Clare Grant is known in our house as ‘Beautiful Clare’ and not just because of her amazingly and internationally popular blog, Three Beautiful Things.

In her blog, Clare records three good things that happen every day, and in a way that makes you look again at your own day. She manages not to be cheesy, and yet still makes me smile every time. Take this one…

“…and look, if you press this button, it makes the rinse noise, it spins and then it dries.”
“That is brilliant,” says Nick. He is nearly as delighted as Alec is by the 50p toy washing machine — just big enough for a wipe and a pair of toddler socks — that we found in the window of a charity shop.

She also writes a column in the Courier newspaper about her daily life in Tunbridge Wells, in which she is far from disgusted.

So here are her sentences:

When you were small, you wanted to … be a writer like Diana Wynne Jones, because she wrote exactly the sort of books I wanted to read. I reasoned that writing the books would be about twice as fun as reading them.

The one thing you can never resist is … an hour alone in a wifi-less coffee shop with the laptop, or a notepad and pen.

You may not say it aloud but… at the moment I much prefer being a mother to writing.

The last time you went ‘WOOP’ with excitement was … when my 19-month-old toddler said a sentence: “Me more bub.” which translates as “I would like to continue nursing please.”

Your five favourite words are …. Naptime, Mummy, munificent, rococo and vervaine

Additional thoughts:

Favourite writing place in Kent : Divinity Cafe at Trinity Theatre, Tunbridge Wells.

A book about Kent or by a Kent writer you would recommend:
One of E. Nesbit’s children’s books. I love the Bastables best, and then fairy stories, so perhaps Oswald Bastable and Others would suit, as it is half-and-half.

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Thanks Clare! And shh… don’t tell anyone but here’s half an hour free time and this…