Beautiful Blogger Award

I have been the recipient of a couple of blogging awards now.  The ones that other bloggers nominate you for.  And everytime I have received one I am equally as amazed as the time before that anyone is still reading!  I just hope I continue to provide useful content!

The utterly gorgeous Luci at Mother.Wife.Me has presented me with the Beautiful Blogger Award.  It was a good few weeks ago that she kindly did this and I feel bad that it's only now that I am blogging about it.  I hope she'll forgive me.  Luci has recently started a new website; Ma Puce, a French for kids website.  If you are thinking of teaching your youngster a second language, look no further.  This website is a great place to start, full of resources, tools and ideas.

I am completely overwhelmed at receiving my fourth blogging award.  There are a great many blogs out there, so it's lovely that folk are visiting my little corner of the interent and having a good time.  I do supply plenty of virtual tea and chocolate cake, chocolate biscuits, hot chocolate and, well, chocolate, so it's a sweet tasting place to visit at the very least!

These awards come with rules (doesn't everything), so I am supposed to tell you a few things about me that you don't already know.  The difficulty now is considering how personal to get, and how far back into the murky depths of my past to wander to collect these gems of trivia.

Some of my more embarrassing revelations came curtesy of the Versatile Blogger Award, so what could possibly be left?  Err... plenty.

1.  At 17 years old I drove my dad's car down the road on the starter motor to get it to the garage after it 'wouldn't start normally'.  A small fixable problem unfortunately then became a rather larger problem.  An entirely new starter motor was required.  Dad wasn't best pleased.  This is a good reason why schools should include lesson's in practical things like mechanics in preference to, say, algorithms.

2.  I can knock up any item of IKEA furniture like a pro.  Just throw me an alan key and watch me work my magic!  See; I might be useless at car mechanics, but I am a star at furniture construction.

3.  I have a current and ongoing obsession with sleep.  I appear to need loads, but am never tired at 11pm and always exhausted at 10am.  I take at least half an hour to go from 'disturbed by alarmclock' to 'can possibly move legs and get out of bed if need is urgent enough'.  A current attempt at dragging myself out of bed at 6am 3 times a week to work out for half an hour appears to be improving my morning energy levels, but I'm struggling to keep it up. (er hem)

4.  I wore shorts to the last wedding I went to.  Yes; shorts.  Yes, this year.  There might be a post on that later.....

5.  I can play the introduction to Dire Strait's 'Money for Nothing' on electric guitar; I think.  Or at least I could last time I tried, only I haven't tried for a long while and I'm not sure my memory will stretch to sophisticated finger movements at speed. Let's just say I can, and we won't check.

6.  I can do a pretty good portrait of anyone using just black and white oil paints.  Or at least I used to be able to.  Not sure if the skill sticks after 10 years of not actually painting. Hmmmm...

7.  I like to think I can sing, but I can't.  And if I am in tune it's only when singing along with men like Justin Timberlake.  Not sure what that says about my range, or lack of it?

8.  I have an unhealthy interest in HTML at the moment.

9.  I love films and books and stories of all kinds.  I just don't get nearly enough time to watch any films, or read many books, so it's children's stories for me at bedtime!

10.  I write children's stories (cor, something I still do now!) and would love to get one of them published.  Watch this space.

I'd like to nominate for the beautiful blogger award the following brilliant bloggers.  Their sites are well worth a visit.

Sally at Recipe Junkie and the attack of the custard creams.  A woman that regularly inspires me with her recipes and gorgeous looking morsels of food.  This site is well worth a visit if you have an interest in food!

Maggie at Red Ted Art.  If I ever need inspiration for a craft project to entertain the girls for an hour or so, this is where I head.  Absolutely brilliant.  Though I will need to start budgetting for more stocks of glue and tape at the rate we got through it this summer!

And finally, the fabulous Mum of all trades, whose home interiors posts and ideas inspire me to tidy up and buy more cushions!  This Toy Storage post is genius!  If you are having any problems at all with toys taking over the house, check this out and bookmark her blog for future reference!

So there you are ladies!  I hereby pass on the blogging love.