Sunshine Award

Last week, Raphaela of the blog, Hummingbird Redemption, nominated me for a Sunshine Award!

Thank you so much for your kindness, Raphaela!

It is an honour to be recognised by someone who is a beautiful ray of sunshine herself.  That is what this award is about: 
to add 'sunshine' to other bloggers by sharing blogs that bring joy and inspire with creativity, positive outlooks and the overcoming of adversity.


Raphaela and I have been friends for a long time, sharing our roller-coasters of life experiences as we go; we've had some amazing ups and also some very dark downs. All the way along, Raphaela's unconditional love and mutual support has given me strength and resolve while her courage and integrity inspire me every day to be the best person I can be.


The rules of the Sunshine Award are:

1. Thank the person who nominated you.
2. Answer the questions from the person who nominated you.
3. Nominate a few other bloggers.
4. Write the same amount of questions for the bloggers you nominated.
5. Notify the bloggers on their blog.
6. Put the award button on your blog.

Raphaela's questions to me are:

1. What has blogging given you?
2. What do you do when you are under stress?
3. What music do you love?
4. What advice would you give new bloggers?
5. What artist inspires you?

… and here are my answers:


1. What has blogging given you?

• A channel to meet new people and learn new things.
• An outlet for self-expression.
• A therapy for maintaining and developing language skills, especially when chronic illness challenges cognitive functioning.

2. What do you do when you are under stress?

• Make a cup of tea!
• Reach for my crochet!
• Withdraw from the world for some private 'time out'.
• Sit in the garden and observe nature.
• Be kind to myself in thoughts and deeds.
• Surround myself with people who are supportive; avoid those that are not.

3. What music do you love?

• All sorts.  All genres have their diamonds and their dirt.  Seek the diamonds!
• Lately I have been listening to jazz – especially since I have a jazz musician in the house.
• I also enjoy a lot of the modern releases, especially those that are using the old analog sounds and freshening them up with the new digital capabilities; loving Hermitude and Porter Robinson right now.

4. What advice would you give new bloggers?

• Gee, I still feel like a 'new' blogger myself even though I just realised yesterday that I have posted almost 200 blog entries on Lupey Loops since it began in November 2012.
• My advice to new bloggers is to go at your own pace and do not let yourself get overwhelmed.
• Be yourself and blog for your own satisfaction.

5. What artist inspires you?

• This is not easy to answer.  I am inspired by the world around me and my own experiences. That's an eclectic collection of influences.  I cannot reduce my answer down to a sole artist.  
• When I think about art, the impressionist movement might be a good metaphor for me.  I am inspired by moods, colours, light quality, atmosphere, generalities.  
• I don't always have the patience or dexterity for creating fine details (like staying within the lines when colouring in) but give me a large canvas with room for swift, broad brush strokes and speedy, scribbly pen lines and I think I could come up with something satisfying.  
• Perhaps my lack of ability in this area is why my attention to detail in other things is well-honed?

Sunshiney Blogs

According to the rules of blogging awards, I am not to nominate bloggers that have nominated me but if I could, I would nominate Raphaela in return for the reasons outlined at the start of this post.

I will nominate five blogs (in alphabetical blog order) that consistently bring joy, sunshine, and inspiration to my world:

Viola at Colour Crochet Love

Anne Schüler & Michelle Westlund at Crochet Between Worlds (Happy Blog Birthday!)

Catherine Richardson at Finding My Miracle 

Kate Bruning at Greedy for Colour 

Annie Kwok at LittleColourfulTeacher

By the way, one of my favourite songs is "Bring Me Sunshine" by Arthur Kent, made famous by the British comedy duo
Eric Morecambe and Ernie Wise. My other favourite that they performed is "Positive Thinking".  Whenever I hear these songs, I imagine how wonderful it must be to be able to spread a positive message and 'bring sunshine and happiness' to people for a living.  

You can find the lyrics here: http://www.morecambeandwise.com/songs.aspx  

These songs make me feel so happy that I wrote them into my 'Comfort Journal' (in case of emergency).
 

I will not hold the nominated bloggers to answer questions because a Sunshine Award should be bright and happy,
not burdensome.  

For those that wish to participate, my questions to you are:

1. What energises you?
2. What is your favourite season?
3. What is your proudest moment?
4. What gets you through hard times?
5. When was the last time you laughed so hard, it hurt?

Be assured that if a blog is not nominated here, it does not mean that I am not inspired by it.  There are so many wonderful blogs out there that my list would be a mile long if I nominated them all.  Also, if I nominated every single blog that brought me cheer, there would be none left for others to nominate!  

Please do not be discouraged.

Do keep up the good work of sending 

kindness and happiness into the world.

P.S. The sunflower is the emblem chosen by the local scleroderma support groups because the sunflower always turns its face to the sun and people with scleroderma are usually more comfortable in warmer weather.  More information about scleroderma can be found on the Lupey Loops Scleroderma Resources page.