Christine Bleakley's a 'wonderful stepmum', says Frank Lampard

Christine Bleakley is a wonderful stepmum, according to her fiance Frank Lampard.

The TV star is stepmother to the footballer's daughters - Luna, eight, and Isla, six - and he told the Daily Mirror that she is doing a great job.

"Christine's done amazingly becoming a step-parent to them," he said.

"She's been in the girls' lives for four years now, she's completely taken to it. It's not an easy role as any step-parent knows."

However, Frank admitted he doesn't know whether he and Christine will have children of their own.

"It's something we would consider," he said. "I wouldn't want a headline, 'We want kids' because it's something we want to do in our own time. If we're going to do it."

The couple got engaged in 2011 and are now making plans for their big day, which Frank said they want to do 'completely our own way'.

"Ideally we would do it sneakily so no one would know and then it's done and I wouldn't get this pressure. We were excited about it from the minute we got engaged," he said.

 

Patrick McLennan

Patrick McLennan is a London-based journalist and documentary maker who has worked as a writer, sub-editor, digital editor and TV producer in the UK and New Zealand. His CV includes spells as a news producer at the BBC and TVNZ, as well as web editor for Time Inc UK. He has produced TV news and entertainment features on personalities as diverse as Nick Cave, Tom Hardy, Clive James, Jodie Marsh and Kevin Bacon and he co-produced and directed The Ponds, which has screened in UK cinemas, BBC Four and is currently available on Netflix. 

An entertainment writer with a diverse taste in TV and film, he lists Seinfeld, The Sopranos, The Chase, The Thick of It and Detectorists among his favourite shows, but steers well clear of most sci-fi.