Sunshine Award

Thank you Daily Musings (check out that link to get inspired about planning) for nominating me for the Sunshine Award! Woo hoo!! Sweet. This happened over a month ago… I have been too busy to apply myself properly to this honor. But during the time between the nomination and my response, I have been buzzing around with a happy glow knowing the pleasure of an award acceptance and pay-it-forward awaited.

Note: For some bloggers, awards are a burden. If this is you, and this award comes your way, please accept your nomination as a hug.

Here are the rules:

– Include the award’s logo in a post or on your blog.
– Link to the person who nominated you.
– Answer 10 questions about yourself.
– Nominate 10 bloggers.
– Link your nominees to the post and comment on their blogs, letting them know they have been nominated.

This award requests that you give ten random facts about yourself:

1. I find photography thrilling, both seeing a shot to take myself and seeing what others do. And this surprises me… I never knew this about myself until I blogged.

2. I have to know what my philosophy is before I take a step.

3. I grew up surrounded by a huge library, a large hardback section and a separate paperback section.

4. Listening to audio books is one of my great pleasures.

5. I have recently rediscovered the simple and amazing pleasure of taking a bath.

6. I sleep like the dead.

7. I do not cry easily. But I get misty-eyed easily.

8. I am not fascinated by history at all, which is unfortunate, because my dad was a gifted history teacher. I like the future a lot more. I’m getting a lot better about being in the present, too. However, here is someone whose posts about history do, in fact, fascinate me: Ed Mooney.

9. I started writing when I was 8. But I count my start date as the year I started the first novel I would complete. Here is a picture of me holding my first completed novel.

10. I dislike doing things the same way twice.

Here are the 10 Bloggers I’m nominating for their sunshine:

Sheri Kennedy

Laura Mackey

Cindy Knoke

Highlighting the Good and Beautiful Around Us

The Nice Thing About Strangers

Get Set and Go

Petals Unfolding

Delicious Daydreams

The Obvious and the Hidden

Margaret Lynette Sharp

Many thanks to Michelle at KidazzleInk for nominating me for The Sunshine Award! I invite you to go check out her wonderful travel memoirs blog. Like Michelle who said in her Sunshine Award post that blogging has become a passion for her, blogging is a passion of mine because of the community of people. The positive thoughts and encouragement combined with getting to see so many perspectives on this world is now a background against which I live my life. I think about what I read and the conversations I have in the blogosphere, I’ve made friends here, I think about what I can do to share something with you every day, and my world is expanded.

Now for 10 Interesting things about me:

I’m finishing up the first draft of a science fiction novel that I’m co-authoring with a poet I met on Twitter. (We expect to do four drafts before we start looking for an agent.)
I’m really not sure I would want my genome mapped. (The price is coming down on it.)
I believe the world is getting better.
I lived with a family in the south of France for three months when I was 22 and by the end I started thinking in French and dreaming in French.
I was an English major and then became a math major in college because I wanted to develop both sides of my brain. It felt kind of weird in my brain, but that might have been my imagination! In any case, getting through Calculus and so on really boosted my confidence and later the combination was excellent for being a technical writer.
I went to Australia and visited a friend I met through blogging.
My dreams usually have sound tracks.
I sometimes “write” in my dreams.
I’m on the border of being an introvert and extrovert. The internet has been perfect for me because I can spend all day writing (introverted) but still stay connected to friends (extroverted) including making a friend who now co-authors with me (see number 1!).
I used to be able to run long distances (15 miles) without training.

I would like to pay it forward to these bloggers who add to the sunshine in my daily life:

For my nominees who would like to accept this award, here are the rules:

Display the Award on your blog.
Announce your win with a post and thank the blogger who awarded you.
Present around 10 deserving bloggers with the Award – “who positively and creatively inspire others in the blogosphere.”
Link your awardees in the post and let them know of their being awarded with a comment.
Write 10 interesting things about you

To close this day of gratitude, here is a bit of sunshine from Southern California: