A park and picnic – it’s all about balance!
On the hottest day this year (so far), the team enjoyed the Hour Hands quarterly meeting in Rothamsted Park. Natalie was in charge of hosting and kindly put together a pretty rigorous fitness regime, classed as “team bonding” (ha!)
Natalie enjoys all things fitness and teaches boxing outside of work so she thought it would be a great idea to put the team through their paces and give them a taster!
The session started with learning specific boxing techniques – stance & guard, lead hand jab, back hand cross, uppercuts, hooks! We also learnt how to defend ourselves with rolls. Natalie took great pleasure in bopping us on the head with pool noodles if we didn’t duck low enough!
We learnt a combination using gloves and padding before having lots of fun with team games, “heads, shoulders, knees and toes” being one of them! (don’t ask!)
Punctuated with many giggles, laughs and groans, we really had a fantastic time being together outside in the park. Exercise, as we know, is hugely beneficial and boxing is a really good way to focus, be disciplined and channel energy, as well as building trust with your partner. One wrong move and you know about it! It took the whole team out of their comfort zone and everyone experienced first hand what Natalie teaches in schools and her boxing club.
Natalie finished the session with good old ‘Tug of War’ – Bookkeepers vs the PA’s! Wow, who knew the Hour Hands team was that competitive? Who do you think won? Well, all I can see is that it was pretty neck & neck to start with but as we all know the typical traits of Bookkeepers shone through and at the last minute totally took the PA’s down! (We are persistent, determined and like a dog with a bone! Explained the bookkeepers!)
After all of this, we needed a rest and Heather kindly sourced an amazing picnic. Sitting on picnic blankets in the sun, listening to a company update and catching up with each other. It was the perfect end to the day, especially as
our fantastic in-house baker extraordinaire, Sarah, baked fresh scones that morning (as you do!) and we rewarded our hard work with heapings of jam & cream!
