emails and the twitter stream) competing for my attention – with my kids and other aspects of my life

3 – New Extension on our house – Anyone who  has been through the experience of builders being in their home will know what I mean when I say that the past 6 months have been hell. The builder turned out to be a cowboy (depsite recommendations, and being an FMB member, etc) and I have spent the past 2 months unpicking the mess he made. This has meant getting my hands dirty and learning a few things – but mostly it has been crap. The good news is that we now have the house back (mostly) – and we are on the case with the builder to get him to make amends (oh yes!).

4 – Spending time with my kids.  This has been the best aspect of this time ‘out’ – as I have formed a much deeper relationship with my kids, and been able to see aspects of their characters that I rarely (if ever) had the time and patience to find out about when I was working full time.

5 –Trying to help at the local primary school. This has been deeply frustrating and wonderful at the same time. The school (like many others across the country) has loads of great features and some wonderful teachers. However, having seen the inspirational progress that many schools and classrooms have taken across the country to enhance learning and engagement with the local community they work in, I have started to make steps to bring some of that movement here, in Oxford (but more on that soon).

So – … that is what I have been up to. It might not sound much, and my plans of a sabattical with whole days of creativity and blog posting, going to events and developing resources, … even just lounging around the house, playing computer games, etc… have gone right out of the window.

As I sit in our new extension, with a new kitchen behind me, looking into the garden that I have partially re-shaped and re-planted, surrounded by kids art work and projects we played and created together, and the sun shining…. I am feeling pretty bloody happy and ready to re-enter the world.

Watch out.    Here I come!