My latest little darling flew the coop last week, and I could not be more thrilled to send it out into the world. London Holiday was a book I wrote for purely selfish reasons—I wanted to have some fun, and I hope it has been just as much fun for those of you who have already read it!
There will be a blog tour soon, so I will save any further excerpts for that, but here in the US, we are celebrating Memorial Day Weekend. We honour our veterans, respecting both those who have fallen and those who stood. However, for millions of kids and parents, Memorial Day also signals the beginning of the summer holidays. Today, I wanted to ask if you have any special summer holiday traditions you absolutely love.
My husband’s family has been making the same pilgrimage every year for twenty-nine years now (they started when he was one! Just kidding.) We take a trip to Oregon’s spectacular sand dune playground and camp next to the bay. It is one of the most beautiful places in the world, and I will share a few photos to prove it!
And, of course, no camping trip is complete without roasting food over the fire. My son, who is either going to be a famous chef or a comedian (the jury is still out on that one) came up with this monstrosity: red peppers with chocolate. He even convinced the picky eaters among us (cough) to try it, and it’s not too bad!
I would love to hear from you! What do you do on your summer holidays? I hope that sometime this summer, you will have a chance to read about Darcy and Lizzy’s holiday as well. You can find it here!
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Red peppers with chocolate…? Hmmm!
Obviously an acquired taste!!! 😉
Photos are fab! Thanks for sharing!
I like to just chill out during the Summer hols,let the work persona slide and just be me!
Love going to the beach and walking along the strand, sometimes with,sometimes without background music and inhale the salty air,with the breeze in my face. Heaven! Afterwards,tucking into a picnic with a sweet treat at the close of day!
Happy hols!!
Looking forward to the blog tour. This book was a fantastic read.
Author
Beach with background music and salt air? That sounds like heaven! And a picnic afterward is just the perfect way to end the day. I hope you get a chance to do just that, Mary!
Food cooked over an open fire.. wonderful. [I’ve never had chocolate and peppers]. Fabulous photos. Your dog looked exhausted… bless his/her heart.
This is the time of the year when we decorate the graves of our relations. We had several new ones this year. I am looking forward to the kind of weather where I can sit on my deck and enjoy a beautiful day. After this low goes through… I hope to enjoy my deck. The trees have filled out and we have shade. Yeah!! I’ve put out my ferns and geraniums. We always wait until after Derby so the threat of frost is over. Blessings on the launch of London Holiday. I loved it. Have a great summer.
Author
The dog’s name is Samson. He’s a great boy! He is an Australian Cattle Dog, and they never leave their owner’s side. He actually belongs to my sister-in-law, but I have his mama, and she was curled up at my feet.
I think it is a wonderful tradition to honor your relatives, but I am sorry you had new ones to decorate!
Your garden sounds lovely. We are trying to get some gardening done ourselves, and I’m finally learning to enjoy it (it’s better when I’m listening to an audiobook).
Thank you for your support, Jeanne!
I am not a fan of summer. It is too hot and humid where I live. I do however enjoy a trip to visit my in-laws, a day at the lake with my sister’s family, and a short trip to the beach with my hubby and kids. My time indoors does provide me with plenty of time to read and I can’t wait to read your book!
Author
Oh, dear, I imagine summer could be miserable if it’s too hot! Here in Oregon, it’s when we finally get to really appreciate all the beauty we paid for with 9 months of rain. At least you can get to the water for some fun, and I hope you have great air conditioning! Enjoy the book 🙂
Nicole,I found London Holiday just after it was on Amazon and bought it. It was absolutely delicious, Darcy was suitably arrogant and Lizzy impertinent. I love love love it.
Author
I am so glad you enjoyed it! I certainly had fun with them. It is so enjoyable to watch them peel back each other’s layers to get to the true person. After all the variations I’ve read, I never get tired of it. Thank you for your kind words, Hollis, and happy summer!
What a fabulous beach! Now that we have grandchildren, we’ve been having them visit every August on their own to spend time with us. We take them to Sandbanks Provincial Park where there is a fabulous beach on Lake Ontario to play in the water and build sandcastles. We put all the leaves in our dining table and all the Lego is pulled out (from when our son was young)so they can create castles and stables and whatever else they dream up. We eat our meals on the veranda and just have fun!
Loved ‘London Holiday’ and the adventures Miss Elizabeth and ‘the footman’ experienced in London! What a hoot!
Author
Oregon has some gorgeous coastline, I must say.
Wow, I absolutely love your summer traditions! Family time is just the best, and it is wonderful to see those kids using their imaginations. I hope you get to do that this year, and every year!
Thank you for your kind words, Carole! It was a lot of fun, and I hope the book gets to go on a few vacations with readers this summer. 🙂
Fantastic pics, Nicole. I hope you have a wonderful summer with your kids. They are lucky children indeed to be seeing these sights, cooking over a campfire, and sleeping under canvas – you are making the memories.
And, look at London Holiday storming up the charts! Amazing. Congratulations.
Author
Thank you, Caitlin! Big day tomorrow for you, looking forward to it!
We do love our camping memories. It’s some pretty special family time. 💕
I LOVE the Oregon coast (both John and I grew up there), and I LOVED London Holiday.
In 1995, the year the Colin Firth P&P came out, we decided to take a hot air balloon ride over the Wasatch Mountains out of Park City, Utah. It was a lovely trip until a woman riding with us started screaming. She screamed from 2,000 ft. until we landed back on the ground. I wanted to stuff a dirty sock in her mouth and John wanted to drop her over the side. Jennifer wisely plugged her ears and enjoyed the adventure. We would much rather have gone up with your story’s characters. Next time, we will take you and yours with us, Nicole. Congrats on your successful launch.
Author
That sounds like an incredible adventure (except for the screaming lady part)! I would definitely love to go with you on the next one. Thank you for all your support, Joy! By the way, I thought you shut down your internet today to get some work done? Write, lady!
Snicker!
That’s an amazing place, Nicole! Thanks for sharing the photos with us. I can imagine the peppers and chocolate working well together. In Mexican cookery, I believe they sometimes put a little chocolate in savoury dishes which would probably have peppers in them. Chocolate with a little chilli in is also pretty good.
We live just about as far from the sea as it’s possible in the UK but my Auntie lives on the coast. We visit her every summer and one of our rituals is to go to the beach and throw a (large-ish) stone into the sea for each of the family members we’ve lost in our lifetimes.
Author
I believe you are right about the peppers and chocolate, Angi. Next time, I’ll have to have him try an Aztec cocoa, with cayenne and pepper!
That is a beautiful ritual to commemorate your loved ones. What a lovely idea! I hope you get to make a fun trip this summer!
As I am a retired senior citizen living on a fixed income, summer is no longer the wonderful time it used to be. Since it gets so hot here, and I have a medical condition that doesn’t like heat, I mostly stay in my house where it’s air-conditioned. I used to be able to travel every summer, but that’s no longer an option and I miss it. However, I always read. I don’t believe I’ve missed a day since I taught myself when I was 4, 57 years ago. Right now I’m reading a Jane Austen book I haven’t read before (Mansfield Park). I always read while I eat breakfast, sometimes read during the day, and always for an hour or two before I go to sleep. Your vacation site looks lovely. I’ve been to Oregon beaches at Seaside and one other city, I forget the name. I loved it there. Have a great summer!
Author
Air conditioning and reading are some very relaxing alternatives to bugs and heat, I would say. Seaside is a favorite spot of ours! We were a bit farther south this time, but I think we will hit Seaside before the summer is over.
I hope you enjoy Mansfield Park. I loved it. Fanny Price is a much deeper character than many give her credit for, and in some ways she reminds me of another of my favorite heroines, Margaret Hale. I look forward to hearing your thoughts on it!
Thanks for the photos, Nicole!! Lovely!!!
The red peppers and chocolate??? I don’t know about that combo. You have one inventive son!!
When I was growing up, we spent ten days to two weeks at our favorite horse camp about a 45-minute drive (and 4000 feet in elevation) from our home. We load up the horse trailer with our two horses, our camping trailer with tent, cots, and other camping stuff, and with my mom driving her car with the camping trailer and my dad driving the 1966 International Travelall with the horse trailer, we wended our way up the mountain and to Los Caballos Horse Camp in the Cuyamaca Mountains. Only 16 campsites with one solar-powered bathroom with showers, each site contained a wooden picnic table, a stone campfire pit, a stone BBQ, a wooden cupboard for food, and two metal-pole horse corrals. Between every two sites was a hose hook-up for water. And that was it.
We’d wake early and go for horseback rides with our dad on the many hiking/horse trails up to Lake Cuyamaca, around the back of Stonewall Peak, up Azalea Glen, etc., then arrive back at camp in time for eggs and bacon. We’d go for a hike while the horses rested, then play cards and board games or read during the heat of the day. We’d shower in the late afternoon, make dinner, and then go for a dusk horseback ride or hike and count how many deer we saw. We’d come back to the campfire for s’mores and to listen to Vern, an old cowboy and the ranger in charge of the campgrounds, tell tall tales about the mountaineers who settled the nearby areas. After a few more games, we’d sleep outdoors (the tent was only used for changing and storing our clothes) on cots with flashlights beside us in case of nighttime bathroom journeys or to watch a raccoon fight in the dry creek bed behind the site.
Los Caballos burned in the 2003 Cedar Fire, and because of the many Native American morteros (acorn grinding holes in granite rocks) within the camp area, the 16 campsites were not rebuilt. My mom and her family camped at Los Caballos starting in the late 1940s, and our family camped every summer from the time I was two (late 1960s) through about 2000 when I was juggling four kids. My grandparents often came up, as did other family members and friends; it was our tradition. We had planned to go up for a week in July 2003, but my dad’s schedule changed, and we decided to try again next summer…but then the fire came through. 🙁
Thanks for your photos, Nicole!!
Author
My son is inventive! He is a bit of a foodie (no idea where that came from) and he also enjoys provoking a reaction from people. I suppose it stands to reason that he would try something like that. I predict that one day he will open one of those “edgy” Portland restaurants like Voodo Doughnuts or something.
Your horse camp sounds spectacular! I would have loved that. You must have some wonderful memories from those days. Such a shame that the camp burned down. I hope someday it gets rebuilt. Maybe some of the local equestrian clubs can take up the cause? It sounds like a worthy one! I hope you can enjoy some sweet traditions with your own kids, Susanne.
Hi Nicole
I just finished youe “Sommer Holiday” book – I loved it 🙂 Fun and tenderness, what a perfect combination <3
Perhaps you know: red wine and dark chocolate is a vey nice combination as well.
Kindest regards from France
Doris
Great photos. While our children were younger we visited the beach for a week each summer but then they became so involved with sports, i.e., swim team and then practices for teams which started on Aug. 1st that we gave up on week long vacations and took some long weekends to Niagara Falls or to Historic Williamsburg, VA, etc. We did take two weeks in mid June to July before my oldest entered college to take a train ride to Chicago and on to Arizona where we toured the entire state as out last “family vacation”. We knew our children would be getting summer jobs and have other events/ boyfriends/girlfriends which would take precedence over vacations. Now we visit Grandchildren here and there. Thanks for sharing.
Loved London Holiday. I have never been up on a hot air balloon but we used to see them flying often, especially on weekends, back maybe 20 years and there was a hot air balloon launch from near here back then which we went to see them all launch one after the other. Then there was one which landed in our driveway on a Saturday – I have photos. We don’t see them any more and I don’t know if it got too crowded in the skies or too expensive or what.
Author
We used to have them land in our pasture when I was a kid. You are right, you don’t see them much anymore! It’s a shame, I loved those colourful spots in the sky.