Our Daughter has the Nex Factor!

The Gleeful & Greedy Restaurant was packed on Saturday evening for the local final of the Nex Factor. It seemed as though every giraffe in the county was there to hear the finalists sing.

To cut a long story short, our family song and my sister Nektareeni's song didn't make the top three. The winner of the competition was an outstanding young singer, Nexandra.

However, there was a surprise in store for us ... Our middle child Necky Becky was awarded a special prize! When she gave her neck-bending rendering of 'Be Who You Wanna Be!' backed by local band The Stiffnex, she totally won the audience and judges over. She was way too young to enter, but had jumped up on stage last week anyway. Everyone said she had more neck than anyone, and it was decided to award her the accolade of 'The Neckiest Factor!'

You can listen to her song here: 'Be Who You Wanna Be!'

(NB: Necky Becky has just pointed out that her long-term ambition is to be a gardener, not a pop-star - but she doesn't see why that should stop her from singing if she wants to).

The Nex Factor comes to Neckelchester Village

We had a really exciting evening yesterday!

A couple of weeks ago Necky Becky had picked up a leaflet advertising a singing competition to be held in the village. The competition is called 'The Nex Factor', and lots of our friends are entering. Of course, we all wanted to join in!

After much debate, we put together several entries, and spent vast amounts of time rehearsing. I had a great number called 'Raph's Rap', which seemed to cause embarrassment and cringing among the family whenever I 'sang' it. My sister entered 'They call me Nektareeni', which she often performs in her restaurant. Necky Becky insisted on screeching 'Be Who You Wanna Be!', to the horror of her sister. Our final entry was our family song, 'With Our Necks Entwined'. We had written this to celebrate moving to Necky Knoll House and launching our new business.

The Village Hall was packed last night for the first round. All the giraffes of Neckelchester and Raffsburgh must have wanted to stick their necks out and sing! After a long evening of music, merriment and intense competition, the judges made their decisions as to which contestants will be going through to next week's final ...

Three of our acts are going through! (Unfortunately my rap number was not chosen). Twenty songs will be performed again next week at The Gleeful & Greedy Restaurant. Of these, one will be selected to win: