A Lot Can Happen in Nine Months…

No, not that, well yes that, but not for me obviously! I’m now a ‘glam-ma’ for the second time! My daughter, Sophie and her partner, Reece are now proud parents of a baby boy born two and a half weeks ago a momentous occasion which was swiftly followed four days later by my seventieth birthday. But before I go into detail on both of those epic events, I owe you a quick catch-up on the past nine months. Buckle-up, it promises to be quite a ride!

Shortly after my last blog, we returned to the beautiful island of Skiathos a mere 30’ish years since we were first there. It was a similar time of year, so the end of the summer season and less crowded than the peak summer months. We stayed in the same place as before, but in the larger of the two villas even though it was only the two of us. Karavotsakisma House is still owned and run by Gail Stathakis with her son, Billie and if you are looking for peace and quiet in a gorgeous location within walking distance of the famed Koukanaries Beach (albeit a steep hill to climb on the way back) I can highly recommend it. My primary objective was plenty of R & R and writing for my next book and I’m happy to report that I achieved both.

During our stay in Skiathos there was a one-day offer on Just Like Her Mother which has been one of my bestselling books. How amazing to film a little video to promote the offer with a backdrop looking out towards Skopelos where they filmed some of Mama Mia.

Most days we ate al fresco and a couple of evenings too despite it being October. It was a lovely trip, even considering that I was stung by a jellyfish while swimming in the sea. Who knew such a tiny creature could inflict such pain?!  Both Chris and I are keen to revisit but without a gap of thirty years this time.

We’d only been home for a few days before we were packing again. This time we were heading to South Wales for a short break with our son, his daughter and his dog! I’m not going to lie, we struggled to get everything needed for a self-catering cottage stay for three adults, a two-year-old and a dog in our car as you can see!

The cottage was amazing, the weather not so for most of our stay.

It did however pick up and was warm and sunny on the afternoon we went to nearby Tenby, a place I’ve long wanted to visit and for the lunch stop off at Barry Island, the location for Gavin and Stacey to break the journey on the four-hour drive home. The bonus was getting some more writing done on the day that I stayed at the cottage with the dog while the others went off to Folly Farm.

In December, we were supposed to be heading off again, this time to Barbados but, like our holiday to Meze in September, we had to cancel because I had yet another dreadful chest infection. That prompted me to have some medical checks done just to be on the safe side. All the tests were normal so I guess it could still have been the knock-on effects of losing my mum.

Christmas was a bit tricky as it was the first one without her but the news that our daughter, Sophie was pregnant gave us something happier to focus on. I love the way she broke the news to our granddaughter and our son’s stepchildren with a T shirt announcing, ‘I’m going to be a big cousin.’ We all enjoyed a trip out to the Richmond Theatre over the festive period to see the pantomime, Cinderella which reminded me of taking my children there when they were three and four.

So, we went into 2026 full of hope for a happier year despite the looming first anniversary of my mum’s death. We then had to deal with a devastating drama bringing to a complete standstill work on my latest book which had been going really well. In fact, it was so traumatic that Chris and I booked ourselves a last-minute break to Tenerife, a place that neither of us had previously visited. For once, I didn’t take my laptop with me as I simply wasn’t in the right frame of mind to be creative… or so I thought! I actually ended up plotting a future book.

We stayed at the Barcelo Santiago, an adults only hotel and our room looked out on the dramatic cliffs of Los Gigantes. We were very lucky with the weather as you can see from the blue skies. Weirdly, it was while there that I spotted a woman with a tattoo on her foot of three little ducks. I’ve talked about getting a tattoo for ages, but I wasn’t sure what I wanted… now I know!

It was also while in Tenerife that I sent my QVC presenter manager a WhatsApp message saying that I would like to reduce my working days from the beginning of April. What a great decision. The difference it has made to my work/life balance is incredible, hence the big smile.

Actually, just to back track a moment, I forgot to mention that in January I had my front teeth ‘done’. Again, it’s something I’d been considering for ages as they were wearing down and the surface no longer felt smooth when I ran my tongue over my teeth. I opted for composite veneers where they leave your own teeth and just add slightly to the surface, and I went for my own natural colour rather than bright white. TBH very few people noticed that I’d had anything done unless I pointed it out which is exactly what I wanted. By the way, excuse me holding up the Ultrasun lip protection product – not an advert, just something I personally use, and I didn’t have any other photos of me in Tenerife showing off my new gnashers!

I’ve just realised that much of this blog so far seems to be talking about holidays. Taking seven holidays was one of the suggestions for my seventieth year on my birthday blog last year. I almost made it. In fact, if we hadn’t cancelled Meze and Barbados, we would have exceeded seven: Skye, Devon, Skiathos, Wales, Tenerife and… Antigua.

We went back to Antigua in late March. Again, it was a last-minute decision and was kind of my birthday holiday as we didn’t want to be away in June with Sophie’s baby due. We were originally thinking of heading towards the Indian Ocean, but world events put a stop to that, so we were lucky to be able to get Antigua as lots of our fellow travellers had had their holidays in Dubai and the Indian Ocean cancelled.

We booked the St James Club as we’ve stayed there once before so it was a safe option and at a pretty reasonable price. This time I did take my lap top and would have finished the first draft of my next book had I not been struck down with pink-eye conjunctivitis on the third day of our nine-day holiday! You couldn’t write it… well, maybe I could but it probably wouldn’t be that interesting.

Anyway, despite my eyes being stuck closed on two consecutive mornings, which was scary, a trip to the pharmacy for some antibiotic eye drops did the trick and I managed a pretty impressive 14,000 words. I also got another idea for a book. Actual blue skies, rather than blue sky thinking seem to work wonders for my creativity. And no, that’s not just an excuse for more holidays, although we do have a return family trip to Javea planned for August.

Apart from the excursion to the pharmacy, we stayed on resort for most of the holiday although we did book a taxi for a day of beach-hopping. I loved our first stop at Morris Bay. One end of the beach is a very posh five-star resort, but the other end has no hotel, just the rusting ruins of a hurricane from the 1990s. It was virtually deserted apart from the bee that I somehow managed to stand on! The water was a little rough and with some semi-submerged rocks, so I didn’t risk a swim. I did have my dip in the turquoise waters of the Caribbean further up the coast though.

We both really enjoyed the holiday, and I got back into doing Pilates mat work every morning before breakfast on the balcony of our hotel room with an uninterrupted view of the sea. I was hoping to continue the good habit when we got home, but I must confess I’ve let it slip a bit.

We arrived back very early in the morning on Easter Sunday and had the family round for an Easter egg hunt on Easter Monday. A couple of days later my son and I went to watch Crystal Palace v Fiorentina in the first leg of the quarter finals of the Europa Conference League. It’s the first time we’ve been to Selhurst Park in a couple of seasons and what a game to choose. There wasn’t a spare seat in the stadium and the atmosphere was electric.

We won on the night and in fact went on to raise yet another piece of silverware in the final a few weeks later. I was so carried away watching the match at my son’s house with his family that I made a rather rash promise to take them all to an away game in Europe as we will now be playing in the Europa League after our victory. The only sad thing about that evening was that it was the final game of our most successful manager ever, Oliver Glasner. He has probably done the right thing on a personal level, quitting whilst ahead, but they are very big shoes (or should that be boots) to fill!

On the subject of Crystal Palace, whilst we only have one player selected for the England squad in the World Cup, we have more than a dozen of our players selected for other countries… I feel like a proud mamma!

I forgot to mention that while we were away in Antigua, we were having some work done on our garden. They’d already done an amazing job on our new patio area, which needed doing after the framework under our decking started to rot. We decided to lose a flower bed to give us extra seating space and chose Indian sandstone. We’re both very happy with the way the patio and path turned out, slightly less so with the new lawn. It looks okay from a distance, but we had brown patches within days of getting back from holiday. It is gradually improving with lots of TLC and an application of Richard Jackson’s Lawn feed.

I feel very lucky to be able to sit outside writing when the weather is good. It might not be a sea view, but it helped me finally get the first draft of my next book off to my publisher, Bookouture. Because it was so delayed, I’ve yet to receive the first round of edits from my editor but I’m hoping there won’t be too much to do as my hands are quite full at the moment with family stuff.

Two days after Palace lifted the Europa Conference League trophy it was our granddaughter’s third birthday. I’ve mentioned previously that her parents don’t want me to post pictures of her on social media, a decision I fully respect. She had a lovely lunch party with the family, including traditional chocolate birthday cake of course and was jumping around in the paddling pool when we left.

She’s such a happy and bright little soul, an absolute delight to be around. She had lots of lovely surprises and one not so good. Just like her daddy thirty-seven years previously she contracted chicken pox at some point during her third birthday celebrations as by the time my birthday rolled around less than two weeks later, she was covered in spots. She was apparently lethargic and listless to start with but had bounced back to her usual bright personality by the time we saw her on the Sunday after my birthday when we had a very small celebratory gathering.

Before that though, we had a very busy and exciting time. Our daughter, Sophie’s first baby was due on June 9^th. Due to delays with solicitors, they were completing on their new house on June 5^th but would still have had a few days to settle in. The baby had other ideas. With the removal vans on the driveway, she rang me to say her waters had broken. To cut a long story sideways, she and her partner, Reece went to the hospital while his daughter, Amber son, Taylor and I directed operations at the new house. We got most things put in the right rooms and anything we were unsure of went to a covered area at the bottom of the garden. There were boxes everywhere as you’ll know only too well if you’ve ever moved house.

The following morning, our son, Dan and his partner Danielle, joined me and Chris, Taylor and Amber and Reece’s mum, Lisa in getting the house ready for a new baby. During a break for lunch back at our house, we had a WhatsApp video call from the hospital.

A tired but happy Sophie was cradling her son in her arms. He weighed in at 8lbs 2oz, a very good weight as he was a few days early and we learned his name for the first time. He’s Frederick (Freddie), Reece, Christopher. Frederick was my dad’s middle name, and I’d be lying if I told you I didn’t shed a few tears. For the longest time it seemed so unlikely that they would be able to have a baby but there he was, their little miracle.

We doubled our efforts to get the nursery clear of boxes which were stacked from floor to ceiling and by the time they were allowed home from hospital the following afternoon the house looked like a home. What a joint effort and what a first cuddle with Freddie.

Because Freddie’s due date was so close to my birthday, we’d kept our plans pretty fluid. As it turned out, we were able to enjoy a cream tea style lunch with Sophie, Reece and Freddie, and then a lovely dinner with Dan’s family at a pub near their home as it was a school night for the children. I wasn’t at all embarrassed by the 70^th birthday balloon floating over our table during our meal – not true, I was! They handed me two cards to open, one of which was a their card to me and the other turned out to be part of my birthday present.

The moment I opened the envelope to see a picture of a duck, I knew straightaway that I would be getting a tattoo like the one I’d seen in Tenerife. Funnily enough, as we left the pub there was a mummy duck followed by her ‘babies’ – clearly a sign! There’s no going back now, I just need to book the day.

Chris had organised lots of balloons and little gifts for my actual birthday, but the biggest surprises were saved for the gathering on the 14^th including this gorgeous cake – it had to be purple. The photo is of a ten-year-old me wearing a Spanish costume for a song and dance duet I used to perform with a girl called Kay Henson to Spanish Flea – yes, the other half of the duet was dressed as a flea – I’m being serious!

Unknown to me, Chris had enlisted Sophie’s help to track down a friend from my past. I first met Gilly when she was a saxophonist in the Ivy Benson Band who backed the show that I was a dancer in at the Hotel de France in Jersey. We hadn’t seen each other in around forty years although we kept in touch with Christmas cards and family newsletters. I nearly had heart failure when I realised it was her. It’s not every day that someone makes the trip from Suffolk to Berkshire armed with a clarinet to give a special rendition of Happy Birthday. And we later found out that it made our neighbour’s day to hear the melodic clarinet being played while he was in his garden weeding.

Dan and all his family were with us, and Sophie was able to make it with Reece and Freddie, along with some close friends and they were all there when I opened my birthday present.

Afterwards, my friend Denise said she thought Chris had lost the plot when I pulled a silver-coloured model of a Spitfire airplane out of the box, but I immediately knew what my present was.

The winner of my blog competition last year for 70 things to do in my 70^th year was Diane, who suggested a flight in a Spitfire in memory of my dad who was ground crew in the RAF during WW2 and literally stitched the planes back together to get them back in the air. I will be going up in a Spitfire and apparently, I will have control of the plane for a short period during the flight. I’m excited and terrified in equal measure.

What a lovely birthday and birthday gathering too. I feel very blessed to have such a kind and thoughtful family.

Just before I finish, June 14^th was also a significant date for me seven years ago. It was publication day for my first book with Bookouture, Little Girl Missing. The contract with them was for worldwide rights for a seven-year period and I’ve opted to have the rights back. As such, the book is currently unavailable to buy. However, as I still have a few paperback copies, I will be running a competition to win them on my next blog… which I promise will be next month.

Sorry this has been so long (both in length and the wait for it) but hope you enjoyed getting up to date with all my news.

Much love

Julia xx