Date/Time
Date(s) - Mon 3rd Aug - Sat 8th Aug, 2026
All Day
Location
Moniack Mhor, Kiltarlity, Inverness-shire , IV4 7HT
Embracing Writing as a Creative and Ongoing Act
The lives we live now are full of a complex combination of challenge, exhaustion, anxiety, and the overwhelming love and novelty that children bring with them into this complex world. In this course, two parent poets, Sam and Nuala, will help you explore this multifaceted experience in your own writing. Through workshops and discussions on the different poetic styles and methods available to you; the ethics of writing about/to your children; the varieties of fatherhoods, motherhoods, and care-giving; and one-to-one tutorials, we shall embrace writing as a creative and ongoing act alongside the creative and ongoing act of parenting.
Tutors
Nuala Watt was born in Glasgow in 1984. Her poems have appeared in anthologies including Stairs and Whispers: D/Deaf and Disabled Writers Write Back (Nine Arches Press 2017), and A Year of Scottish Poems (Pan Macmillan 2018). Poems have been broadcast on BBC Radio 3 Words and Music .‘Important Information Enclosed’ appears in the Poetry Archive’s Poetry Archive Now Worldview 2023 collection. Work is forthcoming in Versus Versus 100 Poems by Deaf, Disabled and Neurodivergent Poets (Bloodaxe Books 2025.)
Current interests include visual impairment as a creative context and the relationship between disability and parenthood. Her collection The Department of Work and Pensions Assesses a Jade Fish was published by Blue Diode in February 2024 and shortlisted for Saltire Society First Book of the Year Award.
Samuel Tongue is a poet, editor, and newish father. His first collection is Sacrifice Zones (Red Squirrel, 2020) and he has published three pamphlets: The Nakedness of the Fathers (Broken Sleep, (2022), Stitch (Tapsalteerie, 2018) and Hauling-Out (Eyewear, 2016). Poems have appeared in Aftershock Review, Butcher’s Dog, Magma, Under the Radar, Finished Creatures, Anthropocene, And Other Poems, Irish Pages, Berlin Lit and many other places. He has performed at Edinburgh International Book Festival and Paisley Book Festival (The Small Hours: Poems on Parenting). His day job is as Project Coordinator at the Scottish Poetry Library in Edinburgh.
Fees
Please register your interest in the options below and we will be in contact after the 10th December when our registration period closes.
There are options for attending this course, as below, and availability of options will depend on interest. Places will be prioritised in order of date of registered interest in this course.
- Option 1: Attend the course residentially as an individual booking.
- Option 2: Attend the course residentially at Moniack Mhor with up to 2 children (age 3-12), who will also stay on site with you and attend childcare at Abriachan Forest School during the day.
- Option 3: Attend the course non-residentially (i.e. arranging your own accommodation) with children attending childcare (age 3-12) at Abriachan Forest School during the day.
- Option 4: Attend the course non-residentially as an individual booking.
OPTION 1: This includes your accommodation in a single room with shared bathroom, all meals, hot drinks and snacks from Monday afternoon until Saturday morning, and your tuition. Due to the arrangements of this course we are unable to reserve en-suite rooms at this time, but please add a note to your register of interest if you require an en-suite for medical reasons.
The fee for this option is £ 740.
OPTION 2: This includes four full days of childcare at Abriachan Forest School, mini-bus travel between Abriachan Forest School and Moniack Mhor, your accommodation (either twin room, or single room with full single-sized trundle mattress) with shared bathroom, all meals, hot drinks and snacks from Monday afternoon until Saturday morning, and your tuition. Due to the arrangements of this course we are unable to reserve en-suite rooms at this time, but please add a note to your register of interest if you require an en-suite for medical reasons.
The fee for this option is £ 740, plus £200 per child.
OPTION 3: This includes your tuition; welcome dinner at Moniack Mhor on Monday evening; lunch, hot drinks and snacks Tuesday-Friday; 4 full days of childcare at Abriachan Forest School, and mini-bus travel between Abriachan Forest School and Moniack Mhor.
The fee for this option is £ 390, plus £200 per child.
OPTION 3: This includes your tuition; welcome dinner at Moniack Mhor on Monday evening; lunch, hot drinks and snacks Tuesday-Friday. If you don’t live locally we may be able to assist with the booking of accomodation.
The fee for this option is £ 390.
Please register your interest here.
For more information about the general practicalities of our courses and retreats, please visit our About the Courses page. More detailed information will be sent out on the specifics of this course when booking.
Please contact us on radicalcare@moniackmhor.org.uk if you have any questions.
We will confirm offered places once register of interest period is complete. At that point, a deposit is required to secure your place, which is non-refundable after a 14-day cooling-off period. The balance payment is due six weeks before the course begins. Refunds are not always available – please read our Terms & Conditions for full details about our cancellation policy. If you would like to pay the full amount in advance, please call our booking office on 01463 592 828 or email info@moniackmhor.org.uk.
Bursaries are always available, and you also have the option to pay in instalments. If you have any problems paying online, or wish to discuss paying in instalments or applying for financial help, or would simply like assistance, please contact us by emailing info@moniackmhor.org.uk or phoning us on 01463 592828.
Access
Please let us know in your register of interest if you have any access requirements, for example a ground floor bedroom and / or access to a step-free accessible shower room. We also reserve one en-suite bedroom per course for anyone who may need this due to a medical condition. For more information about access to our courses, please visit our Access page.
Terms and Conditions
Please read our Terms & Conditions before booking.