My Family

This is Dominic… a small, eccentric challenge to the medical profession, and possibly the funniest six year old you’ll ever meet. He is currently getting used to school, when he manages to get there. Or perhaps it is more accurate to say that school is getting used to him. He’s smart, very philosophical and in love with a girl called Poppy

This is Elliot… my serious, sensitive and cerebral ten year old, destined to be a great research scientist or an evil overlord, he hasn’t quite decided yet. When he’s not attempting to hack into my computer system or staring, eyes glazed, at a screen he’s negotiating his way through his own issues to become an amazing kid with so much potential.

This is Lilia… an eight year old happy go-lucky and beautiful little girl. Has ambitions to be a princess when she grows up, if she gets bored of being a rock star. Lilia was born laughing and has an easy and endearing personality and is very emotionally intelligent. She also has a very farty bottom.

This is Roger. He works too hard and eats too much cheese. He also occasionally comes to listen to us excitedly update him on all the highs and lows of our lives while he’s been off being important somewhere in the city. At some point he generally falls asleep, not normally before he has made us feel that the final piece of the jigsaw puzzle of our family is put in place though. He enjoys the principle of peace and quiet even if, with us he can’t enjoy the practice.

And this is me… a sleep deprived, closet techie geek who serially modifies every piece of shiny technology that comes my way just for the satisfaction of being able to do it. Turned, out of necessity, into a disability advocate I have developed a habit of taking on the system when I think there is bad practice and am getting adept at speed learning specialties to help fight my case. Out of sheer bloody-mindedness, I normally win. Being both a lateral thinker and a habitual problem solver means that I rarely spend time focusing on the negatives in life though, which, if I’m honest, is probably less about being a noble person and more likely to be because I’m usually far too busy trying to find a way to fix problems to let them depress me.

I also write, illustrate and design in my spare time and can often be found breaking my website as I learn to code. Just Bring the Chocolate is what I do in my ‘me’ time, even if that time can only be found at 2am. If the website appears a bit neglected, it’s probably safe to conclude that I’m sat in a corner twitching somewhere trying not to drop any of the things I’m juggling. Thankfully I have a well established chocolate-based coping mechanism and think I do an admirable job job of appearing together help be attempt to ‘do’ normal life, or at least fake it convincingly.

Chloe the neurotic border collie

Tallulah the insanely enthusiastic labradoodle.

(and three black cats Hecate, Pyewacket and Pandora and about 20 chickens)

 

(NB Just in case you’re interested… all the illustrations above where done while I was in hospital with Dominic from 2010 to 2011 on an iPad just using my finger. Although the style is rougher, I have to say I rather like it, but not enough to carry on drawing like that as it’s a real pain in the arse!)