Chasing Butterflies Daily

I recently read this quote by Sinéad Burke and it resonated with me so I wanted to share it here: "I was born disabled and I’m very proud to be disabled. My greatest challenge is that I live in a world that wasn’t designed for me." I love Elis' disability and I'll tell you why. It's not just because it's my duty as his mother to lift him up - figuratively more than physically! With all my children I've believed strongly in letting them figure things out independently as babies and toddlers. I may guide and show support so they may learn better but ultimately I want them to succeed on their own. It is greatly spurred on by me wanting him to feel like Sinéad, I want him to be proud of who he is, and what his disability gives him that average height people miss out on. It's perhaps a different way of looking at it, but to me it is the only way. When we got his diagnosis over a year and a half ago all I could do was worry about the health i...

Firstly it took 1,438 attempts to get this photo... I've got one where the youngest looks like he's surely possessed by the devil himself. The rest either someone isn't looking at the camera, or their head is cropped out or they look incredibly miserable with the experience... Don't blame them! Looking at this you've hopefully noticed we're all wearing matching clothes. There's several reasons for this, the main one being my husband. He's enjoyed getting me and my eldest matching clothes for years now, that is mostly because he finds it hilarious that I fit into children's clothes (it's actually very convenient as they are usually a lot cheaper). When we had our second and she turned out to be another girl he started buying them more marching things. Part of me was very against this as there were more than enough clothes for the second born to wear. But having siblings of the same gender and close in age pretty much guarantees e...

This is me, 16:30 on a Friday afternoon. Nursing a beer and I've had a wee dram of whisky already and I'll tell you for why. Mouldy fucking bread. Not my kids, not because it's Friday, not because I've done anything to deserve a drink. Just. Mouldy. Fucking. Bread. Inside. Me. I felt peckish when I was preparing the kids dinner and was delighted to see there was some salmon and cream cheese mix left from our lunch (bagels: Nom!). Thought it would go nicely on some toast. Kids were being pricks (did I mention it's Friday = everyone being over tired) and I barely avoided burning their pizzas, most definitely did not think to check my bread. Sat down and it was about 3/4 into the first slice of toast with smoked salmon and cream cheese that I noticed mould patches along all the crusts. BOKE!!!! After three pregnancies where I've done nothing but puke my gag reflex is pretty sensitive... I quickly dumped the toddler in the travel cot and ran to stick ...

Day 1 (With us) On the 18th of July I was out on one of our daily dog walks out in West Cowal on Argyll's Secret Coast, a peninsula on the west coast of Scotland. As I walked past some long grass and weeds. I spotted something that "didn't belong there", something that looked out of place. I was a good 3-4 metres away, I thought I was probably imagining things but you never know if you don't explore further. I thought, if I was lucky, it might be a butterfly or moth hiding in the long grass. As I got closer I soon realised it was a small group of caterpillars on a cluster of nettles. These black, spikey caterpillars are those of the colourful Peacock butterfly. I remember seeing them as a kid, but then in their hundreds, safe in the web they form around themselves as protection from predators. They are one of many breeds of butterfly and moth that feed from nettles as larvae. One of the reasons it's so important to not get rid of all nettles in your gar...

Some toddler tantrums are so bad I'd rather shoot myself in the foot than deal with them, but a lot of them are just laughable. To be fair they get worse as they get older so I will no doubt not find my son's outbursts as funny in a year's time. But right now his tantrums are delightful, especially compared to his older sisters' ones. This photo is from the other day when I shut a door and the world ended but it's not the reason for the post. This photo was just preferable to a photo of smudged shite, as today we had a "poo-gate" moment. I say "a" because we've had numerous with each child by now. I was dropping off the dirty dishes in the kitchen and had left the toddler (sans nappy as they were all just about to get into the bath) with the older two in front of the TV when I heard my eldest yelp. "MAMMA!!! Come quick! Elis is HOLDING POOOOO!!" I ran in, and he was indeed holding poop. To be fair it was nowher...

When we found out about our son's achondroplasia diagnosis a million thoughts and emotions went through me. Not for one second did I doubt our unwavering love for him. What did happen though was an intense feeling or worry and fear. Worry about all the possible physical ailments and fear for the bullying. Worry and fear about HIM not being happy with himself, something that, to be honest, I feel for my daughters too. We all have our own mountains to climb, they'll meet adversity too. Of course I feared like it would be even harder for him. In many ways it will be because things aren't set up for him in the outside world, but in a million ways my fears have subsided because he's got relentless determination and is such a happy contented soul.  My job is to stay positive about his condition so he learns to love it and the fact that he's different from the norm. My job is also to reach out to others so he grows up in a more accepting society than the one he gr...

As most of my readers should've gathered by now I'm a little obsessed with butterflies. My obsession started after we chose our eldest's name, which means butterfly (more about all 3 kids names can be found in my post: Why all the butterflies? ). After that it was a slippery slope, and we now live in a house with butterfly motifs EVERYWHERE. I often have others ask me how I manage to find so many butterfly clothes and things for and the kids. The secret is that I'm that crazy person who'll add "buttery" to most of my Google searches when purchasing something, whether for us or as a gift. HOWEVER I'm still very much a novice when it comes to knowing about actual butterflies. I have however been completely smitten by them, moths and their caterpillars. I've started looking for them anytime I'm out and researching any new ones I don't know about. Most valuable in this, I've found, has been several Facebook groups that are focused...