Through a twisting, complex, yet interesting story my mother's family is beginning to regain its genetic history. Specifically it has been kept in our oral history of being from Ireland, along with some discussion of Welsh, the DNA testing helped confirm the Irish heritage yet the genetic results also noted that Scotland was represented (along with English). While it took some time, I believe I have discerned the Irish and English. However I was a bit perplexed with the Scottish until I looked beyond my direct DNA results, along with my mother's grandfather side (surname Stephens), and thought of my mother's grandmother side which has the surname Sooter.

When I looked up the Sooter name the first historical placement I got was Scotland, namely from the Angus part of the Tayside region of the Scottish Highlands (please see: https://www.houseofnames.com/sooter-family-crest). I found this to be very interesting and exciting, especially in light of my Irish heritage, and while I directly found data linking the Sooter name to this history I often found the spelling of Sooter to be varied, such as Souter and Soutar. I am okay with these variants as I understand the lack of spelling consistency through time.

Nevertheless, when I discovered my possible Scottish ancestry I immediately thought of getting a tartan due to my owning kilts (to date: Saffron and tactikilts). When I tried to find a kilt linked to the family Sooter I only found one listing and that was for Souter/Soutar (please see: https://www.scotweb.co.uk/tartan/Sou...r-Souter/31678). While I may be intellectually aright with the answer to spelling variations, I was curious what you all may think of this? Would it still be acceptable to get the Souter/Soutar tartan even with my mother's grandmother side being named Sooter?

Thank you, everyone, for your thoughts.