Elizabeth: Hot Pants! Remember these?

Ingrid: A gold and silver evening gown that I wore to the opera in Covent Garden.  It was far too fancy – everyone else was in black – and I had to keep my coat on the entire evening because my boy friend was so embarrassed.

Lois: No such thing as a fashion mistake – just another bag of goodies for the charity shop

Alison: Shorts too short when I was 19, I heard a woman behind me complain that they were indecent.

Harriet: It’s too traumatic to even recall….

Vanessa: A long black leather skirt and matching halter top, which James insisted I buy.  I wore it only once, when we went to Amsterdam, where I figured it would just blend in.  An old woman spat at me in the street!

Shirley: My (first) wedding dress because of the symbol it now is in my memory

Elizabeth: My great taste and judgment in choosing my husband!

Ingrid: Climbing a huge marble mountain in Bulgaria.  It was very slippery and dangerous and I was very unfit.  Never again!

Lois: BA(Hons) Embroidered Textiles First Class!!!

Harriet: Climbing Mount Kota Kinabalu at 4093m- although giving birth in October this year will beat that I’m sure!

Vanessa: Becoming a successful journalist after only an evening class at a local college.

Shirley: My children first, my business second

Elizabeth: Our initial decision to leave the UK and subsequent decision not to return. Life’s full of choices but you have to make the best of the path that you choose.

Ingrid: I should not have left Sweden for the UK.

Lois: Nothing – everything has its pluses

Harriet: None – although I fell into my career by accident, so often wonder what I might have ended up doing if there hadn’t been that accident.

Vanessa: Waiting 10 years to change my name after my divorce. 

Shirley: My first wedding - one decision to be with a man that affected over 30 years of my life

Elizabeth: On the coast, with a wonderful view, lots of glass windows, a big conservatory/kitchen/living area, lots of gallery and library  space(s) for our) art collection and  books, a large garden  with an orchard of old fruit trees.

Ingrid: It is by the water, in French/Scandinavian style, very light with lots of pale blue.

Lois: Something that is totally maintenance free, near London, in the country, near a coastline, near Waitrose, with a climate of sunny skies and temperatures always in the seventies except for the odd day of snow

Alison: No walls but has a roof, in a forest but near the sea.

Harriet: A Georgian Rectory somewhere in typically beautiful English countryside.  Alternatively, a fantastic new build where I could bring together all the features of various properties I have loved, to create my dream home – somewhere on a sunny coast, but close to my loved ones.

Vanessa: It would be near a private beach with lots of fossils. A stone cottage, at least 200 years old, with thick walls and huge fireplaces, a large bedroom with a vaulted beamed ceiling and bathroom with a claw-footed bath; a cosy kitchen with French doors onto a garden which comes right up to the house- the whole thing surrounded by an old stone wall.  Oh, and an alpaca herd next door.

Shirley: A converted barn in the countryside on the outskirts of a thriving village community

Elizabeth: I was 16, and was on a double date with a friend and two visiting lads from another city. We went to a fairground and had my first ride on the “Waltzer”, came off it totally disoriented, threw up on the ground and had to be escorted home. It wasn’t impressive!

Alison: when child number 1 lifted up my skirt in a department store to see what colour knickers I had on! He was aged 3yrs

Vanessa: A national newspaper printed a photo of me where I looked like a 100 year-old waxwork of my grandmother.  I imagined that my ex-husband saw it and counted himself lucky.

Shirley: Bound to have been when I said something in public that showed I had no idea what the previous conversation had been about because I either misheard or forgot what had been said.

Elizabeth: Dog – definitely.

Ingrid: Both, but more cat.

Lois: Cat

Harriet: dog

Vanessa: Meow.

Shirley: Cat, always and forever.