A Sparkly Bow On Top

Each year, the sponsors of NaBloPoMo have offered various prizes to participants who manage to blog daily throughout the month of November.  I have never been awarded one of these prizes--I made a little joke about it in a post two years ago. This year the event's headquartered at Blogher and they are giving away prizes on a daily basis. And even with daily prizes still nothin'...

Of course, NaBlo is not really about the prizes--it's about "that geeky sense of accomplishment that comes from posting every single day for a month," as I said in that post where I (parenthetically) whined about not getting a prize--and that sense of accomplishment has been mine every year except one (thanks a lot, Time Warner and Verizon).

This year, as I gushed a little about here, I've gotten not only a growing sense of accomplishment as I've inched my way through the month, but I seem to have recovered a bit of my long-buried writing mojo.

An added--and invaluable--bonus has been discovering (and rediscovering) some great bloggers. One of those great bloggers is S. Stauss, who blogs over at Periphery. My bloggy crush on her started the moment I clicked over to her page and saw the tagline: "Out of the corner of your eye is where the magic happens." I loved the simple (magical) brilliance of it. Her posts are full of that same brilliance--she's smart and funny and has a way of looking at things that is quietly revolutionary, if that makes any sense.*

So I've been popping over to Periphery for her daily posts and yesterday, I found out she'd named me in her Top 5 for the Liebster Blog award: 

                                           

"Liebster" is a German word meaning dearest and the award is given to up-and-coming bloggers with less than 200 followers (in my case significantly less--I was ecstatic to break double digits this week).

Not only was this a compliment from someone whose blog I love, it comes with a built in opportunity to share the bloggy love.

Here's how it works:

1. Show your thanks to the blogger who gave you the award by linking back to them.

2. Reveal your Top 5 blogs (with under 200 followers) and let them know by leaving comments on their blogs.

3. Post the Award on your blog.

4. Enjoy the love of some of the most supportive people on the Internet.

Below you can find my Top 5--all of them are bloggers I've "met" this week, and they all really deserve an individual accounting of why I'm giving them the award, but I am unfortunately strapped for both time and mental energy so I will just list them all and say that, for different reasons, each and every link is worth clicking on.

1. Diminishing Gene Pool

2. four under 4 (plus 2)

3. Jane In Her Infinite Wisdom

4. Educational Anarchy

5. Julie's View formerly The Silver Lining

Check them out if you get a chance and while you're at it stop over at Periphery and tell S. Stauss Masked Mom says, "Step away from the mallet."

(A PS to those I've awarded--play along if you'd like, but I will completely understand if you can't fit into crazy holiday schedules.)

*And it may not as I am on several deadlines (holiday and blog related) and I am currently running solely on the frosting I've been licking off my fingers while making Thanksgiving cupcakes and the Diet Dr. Pepper I've been washing it down with.