Fiona Holliday is our Finance Manager, and has been working from home in Hertfordshire throughout lockdown. Read her blog:

Since lockdown started I have been working my normal hours but working from home.  It has been very strange not catching the train in the mornings but just opening my study door.  I normally swim each morning before work at the Ironmonger Row baths and I miss that but I am trying to keep fit and like most of the nation I am following Joe Wickes or other workouts on You Tube in the mornings.  My weekly Pilates class, usually in the St Luke’s Studio on a Tuesday with the lovely Paula now takes place over Zoom in my living room.

Working from home is strange, my husband, daughter and I work on our computers in different rooms.  I miss my amazing colleagues but we keep in touch by, phone, e-mail, Teams and Zoom.  It is brilliant that the wonders of modern technology make it possible for us to see each other as we speak.  One of the advantages of working from home is that in the lovely weather we have been able to make use of our ‘garden office’.  Another joy is watching, from my desk, the birds that come to our bird table and bird bath, we have lots of blue, coal and great tits as well as very friendly robins, chaffinches and a nuthatch.  We’ve been delighted to see a greater spotted woodpecker enjoying the nuts and this morning I had the treat of a pair of goldfinches sampling the seeds from some flower heads.

I am very fortunate to live in Hertfordshire so when not working my husband and I have been able to explore the many footpaths round our home.  We have so enjoyed the spring and early summer, watching the succession of spring flowers, the trees budding, flowering and coming into leaf and the crops changing.  On one walk we were covered in yellow pollen as the rapeseed flowers grew to over head height. 

As well as working, walking, gardening, zoom calls to family, friends and church members, jigsaw puzzles and baking, my lockdown project was to make birthday bunting for my family.  So far I have made three Happy Birthday bunting and six name bunting. For me there has not been time to be bored!  But it is hard not seeing my family and I can’t wait to give my other two daughters and grandchildren a big hug, and to spend face to face time with my friends.

I am very proud to be a part of St Luke’s and from my desk here to assist the fantastic work my colleagues are doing supporting families and some of the most vulnerable in our community.