Liebster Blog Award!

I admit that with work being so busy this week I've been pretty neglectful of logging into my email and twitter accounts to see what's been going on. Imagine my delight when I saw that fellow Nunavut blogger Sarah whom I've gotten to chatting with recently gave our tiny little blog a Liebster! Sarah blogs from the community of Pangnirtung and has the most amazing photos of her life there. Her shots of the Northern Lights make me green (ha, get it?) with envy!!

What's a Liebster you ask? It's an award given by bloggers to up and coming bloggers who have less than 200 followers. A German term that means "sweetest, kindest, nicest, dearest, beloved, lovely, kind, pleasant, valued, cute, endearing and welcome." Well! Isn't that the nicest compliment someone could give? :) Thank you to Sarah for brightening my day!

Rules:
1. Each person posts 11 things about themselves.
2. Answer the questions the nominator made for you and create 10 more questions for the blogs you nominated.
3. Choose nominations and link them to your post.
4. Go to their page and tell them.

Here are 11 facts about me!

1. One of my greatest pleasures in life is food. I love to cook and bake. I get a sense of satisfaction and intense pride when something turns out really well and people like it. Reading cook books, watching the Food Network, talking about food, grocery shopping (but I hate putting groceries away)...if it has to do with food, I'm happy.

2. I am a Tetris and Bejeweled addict. There is something intensely relaxing about mindless, repetitive and colourful blocks that I can't put down. I don't think when I play and it could be hours before I look up and realize how long I'd been distracted.

3. I'm pretty certain I've got some strong OCD traits about me. (the dishes need to be put away in alternating colours, certain doors need to be closed all the time and others always open, I'll drive away and come back because I'm not sure I locked the door...the list goes on and on.)

4. Sarcasm and witty comebacks are my weapons of choice. My husband is the same and it's probably one of the biggest reasons we fell in love (we're masochists, what can I say?)

5. I can be extremely shy and introverted. I am most comfortable relaxing at home and having a few close friends over instead of large parties. I get really nervous meeting new people and having to talk to someone I don't know very well.

6. I love to shop and want to go on wonderful vacations but I have extreme guilt issues spending money "frivolously" on things for myself that aren't necessities. I am notorious for buying things, having such intense guilt, that I turn around and return it.

7. I may or may not have an alleged shoe "addiction." I don't think I do, but my husband disagrees. It saddened me a great deal to put the majority of my pretty high heels, stilettos and sandals into storage when we moved North.

8. I don't have an artistic bone in my body. Ask my mother - my drawings from art classes were always...interesting. In spite of this lack of creativity, I was in the choir/band from middle school to high school graduation. I played the flute in high school...sort of. I made noise with the flute, but I wouldn't say it was musical.

9. The furthest I've traveled was going to Australia when I was 10 to visit family. We stayed a month and also visited Hong Kong for a few days. Unfortunately, my most vivid memory of that vacation wasn't who I met or what we saw - it was that during our very long flight a flight attendant accidentally dropped a tray of food on me and I was miserable for the rest of the 14 hours or whatever it was we flew.

10. I won't watch horror movies that have murderers, and other gory things, but I am a sucker for paranormal shows/movies. Then I get freaked out and can't sleep. I also love watching shows like Law & Order: SVU and Criminal Minds...and then I get freaked out and can't sleep.

11. I'm a super light sleeper. The slightest movement and the slightest noise can wake me up. I'm also really, really jumpy. If I don't expect you to tap me on the shoulder when I'm standing there, I will jump about 50 feet. When I'm *really* scared, I will literally say "eek!" (in a super small voice).


My 10 Questions from Sarah:

1. Where is your happy place?
As cheesy as it sounds, it's wherever the people I love are.

2. What is your least favourite thing to do?
In terms of chores around the house, I hate putting away groceries. You'd think I'd enjoy employing my Tetris-building skills in the kitchen, but nope. Love grocery shopping. Hate, hate, hate putting everything away. (Unfortunate, because my OCD dictates that things should be put in certain places in certain ways, so really, I should do it myself if I'm that picky!)

3. Why did you choose to live where you are living?
The opportunity for a badly-needed job change fell on my lap and it was too good to pass up. The timing was right, there were more pros than cons...it was the right thing to do.

4. What is your absolute comfort food?
This is tough - all food is my comfort food, ha! (Emotional eater, what can I say?) My favourite food as a kid was hot dogs and I'm still pretty happy when I eat them, so I guess I'll go with that!

5. Pick 3 friends to be on your team to survive a zombie apocalypse and explain why they are on your team.
I'm going to assume that husband translates to friend - because I can't survive a zombie apocalypse without him! Heck, I can't open most jars without him (and I assume apocalypses mean eating a lot of canned goods...) but really, I choose him because he's part of me - and we're going to kick some zombie butt together (we've already hatched a plan since I'm certain it's going to happen one day!)

I'd also pick my sister! She can distract them with her charm and wit and they'll be so confused and bedazzled that Jeff and I could swoop in for the kill. Actually, she's much more likely to spend the apocalypse scrounging for supplies so she could bake hearty loaves of fruit bread, make tea out of broken twigs and keep us awake by serenading us with cheesy ballads.

Finally, I'd pick my oldest and dearest friend. We've made it through more than half our lives together, and we've been through so much - what's a zombie apocalypse between good friends? :)

6. What is your most favourite song?
The Cure - Pictures of You.

7. What is the craziest thing you've ever done?
I'd say packing up and moving 1,600 miles away from everyone/everything we know and love is pretty darn crazy.

8. If you could have coffee with anyone in the world, who would it be? And why?
My parents. This is the longest I've gone without seeing them and I miss them terribly. Plus, if we're having coffee...mom's going to for sure be bringing some of her delicious cooking. :)

9. If you could go on an all-expenses paid holiday for 2 weeks, where would it be?
I'd love to see Vietnam. I've never been and I'd like to see where my parents grew up, visit/meet some of the relatives that are still there, and discover my roots.

10. When did you start blogging and why do you continue to blog?
I started writing online many, many years ago - I still have (a still active, but not visited) livejournal account  that I started when I moved away to university, and I still have a food blog that I created a year or two ago where I reviewed local restaurants and recipes I found/created. I keep meaning to re-start that one since I still get the occasional request from readers. This blog we started when we had confirmed we were moving to Nunavut and we wanted a way to keep in touch with our family and friends. We also found it fairly hard to find first-hand accounts of what life in Baker Lake would be like, so we also hoped that maybe one day someone else in a similar situation to ours would find our blog helpful.

 
Now, unfortunately I don't follow or know of a lot of blogs, so I only have one official nominee:

Monica at Nervous Chef is a dear friend who takes beautiful pictures of the recipes she tries out. It will make you drool just looking at them!


The rest of the blogs I follow are either: 1) already nominated for a Liebster, or 2) have way more than 200 followers. That being said, I'd still be curious to know the answers to the following questions so I'll open it up to anyone who reads this - feel free to blog it if you have a blog, or answer in the comments below!

My 10 questions to anyone who is interested in answering are:
1. What is your happiest memory?
2. Who is your greatest role model and why?
3. What tips do you have for someone looking to start blogging?
4. Are you where you thought you'd be at this point in your life?
5. What makes you laugh?
6. What's your "signature" recipe/dish/thing you buy and bring to parties?
7. If you could have any animal in the universe as your pet, what would it be and what would you name it?
8. If you could have any superhero ability, what would it be and why?
9. If you had to karaoke right now, what would you sing?
10. You have one day left on earth - what would you eat?




Thanks again to Sarah from Sarah on the Road for the nomination!! It was really fun to write this post! :)

-L