Spoilt rotten

I know that Mother’s Day is always a difficult day for people who no longer have their mums or have a less than perfect relationship with them, but while I am neither of the aforementioned, I couldn’t enjoy it as much as I usually do because I couldn’t stop thinking about Sarah Everard’s mum and how completely devastated she must be. Since becoming a mother myself, one of my biggest fears has always been losing either of my children to illness or accident, but to have your child taken from you in this appalling way is unimaginable and utterly heart-breaking… RIP Sarah.

So, not quite the usual light-hearted celebration, but I did nonetheless feel thoroughly loved and I must admit rather spoiled, despite having to work. How thoughtful is this gift… all my novel front covers framed and ready to hang on the wall in my writing room?

I’ll post a photograph when they’ve made it onto the wall – hopefully on next week’s blog. I just managed to catch a photo with the sun shining on them and quite appropriately highlighting My Mother’s Secret on Mothering Sunday!

I also had beautiful cards with meaningful words, including one from my husband, Chris. For quite a few years he didn’t send me a card saying, ‘You’re not my mother, so why would I send you a card?’ He’s now mellowed and sends one to ‘the mother of my children.’ I wonder if your husband sends you a Mother’s Day card? By the way, the framed photo in the background is of me with my son, Dan. It appeared in Good Housekeeping magazine a few years ago after we’d done a 10K walk for Breast Cancer Care – I certainly wouldn’t be able to do that at the moment with my ankle still recovering from last year’s surgery.

Our daughter Sophie couldn’t visit due to lockdown of course, but she and her partner, Reece did send these gorgeous flowers and there were more flowers from Dan and his girlfriend, Katie too.

If you’re wondering about the cat picture on the wall, it was made for me by Reece’s daughter, Amber for my birthday last year and looks exactly like our cat, Wilfie. As a thank you, I named one of Danni’s daughters in My Mother’s Secret after her. It’s great being a writer because you can do nice things in books as well as ‘killing off’ people who you’ve crossed swords with. I haven’t properly introduced you to Wilfie, who is actually Dan’s cat so will be leaving us soon when they move into their new home, but I’ll put that right in next week’s blog as he’s a bit of a poser, so it won’t be hard getting photos of him.

As I mentioned above, I was working most of the day at QVC, so wasn’t able to have a Mother’s Day lunch although nobody was able to go ‘out out’ for lunch this year. I’m not complaining as a delicious veggie lasagne was waiting for me when I got home and I’d already enjoyed ‘a salad in a box’ for lunch made by my husband, just as he usually does! I do know how lucky I am.

Chris also queued up at the post office on Monday morning to send the first competition winners Alice in Theatreland books out. There should have been twenty, but we are still awaiting three addresses to be emailed to us, so if you entered do check your inbox as you might be a winner without realising it.

The second week of winners have now been notified and the third newsletter with the next competition was sent out to subscribers yesterday too. There is still one more opportunity to sign up to receive my free newsletter if you haven’t already before next Thursday.

I haven’t had much chance to write this week as it’s been pretty full-on at QVC, however I have come up with an unexpected twist for the end of my current WIP which I’m really looking forward to getting down on paper (so to speak) over the coming few days.

Have a great week

Much love

Julia xx