Morrison Family Update 2020

Our first daughter Xene is now 22 years old, she is one of the unfortunate ones that finished university during a pandemic, she was studying production design for stage and screen, which was a practical course which involved a large final project, which sadly only got half completed, although she has been awarded a 2.2, and is waiting to find out if they will get a graduation at some point.

Like so many others she is struggling to find work, theatre and stage jobs are non existent at the moment, however she is working voluntarily at the local model village, helping to paint and refresh some of the models, which is keeping her busy, and gets her out of the noisy household she has come back home to!

She is a fabulous artist and loves all things cosplay, she has made some amazing costumes and is currently taking part in numerous live streams of online performances via zoom. She is extremely quiet, but when she gets on stage its like a completely different person, she sings, dances and acts and loves everything theatre.

Lochlan was one of those millennium babies, so I always know his age without having to think too hard! (unlike the rest!) He is currently studying film production at University, he is in his second year and already has an HND in Game Development. He loves all things gaming and computers, and spends far too much money on buying the latest games!

He was an extremely quite, shy little boy when he was younger, but when he decided to change high school at the start of Year 10, he seemed to find his feet and became quite a confident young man, he has long curly hair that he is reluctant to cut very often!

I asked Lochlan via fb messenger as that seems to be his preferred method of contact, what I should write about him, and he said That’s he’s really, really, cool, so as you can see he’s extremely modest too….

He moved into his new house for second year uni in July with three friends, and he came home for a few weeks to celebrate Kaide and Viggo’s birthdays, so fingers crossed the world doesn’t go too crazy and he’ll be able to make it home for Christmas.

Neva was born 3 years after Lochlan with a very speedy delivery, only just getting to the delivery suite. She is currently in her second year at college studying Travel & Tourism, English Literature and Media, she already has an AS level in Sociology, as she was doing 4 courses due to excellent GCSE results, but has now stopped that to concentrate on the other three.

She has been a vegetarian for 4 years and is quite strict about not eating or wearing anything animal related, she even bought the dog a vegan leather collar! She wears glasses and used to suffer badly with migraines, but these seem to have subsided since she started wearing the glasses.

She loves animals and was the biggest advocate for getting the chickens and then the dog, she did her work experience at the local kennels and loved it! During lockdown she developed her skills in embroidery and is currently stitching patterns onto her clothing, to make them personalised.

Kaide was our first child not born in April, he arrived one week late in mid September, after quite a hot summer, he delivered in his amniotic sac, which caused quite a stir at the hospital and my room was filled with lots of midwives and doctors who hadn’t seen it before!

He is quite sporty and can often be found throwing an american football around in the garden with asa, during lockdown he started on an exercising routine and this year for his birthday he asked for a punchbag, he was always very little and usually one of the smallest in the class, but, just like Lochaln he has hit 15 and suddenly grown, he’s not giant but near enough the same size as me, in fact many of his friends commented that he was now as tall as them when they returned to school.

He has always been good with numbers and is extremely quick at solving maths puzzles, even though it’s not really one of his favourite subjects, he doesn’t really know what he wants to do when he leaves school, this year he has to choose somewhere to go on work experience, so it will be interesting to see what he chooses.

He is also a lover of gaming, and thanks to the joys of technology, he gets to talk with his friends and catch up on all the latest happenings without me having to play taxi! (whilst joining in the latest battle on fortnite, or the latest creation in minecraft).

Our final girl Eowyn arrived a few days early, at the end of November, one day after I started maternity leave, she is quite a different personality to the other two girls, their parents evenings would always be how quiet they are, whereas Eowyns are usually that she talks too much! 

She has just started high school, and is only at the school with one other girl from her primary school, but already she has made a lovely group of new friends, although she seems to be getting the teenage attitude much earlier!!

She loves arts and crafts and is usually making a mess on the kitchen table with her latest creations, she loves playing fortnite and overwatch, but is also happy cartwheeling and dancing around the house and garden. Her and Kaide get very competitive in everything they do, currently they are battling for views on their IG Reels, you can check them out over on my Instagram!

Like her brother she has grown quite dramatically over the lockdown, and she is also the same size as I am, and now steals my shoes!

Our sixth child Tyrus we welcomed two and a half years later in June, it was a lovely homebirth and his siblings were able to come home from school and already have their new baby brother and mum at home, which was great. From quite an early age I knew that Tyrus wasn’t reacting the same as the other children, and after lots of paperwork and appointments he finally had an asd diagnosis with sensory issues in June 2016. 

He attended the same preschool as all the other children and went to the same primary school, it was only towards the end of year 2 we had the discussion about his future and how we wanted to proceed, we found the perfect specialist school for him, only 10 minutes up the road from his current school, I went for a visit and knew that was the place he needed to be, unfortunately so do lots of other children, so were were turned down for him to start in year 3, two years of fighting, endless paperwork, telephone calls and eventually a tribunal one week before lockdown, he was awarded a place, and he began there at the start of September, already he is flourishing, he now looks forward to school, he is starting to communicate more, he even likes PE which he has never done before.

Tyrus is a very kind, quiet boy who adores playing computer games and playstation, and he is extremely good at it! He even found a glitch in a program at school that allowed him to complete the levels by clicking on a particular pixel on the screen! His sensory issues means that he has a very limited diet and he dislikes wearing clothes, so most of the time when he is home, he’s wearing as little as possible, although he has started to tolerate pants AND socks, and he will wear his school clothes (thank goodness!) If its a non uniform day we go through at least 6 different t-shirts until he fins ‘the one’ which he deems soft.

Finally, breaking the boy, girl pattern, Viggo arrived 8 days before Kaide’s birthday, and he was due to be another homebirth, but with the increased number of births in September (usually the result of Christmas time together) there were no midwives available, so a mad dash to collect everything together and a phonecall to my friend to come and babysit the other children we went to the hospital, after some negotiation on the phone between contractions, they would allow me to give birth on the birthing unit, and a waterbirth, as I couldn’t have my homebirth. It was quite a quick delivery and another of my children was born in his sac (I have had to have my waters broken at every delivery, so they must be pretty strong!) All of the children had weighed between 6lb15 and 8lb so I was a little surprised when Viggo showed 9lb 6oz on the scales!

If any of my children are going to follow in their fathers footsteps with playing rugby, it will be this one, he has just had his 7th birthday and he’s already in the same size clothes as Tyrus aged 9, he towers above quite a few in his class.

He is another one that loves numbers, but has also just been put onto the accelerated reading scheme, so doing great in both. He loves playing on the Ps4 and Switch with all of his brothers and sisters although he isn’t the best at losing! He loves running, jumping, climbing and he has some wicked dance moves!

When he was about 3 we took him to the doctors as he had a bit of squint, he was referred to the hospital and he now wears glasses, he has lots of funky minions/marvel/jurassic park ones although he’s not great at remembering to put them in his case ready for school! Whilst we were at the appointment, we mentioned that we had only recently discovered that Kaide was colour blind, they did a test and it turns out Viggo is too, the consultant said it was that much of an issue and only rules out a few job choices such as a pilot and an electrician!

And there we have it, all seven children, now tell me about yours