Lisa Jewell: DiaryJune 2006

Diary

June 2006

Easter at Wyken Vineyards, Suffolk.

Here I am in cotton skirt and sleeveless top, the back door open, listening to children playing outside in the communal garden while the smell of Clarins self tan cream emanates from my lower legs. It must be summer!

And about bloody time too. What a stinker of a spring it was. Well, apart from the two weeks that we spent in St Lucia of course! I don't feel too guilty mentioning our holiday now that summer has arrived, but really – it was spectacular! If someone told you that you were going to stay in a cottage in St Lucia on the cliff-top estate of their tax exile uncle you would probably expect something pretty snazzy. But nothing could have prepared us for the sheer luxury, elegance and class of our surroundings. It was like staying in our very own five star boutique hotel with fat towels and crisp bed linen and expensive lotions and potions all over the place. Our ‘cottage' had its own swimming pool complete with a water flume built into the hillside – and a tennis court with a pavilion. Yes, I do realise that I am the luckiest girl in the world!

Being the Holiday Queen, two weeks in St Lucia simply wasn't enough for me and we've just come back from a week at the seaside in Italy with my father, my sister Sacha and her family. Amelie was beside herself with joy getting to spend an entire week with her cousins and didn't stop smiling all week (which, as regular visitors to my diary will know, is a rarity indeed!) Then we drove up to Milan for my cousin's wedding, which was breathtaking. A string quartet played while we drank champagne in the grounds of an ornate stately home, helping ourselves to platefuls of food from a ‘Grand Buffet di Antipasti'; piles of sushi, tuna teriyaki, steak tartare served on silver spoons, frito misto in tiny paper cones and slivers of salmon carpaccio.

Then we went inside for lobster risotto, followed by saffron dumplings and a main course of fillet steak with potatoes. Afterwards it was back out into the candlelit garden for the ‘Grand Buffet di Dolce', yet more tables extravagantly loaded with puddings, fruits, cakes and mousses. For a foodie like me this wedding was pure heaven – five hours of non-stop eating. I was wearing an empire line dress and by the end of the night it looked more like a maternity dress!

Well, that's more than enough about holidays. Work-wise everything is going smoothly. I'm squeezing an extra book in before I start my next novel – and it's non-fiction! I'll let the subject matter be a surprise, but the plan is to publish it next summer, just six months after the new book comes out. This means writing faster than I've ever had to write before. It usually takes me about eighteen months to write a book. I have to write this one in eight months!

As Lorna pointed out in the guestbook a few weeks ago, ‘Learning to Fly' was also the title of Victoria Beckham's er, classic autobiography, so my next book has now been renamed: 31 Dream Street – what do you think? I'd love to hear your thoughts in my chat forum thingy. Does it sound like a book you'd want to read? Any other suggestions would be noted with interest. In fact, if anyone can come up with a better title I'll send them a bottle of champagne and a signed proof! (See last month's diary for the synopsis). The publication date is February 2007 (even though it says June 2007 on Amazon – ignore this) and it is going to be a lovely little handbag-sized hardback. I can't wait!

So that's holidays and work covered. What else is there to mention? Well, there's my hair. I accidentally dyed it brown a few weeks ago and had tried to persuade myself that I liked it, that it was classy and more fitting for a lady of my advancing years. But then I surrendered to the lure of the blonde and am now a flaxen bombshell. I know it doesn't look natural (I have jet-black eyebrows!) but I don't care. I love it!

But much more exciting than that was the delivery of MY NEW DESK! I've been wanting, craving a new desk for months. For the last three years I've been working on a postage-stamp sized computer table that cost £39 from Viking Direct. I called it my ‘rickety table.' I hated it. I mentioned to my father in law that I was looking for a desk, and being a furniture designer he insisted on having one made for me. To my own specifications. It took six months, but finally it is here, all highly-polished myrtle with animal-face veneers and vintage drawer knobs and cubby holes and secret compartments. I love it! I love it so much I could cry. Unfortunately someone climbed in through an open window last night and stole my handbag, with my camera in it, so I can't take a picture to show you, but I will when I get my new camera. Come back in September to have a look if you're the sort to get strangely overexcited about pieces of furniture!

It was the anniversary of my mother's death last week and me and my sisters left the kids at home and went out for lunch in the countryside with our dad. Afterwards we went to the cemetery where my father's plot is and sprinkled our mother's ashes there, just as she'd asked. Even though they'd been divorced for fifteen years when she died, my mother only had one love in her life – my father – and she wanted to be with him forever. So now she is. It was very moving and very fitting. And I am very relieved that my mother's remains are no longer sitting on top of a pile of things down the side of the bed in my spare bedroom!

So, that's it for another quarter. My summer plans consist of work, work, the World Cup, some more work (and two weeks in Spain at the end of July – well, come on, you can't expect me to go two months without a holiday can you?!)

I'll be back here in September, mourning the end of summer, but until then, here's some holiday snaps (please note; Amelie smiling!)

Lots of love to all of you,

Lisa xxxx

Italy


Ice cream! Sunshine! Cousins!	A pole! Sunshine! Cousins!


I'm with my cousins. I'm so happy! I'm so happy!	This is my cousin! I love her!


I hate churches. And I hate weddings. Where are my cousins?	Look at me! I'm dancing with my daddy! And my cousin!

St Lucia


The good life. Jascha and Amelie on the veranda with Peter and ten week old Marly.	Jascha and Amelie take a break from a really stressful holiday to chill out for a moment.


Amelie and Zac discuss the colourisation of an early evening sunset.	Hey – check out my cute sunglasses!


The pool. Wow.	The pool again. Wow again.

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