Finding Enough

Autumn in SW Scotland, visiting family and a creative streak

findingenoughwombat

27th Oct 2026

A sunny September morning. Perfect for a swim – even the dog went in.

September was mainly a month of settling the dog in and visiting family down south, but there was also time to focus on some artwork. It seems when I spend more time on creative pursuits, I feel less like sitting down and writing this blog. Maybe I switch on a different part of my brain, but whenever I thought about getting the laptop out, I was never quite in the right frame of mind to order my thoughts and string cohesive sentences together. Storm Boelo has been battering us for the last 24hrs or so (and took the power away overnight), so I am much less inclined to head outside to my studio space and instead I’m hunkering down in front of the woodburner, watching the horizontal rain battering the windows from the comfort of the living room.

The end of summer in Scotland, lots of butterflies and a new member of the family.

findingenoughwombat

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10th Sep 2026

One of the many tortoiseshell butterflies on the mint flowers in August

The local agricultural show is considered the end of the summer in these parts. Nights start to draw in quickly and the weather cools. This certainly seems to generally be the case this year. Although there hasn’t been much rain, sunset has gone from 21.21 to 20.13 in August.

A Scottish heatwave, trip to Glasgow and an interesting use for cow poo!

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28th Aug 2026

Corsewall lighthouse – taken on one of the mini-holiday days out we took in July

The weather in July in SW Scotland was stunning. When you have weather like this, and live in a beautiful place, there really is no need to travel. We were incredibly busy this month, both with house projects and other things locally, but we also made time to have a few mini-holiday days out to enjoy the magnificent corner of the world that we call home, while the sun shines.

Early summer in SW Scotland, sunshine, swimming and a new pine marten kit

findingenoughwombat

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6th Aug 2026

My local swim spot on a beautiful June morning

June was a beautiful month in rural SW Scotland, despite very mixed weather. There was wildlife everywhere and we made steady progress with the endless to do list on the house project.

Visitors, bait hives and gorse flower ice cream

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11th Jun 2026

Gorse flowers in a field near the house – and the main ingredient for this month’s ice cream experiment

It’s raining outside, so its much easier to focus on writing, hence two posts in fairly quick succession. We are recovering from a month full of visitors. May is always a busy month for friends and family wanting to visit. I suppose I can’t blame them, May has always been my favourite month for flora and fauna, and in our beautiful little corner of Scotland it is very special indeed. May is when the need for heating peters out, the days stretch out into long evenings, all around the birds and bees are busy and the wetsuit boots are exchanged for summer swimming shoes. Oh yes, and the infamous Scottish midge starts its reign of terror as soon as the temperature rises and the wind drops.

Bluebells, seedlings and a difficult decision

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1st Jun 2026

It seems to be a very good year for bluebells

Although we took time out to complete our Finding Enough monthly financial review as usual at the start of May, I am horribly late in turning it into a post. I’ll save May’s musings for the next instalment (which will hopefully be less tardy) but sufficed to say, it’s been a busy spring in our little corner of the world – and its difficult to get motivated to write indoors when its sunny outside.

April is when the daffodils start to be overtaken by bluebells, and this year seems like an incredible year for them, with carpets of blue in places I’d never noticed them before. The bees must be having a busy time. It seemed like a very busy month for the humans too, but when I look back, I am not quite sure what we were doing, as the renovation didn’t move forwards much, and the visitors hadn’t arrived yet.

Spring in SW Scotland: Daffodils, hail storms and a red squirrel

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22nd Apr 2026

The red squirrel we’ve been seeing in the garden for the last few months finally found the feeder

March saw the snowdrops give way to daffodils in the garden, and we are fortunate that a previous owner planted a LOT of them. I have no idea how many varieties, but there are quite a few, so the flowering period is spread over weeks. They are such cheerful flowers and they come up all along the track to our house to welcome us home. Some welcome spring weather allowed us to get on in the garden this month too, and the solar panels started earning their keep.

Snowdrops, frogspawn and a bittern, February update

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21st Mar 2026

Part of the amazing display of snowdrops in the garden in February

The birds are starting to sing, so they must be noticing the lighter evenings and snowdrops too. February brought an occasional glimpse of sunshine and slowly but surely, slightly lighter evenings. A bit of sunshine on your face suddenly makes you realise you’ve been feeling a bit flat. Maybe that’s normal for January, and it didn’t seem depressing at the time, but a hint of spring has definitely lifted my mood.

A new year, more decorating and a sheep invasion, January Update

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20th Feb 2026

One of the few highlights of long winter nights – glimpses of the aurora borealis (between the clouds!)

It was difficult to get motivated in January. After a chilly bright start to the year, short days were made to feel even shorter by seemingly endless cloud and rain. It didn’t help that the jobs that needed doing were not ones I was looking forward to tackling.

2025 Financial Journey: Financial Independence (FIRE) Success Story

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6th Feb 2026

The biggest adventure of 2025 was spending a month in California – definitely a contrast from SW Scotland!

2025 definitely didn’t turn out as planned for a number of reasons, good and bad, but our freedom fund had a great year with no active tinkering whatsoever. One of my greatest fears when finally taking the plunge and quitting the 9-5 was large falls in the market in the first few years that we were relying on it for an income. Whilst we are probably not out of the danger zone yet, after 3 full years of early retirement (and not having a large side income from anywhere else), things are looking very healthy so far. While we were dealing with the ups and downs of life, the freedom fund finished 2025 with stellar gains on a year earlier.