How Derry Does Halloween.

Every Year My wee home-town Derry put on a spectacular parade and fireworks display to celebrate the Halloween festivities, this year they definitely surpassed all of my expectations and then some !

Each year Derry draws in Thousands of visitors during this final week in October , But this year was something else, We were proudly voted as the number 1 Halloween Destination IN THE WORLD! So as predicted crowds of up to 50,000 gathered to watch this years "Rise Of The River Gods" themed Parade which had no less than 600 costumed performers, musicians, dancers and more, My kiddies favourite though I have to say was when the giant Dinosaur puppets tried to attack me while taking pictures (hehe) all caught on video too.

Below is some of the pictures that I captured during the Parade.

As you guys can see the standards of the floats this year was exceptional, the little performers danced their wee feet off and the music kept us all entertained along the way, I want to applaud the organisers, designers and everyone who got involved this year as you were all spectacular.

The Parade has always been my Favourite part of Halloween , but for my children it has to be the Fireworks display, It just wouldn't be the same for us without them, although this year I spent more time watching them than taking pictures of them as they definitely went the extra mile with the display, But here are the photos that I managed to capture. 

 I really hope you all love having a wee look through , but for now its love, hugs and kisses from

Our visit to Tropical World in Letterkenny

There is nothing better than getting the kiddies out and about on long boring days, and a little road trip is our favourite way to entertain the wee ones.
Yesterday we decided to take a drive to Letterkenny to visit Tropical World butterfly house and mini zoo

Having heard so much about it from family members who have went before we felt that we were missing out. Being so close to home Im suprised that we hadn't heard more about it to be honest,  Can I just start off by saying what an amazing place this is, for children and adults alike.

Our first stop off was in the new Dino Den, this was a room set up to look like a scene from Jurassic park, filled with dinosaurs of all shapes and sizes, along the side were cages with nests inside filled with dinosaur eggs, it looked sooo realistic. There was even a mini excavation site set up for the children to dig up and discover there own dinosaur bones, such an amazing place for their little imaginations to run free.

This then lead us through to the Butterfly House and for anyone that knows me personally will of course know that I am obsessed with butterflies (hense the Little Painted Lady Blog name) so I felt right at home inside the butterfly house, such a stunning array of species of all shapes,sizes and colours, and to be able to walk through their own little butterfly haven was just fantastic, although my youngest had a little freak out as one of the butterflies took a little shine to him and kept trying to perch itself on top of his head, which i found hilarious of course (bad mummy). Poor child.

After exiting the Butterfly house, we were then lead  into a mini zoo, in here the children were able to see a tonne of different animals,  from Monkeys to Owls, Prairie Dogs to Meerkats , Snakes to Scorpians , Parrots to Tortoises, the list goes on,there were just soo many to mention , the Parrots though had to be my childrens favourites, the colours of them alone were just stunning

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Needless the say after troopsing the kiddies around for an hour , they were getting hungry,we brought our own picnic and we were able to sit in the seating area just beyond the gift shop, but if you do visit and forgot to pack goodies then there is a gorgoeus vintage Cafe/tearoom situated inside the premises called Thyme Out, they will cater for everything from Tea/coffee to homemade lunches, definately 10/10
our last stop was the childrens soft play area, great for a final little pitstop to finish the day off, my son loved the obstacle course , while the girls loved the giant board games on the tables.

I honestly cant praise this place enough, if you ever need a day to you wind with your children then I urge you to pay Tropical World a visit, you wont be disappointed!! Below I will list their web address/twitter , admissions fees and opening hours for you to have a look over.

WEBSITE http://tropicalworld.town.ie/app/index.php/page/home
TWITTER http://twitter.com/tropicalworldlk
I hope you all have a fantastic day but for now its love , hugs and kisses from Little Paintedme xxxooo

Realising how special family holidays are.

Having just come back from our little family holiday I have had time over the past few nights to sit down ,relax and go through the holiday pictures .
This year we went back to Log an tSeanti,

a holiday home in Derrybeg county Donegal in the west of Ireland,and even though this is just a mere hours drive from where I live it feels like a whole different part of the world. The house is situated so close to the sea and has only a handful of houses dotted around it

. I am so used to the hussle and bussle of living in a big city, so when we go there on holiday it feels so peaceful. The air is filled with the smell of the turf fires and sea air, such a homely place to stay, its hard to put into words just how I feel when I'm there
 This year we brought our extended family with us, children, mums, dads, sisters, aunts the whole works, we wanted to share this amazing place with them in the hope that they would love it as much as we did . They weren't disappointed, in fact my aunt cried as we were leaving (big softie) I think it was just the fact she could come away from all of her stresses for a week, leave all the worries in Derry, plus the fact that our phones or internet didn't work down there was a major bonus in my eyes, I don't know about you guys but I struggle to get a conversation from my crowd at times because they have there noses stuck in there phones scrolling through Facebook ,Twitter or Snapchat! don't get me wrong I'm as obsessed as the next person is with social media, but for them few days to be able to actually have proper conversation, oh my god ,it was bliss!
Thankfully while we were there we didn't have our typical Irish summer weather, we actually had some scorching sun shine,

The kids loved it because we could go to the beach every single day as it was practically on our door step, plus the sea air knocked them out at bed time so it was happy days for mummy as-well.
I have never seen such a stunning place, granted I have never travelled any further than England for holidays in the past .I know, I'm 31 and never been on a foreign holiday, but in all honesty why would you need to when we have absolutely amazing places like this in our own country, with stunning views to match I may add.
From our beach front we could see a number of little islands across the water,

 It is so breath taking just being able to see it all really, and the fact that we were spending precious time making memories with our family, made it all the better. Needless to say I took loads of holiday snaps, most being of my kiddies making sand castles, making my daughter a mermaid tail from sand

,my mum hunting for shells with my two youngest children, and our family just being together, having fun.

words cant explain how happy and content that makes me feel.it really is the simple things in life.
what is your idea of an ideal holiday? do leave me a little comment and share.
I hope you all have an amazing day, whatever you may be up to, but for now its love, hugs and kisses from Little PaintedMe xxxooo.

Friends or just strangers who share memories??

Today i came across a post on instagram, It was like a little competition entry were to participate you had to tag  your "best friend" and state why they were your friend and what they meant to you.... now seems straight forward enough right? , well ,what if your like me and have no friends?! It is  in situations like this when your sitting reading stories of girls telling their buddies they would be lost without them and chatting about memories. They shared  that you can realise how lonely you really are...

I was not always without friends, infact from a young age I was always surrounded by lots of friends, boys and girls, being that  I was the ultimate tomboy I swayed more to hanging around with the boys more than the girls. I just seemed to be more comfortable with them. But as I got to my late teens the numbers soon whittled down to less than a few as  I had my first child at a very young age (18) , we all separated from then on as our lives took different turns, they went to university and enjoyed nights out in nightclubs  as I was doing night feeds and nappy changes. Being only 18 it was soooo hard and I had to mature alot faster and settle down quicker, don't get me wrong I wasn't house bound or anything like that as my mum would babysit and let me head out with friends to try and have, in some ways a "normal" teenage nightlife. It wasn't for me though, I would rather be home with my baby than out boozing.

As me and the friends i did have left drift apart the more lonely I became. It is the worst feeling in the world when you feel that you have no-one to turn to, no one to just call up and gossip and have a laugh with, even to discuss how your day went. I spent most nights crying myself to sleep.Its a feeling I never thought would pass. I thought is it me? Am I a nasty person? Did I do something wrong? Why have I no friends? Am i a terrible person? But the older I became the more I realised that as nice as it would be to have friends it wasn't the be all and end all of life,My wee family were the most important people to me now and always will be. They are the best friends anyone could ask for ,and now having 3 daughters, a son and a husband to be I have all the friends I need.
I just wanted to take this opportunity to let you all know If you reading and if you ever feel like you have no-one then think again, I am here should you ever need someone to talk to,I was where you are now,loneliness is a horrible place but believe me when i say things get better through time, they ALWAYS do.

I hope you all have a fab day, and hope this helps you to get to know me a bit more, but for now its love, hugs and kisses from littlepainted me xxxooo