Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Protection built in.

Meet the Other Phone.
Protection built in.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
What we're reading

Find your new favourite book or recommend one on our Book forum.

Original poster

Anyone going to the Hay Festival this year?

11 replies

helyg · 04/05/2010 14:25

We are going for one day, would love to go for longer but can't

Have booked Francesca Simon (Horrid Henry) and Andy Stanton (Mr Gum) for the boys. Can't find much for DD (who is 4) on the day that we are going, other than the free stuff in the Hay Fever Space of course.

Last year we went to the Gruffalo 10th birthday party, which the DCs are still talking about now.

Have a dream wishlist of things I would like to see, but I won't be seeing them with 3 kids in tow!

OP posts:
Nymphadora · 04/05/2010 14:27

Yes! We are having an adult w/e the bank holiday but loads of stuff we wanted was the other one.

We are seeing justinemumsnet though!

Francesca Simon was great last time we saw her.

Original poster
helyg · 04/05/2010 14:33

I would love to see justinemumsnet .

What else are you seeing? I fancied Thomasins Miers on the 30th, I shall be very jealous if you are going to see her...

OP posts:
Nymphadora · 04/05/2010 16:34

No haven't got her. Have a couple of comedians. Tony Parsons ?

Original poster
helyg · 04/05/2010 16:54

Ooh I liked Man and Boy/Man and Wife so would like to read the new one in that series. I was quite disappointed by My Favourite Wife though, just couldn't get into it.

OP posts:
Nymphadora · 04/05/2010 17:09

It was him or Roddy Doyle as they overlapped. I was more up to date on Tony Parsons though will need to reread

Cant remember who else though, having a crap memory day!

I would have preferred going on the last weekend so I could get more signed books I also wanted to see Jasper Fforde, dh saw him before but I had the kids. He is doing something on Agatha Christie and I would have loved that too

Original poster
helyg · 04/05/2010 18:00

I'm hoping for plenty of signed books by the 2nd Friday

OP posts:
Nymphadora · 04/05/2010 18:12

Should be, I'm a sucker for them! Trawl the shelves as well ad the table as they sometimes put them back.

I really wanted signed Quentin Blakes. We saw him a couple of years ago but had to leave very soon after & the queue was huge

Original poster
helyg · 04/05/2010 19:55

We waited for 1.5 hours last year to get our books signed by Julia Donaldson and Axel Schleffer. I was actually quite proud of DS2, who had only just turned 5, for waiting that long. Although the wait was made far more enjoyable by Julia's husband and sister, who walked along the line with a huge Gruffalo puppet and a guitar playing songs from their CDs!

OP posts:
Greenshadow · 04/05/2010 20:01

Julia Donaldson's sister is great - she was a tutor of mine a few years back.

Nymphadora · 04/05/2010 21:17

We were near the front 2 years ago for julia Donaldson! we got pretty good at getting to the front though after the first year

Original poster
helyg · 05/05/2010 09:53

Our problem was we were near the front for the actual performance, so by the time we had got out of there with three kids, picked the buggy up, had a toilet stop and then walked to the bookshop we were near the back of the booksigning queue.

Her sister seemed great, and I really liked the fact that they all worked together to do the shows.

It was DS2's birthday and he had taken his birthday money there to buy some books, so they wrote/drew little birthday messages into them for him. He was over the moon

OP posts:
New posts on this thread. Refresh page