Making Hay- what a day

Wow! All I can say is what a week- what a day. This was my first experience of Hay and I am addicted. I felt so happy and so relaxed and of course the excitement about our launch mounted as the week went on. I had planned and prepared and organised everything and was determined it would all go to plan...

And it did.

I woke up on Friday with such excitement I was buzzing. The family and friends had all arrived the day before and we were ready. I sat painting my nails looking out into the gardens of the farm where we stayed savouring the peace of the moment. This was the day I had been preparing for for a year. And I knew even then it would be a day I would never forget- none of us would.




Home for the week

We met Virginia McKenna and Lauren at The Swan hotel after their drive from Surrey and Virginia was so lovely about the book and talked about her favourite stories. At 12.20 we left Gill and Nicola and Virginia, Lauren and myself were picked up and taken to The Green Room on the festival site. So suddenly I was seeing it from the other side of the marquees and I loved it! We were met by Judy from Sky Arts and taken to a tiny green room ready for the taping of the Sky Arts BOOK SHOW. On the show were also Alexander McCall Smith and Brian May! All charming.

Lauren and I were shown to front row couch seats- I can not tell you how exciting it was! Although when we realised we might be caught on camera we were a little distirbed- reapply your lipstick time! Then the lights dimmed and the show began. Alexander was on first. Then it was our Virginia and wow she did us proud- she was so fantastic talking about the book and how much she enjoyed it. I was sat there feeling so proud to think an idea 12 months before lead to The Book Show!!! And what a plug she gave us. Short clip here... Clip



After the show we spoke with Brian May and he was in awe of Virginia- he also is very interested in animals with his Save Me campaign (follow the link) SAVE ME -so some good networking.Of course I gave him a copy of the book and he seemed really interested in helping. So we took some photos outside! In fact as we did I suddenly realised we were drawing a bit of a crowd... whispers of isn't that Brian May- from Queen and Virginia McKenna...





Then it was back to The Green Room and another car back to The Swan to the Meet n Greet... before the big launch...

We had a large room and there were sarnies... and everyone got the chance to meet all the other authors and artists present, a book signing fest and of course the chance to meet Virginia- what a gracious lovely person she is.

At 5 everyone started the 15 min walk back to the festival site while I was lucky enough to go in the car with Lauren and Virginia back to The Green Room to meet Paul Blezard- that's when I knew it was really happening. What a buzz...


Details of the actual event tomorrow but here are some photos to whet your appetite!