No place like home?

Recently I was asked to write a review of the disabled facilities at Chester's 'Storyhouse' for the fab website 'Euan's Guide'. Euan's Guide is the leading disabled access review website in the U.K. It is an award-winning sight built by disabled people for disabled people and is also a registered charity.
 Euan's Guide aims to inspire people with limited mobility to try new places. The website was founded in 2013 by Euan and Kiki Macdonald, after Euan became a power chair user following a diagnosis of Motor Neurone Disease. Since Euan's Guide uses reviews from members of the public who have actually visited venues around the UK, it means wheelchair users can get an honest cross section of opinion about the accessibility of venues, rather than just what the 'official' websites for said venues state.
It can be frustrating and time consuming to rely on trial and error when choosing where to visit if you have a disabled person in your party. There is quite a distinct lack of information in general on the web regarding places with appropriate disabled access. Also, what works for manual wheelchairs may not always work for power chairs or mobility scooters and many web pages citing disabled access at their venue don't make detailed enough distinctions.
That's another reason why Euan's Guide is so handy, each review clearly states who was visiting and what their specific needs were at the time. As we are going to Edinburgh in the Summer, I will definitely be trawling Euan's Guide to see the recommendations for families in our situation. Euan's Guide states that is aims to remove 'the fear of the unknown' for disabled people visiting a venue for the first time and I think it has definitely achieved this aim with a wonderful vision by Euan and Kiki. It's not until you stumble across something so useful that you wonder why on earth you never googled it before!
Finally, the reviews on Euan's Guide are concise, honest, friendly and empowering. I would encourage anyone in our position to take a look and more importantly to add your own reviews to Euan's Guide, from coffee shops to museums, hotels, shops and everything in between. Sharing your experience might just give someone an invaluable helping hand in deciding where to spend their down-time in the best place available, wherever they are.
Reviews for Euan's Guide are super-easy to write and upload. The link below is my first review for Euan's Guide, of Storyhouse in Chester. Regular blog readers will be unsurprised that I highly recommend a visit! It is my own home away from home and the first place I found that I not only love in it's own right, but a place I can share with Elin too whenever we want to just hang out somewhere as a family. Not all outings have to be about a big mission or a big day out. Sometimes we want to just go and have coffee in a home away from home- somewhere where there is a supportive and accessible environment to simply watch the world go by in. Thank you Storyhouse for providing that for us. Thank you Euan's Guide for enabling us to share it :-)
https://www.euansguide.com/venues/storyhouse-chester-8263/reviews/their-house-is-everyones-house-7271

xxxxx

Happy Easter!

 

Happy Easter everyone!

Elin has had a lovely first week off school. She’s been shopping and for a walk by the river. She’s seen family and friends and had a super productive physio session. We can really see that she is making small improvements toward working on her head control and balance now. It feels great to see even more progress by her lately, we are so proud! 

There has been good sitting and not so good sitting. But mainly good!

She has even managed cuddles with her favourite person! Caitlin is home for one week only from Drama College, since she has been asked to assist the current third year group with their dissertations, so she has to be back in London for the majority of the Easter break to rehearse. Their dissertations involve writing ,directing and producing a show from scratch which they then ask a handful of students from the first and second year to perform in. This time next year Caitlin will be preparing to graduate and it will be her putting together her own show! Eeeek! She has come home with yet another amazing termly report and the whole family is so proud of what she is achieving. She is working so hard. I think Elin just  wishesLondon was a little closer! 

 

Finally Elin had a fantastic session at The Movement Centre with the final fitting for her new standing frame, which we will be using in conjunction with a basic physio programme to gradually encourage and hopefully improve head control. It was a stress free appointment as there was no Dystonia in sight and Elin looked great in her frame. She has had some new boots and callipers which also work really well for her and promote a better foot position when standing than her current splints and boots. So it’s all looking good, now the hard work starts with daily standing frame sessions after school each day. On Thursday, Elin looked ready for the challenge! 
 

Hope you’ve all had a great Easter weekend despite the STILL appocolyptic weather! Paul and I celebrated our 13th wedding anniversary on Good Friday with a lovely meal out and a red wine list that was a little TOO good, so I was busy feeling the effects of that on Easter Saturday! Oops! But you know what’s good for a hangover? Chocolate eggs 😊 How lucky is that? 

Thanks for reading, have a great week.

Ruth xx