Presenting The Liebster Blog Award.....

 

February is the month of love, and though I am lucky enough to spend most of days being in love with my daughter (save for the days when office and a 05-year-old and freelance work makes me go all bonks!!), I had decided to make sure that February, especially, in my home, gets spent as the month of love....more time, dedication and attention to my daughter (poor hubby always burns green with envy)....

So when I received a mail on the 01st of Feb 2013 about a comment on my parenting blog and checked it out, I was surprised, overjoyed and really really smiley! :-) I did receive some earlier from blogging sites and the like, but I've never got another award from a fellow blogger, and there's something about getting a positive comment, getting love and appreciation from fellow bloggers and an AWARD! from a fellow blogger is a big big thing for me....So what did I get?

I got the Liebster Award from Falak of Being Zoes Mum. 

I was super excited, super surprised and super happy! Yay yay yay! :-) A big big thanks and a big big hug to sweet Falak for thinking of me, and for liking my parenting blog enough to award me the Liebster Award. Thank you Falak! You can read her Awarding post here

So what's the Liebster Award?

I didn't know about the Award myself, so I checked it out online. Liebster is originally a German word that means sweet, loved, beloved, favourite. The Liebster Blog Award is given by bloggers to other bloggers who have somehow managed to inspire or bring a smile to your face, and also essentially to 'new'er bloggers, who have less than 200 followers. The Liebster Blog Award is meant to encourage promising and special bloggers. Once you receive the same and accept it, you should pass it on to other bloggers in the same category that you have been chosen for (please read rules below).

Rules:

• Reveal 11 random facts about yourself
• Answer the questions the nominator has asked in their 'awarding' post
• Create 11 new questions for the bloggers you are nominating
• Nominate 11 bloggers whose blog you like and who have less than 200 followers
• Inform the nominee about their being nominated by commenting about it on one of their posts
• No tag bacck

So here are 11 random things about me :-)

1. I am a book-addict, I always have to have at least 1-2 books in my tote, even if I am just dropping in to the mall outside my home! Keedi!!!! ;-)
2. I love street kids and am always playing with them while my car stands at the traffic signal. We make fun faces, we touch hands, we smile and we laugh! I also cook home meals for street kids and feed them along with my daughter and my hubby.
3. I love all things 'vintage' - from book covers to brooches to wallpapers to desktop images to posters to furniture!
4. After my daughter was born, I gave up working full-time, managing work from home, occasionally heading for office and meetings and also continuing with my freelance work. As of now, my daughter hates me sitting with the laptop and I mostly try and sneak around my work in my own home! :-) Chori with seena zori! :-O
5. I am a complete night bird...I can sleep the entire day, straight 7am till 6pm...(I have done it earlier!) and I can stay awake the whole night happily. I typically sleep around 2 in the night.. always wish the world could be turned time-wise, and days would be the 'normal' time for sleep. Lady Daakoo of the night :-)
6. Both my daughter and I are crazy about dancing, especially dancing together, and we break into a song and dance regularly - inside the house, at the mall, on the road, anywhere! Pakki Paagal!
7. I am a maths illiterate, I am TERRIFIED of maths and numbers. I think I have some maths-related phobia/condition that I'm sure will be diagnosed if I look into it. As soon as someone starts talking maths with me, I see a blackboard with numbers written on it, that start flying away the moment people start speaking about them!!! What am I??? :-O
8. I am terrified of public speaking. I can write about anything and my work is related to writing, but when it comes to saying anything in front of any third person, I just clam up! Darpok??
9. I someday want to open a book-and-coffee shop, where people can come in, sit with a favourite book, enjoying a sip of coffee or green tea, and spending as much time as they want with books. Wishful and hopeful thinking :-)
10. I was born and lived my entire life in Delhi, but for the last 7 years have become a Mumbaiite. I can spend the entire day sitting at Marine Drive by my own. Crazy???
11. I absolutely love street shopping and love traveling to different places, especially interiors in India. Fully Velli :-)

Answers to the 11 questions set by my nominator:

1. If you can get to live a famous person's life for one day, who would it be and why?
At the moment, I would love to live the life of Amitabh Bachchan for a day, simply for the reason that I want to understand his way of managing time so amazingly, and also to learn how he manages to age so gracefully.

2. What is the best blog post you have written (per you) and why do you think so?
The best blog post I feel I have written on my parenting blog is the one where I talk about my daughter's sudden refusal to go back to kindergarden (she was about 2nhalf that time). This post is special not because Blog Adda gave it the Editor's Choice Award for the best post, but instead, its special cause it was personally a tough time for me and hubby to figure out exactly what had suddenly scared her off school. It was a painful 5 months for her, and for us to see her like that, terrified, not speaking, the bubbly chubby baby suddenly gone quiet, crying at the merest thing and simply not ready to leave mamma's lap. It was one of the most difficult challenges I have yet faced as a parent, and am happy to say, have come out of. She is now ready to 'graduate' from Senior KG and happily gives me a flying kiss each morning from her school bus :-) If you wish, you can read the post here.

3. What is the worst blogging mistake you have done and why do you think so?
When I started blogging, there were many things I wanted to talk about and share. I ended up creating about 7 blogs, full-fledged blogs that required a lot of time, attention and thought from my end, and that was the mistake - taking up too many things together, motherhood in a nuclear family, my job, my freelance work, my family and then these multiple blogs! I think I should have planned better. Though I deleted I think 2 of them, the other ones have earned a place for themselves, and have even led to new jobs and opportunities for me :-) 

4. 1 book/movie character you would love to become for your life?
I'll have to pass on that - I am pretty happy with the people I have with me, with the special and lovely family I have, and I don't want to trade it for anything in the world.

5. If you get to do just 1 thing for yourself in 2013 what would you do?
I would love to take a long long long break and travel to the interiors of India, to unknown and yet untouched by commercialization places where nature and man are still at peace. I would also love to travel to some of the biggest and most modern cities of the world!

6. What's the one food you'd wish to eat all the time and never get bored of? Do not think about calories.
Definitely Fries!!!! :-)

7. When you were younger what did you want to become? What are your views about that profession now?
I always wanted to become a professional theater artist. I still admire the profession and would love to take it up if I could, only that now I realise I am too shy and introvert a person to be able to open up in front of complete strangers. Or maybe I would!!! Who knows?

8. What was your favourite fairy tale as a kid? Why? Do you still like it as much?
I loved listening to Little Red Riding Hood when I was a kid, as my mother had a very special way of acting out the story with her voice. I still like it cause my daughter loves it :-)

9. What is the strangest thing about you?
The world thinks I am a big extrovert, but not many know that I am a complete introvert. I cannot handle too many conversations with 'real' people at a time, and will very soon cut off myself from conversations that bore me, or fail to hold my interest.

10.What is your funniest childhood memory? 
Not childhood but high school - I locked up my economics teacher in a class so that we could have mass bunking and then chomped off on samosas and burgers in the school canteen. Later I 'rescued' him and became the good girl again ;-)

11.One person who has influenced you as a blogger? 
Definitely my parents (I'll count them as one). From my earliest memories, I remember my parents teaching me about the world of words, and about being fearless, about believing in myself and not being afraid to speak my mind. My various blogs always mirror these exact teachings. Some of my posts have been hugely popular, some have brought journalists to my mail box and to my door step, some have been picked up by international sites and discussed, and every little appreciation that I have ever received is all thanks to my amazing parents!

11 Questions For The Bloggers I'm Nominating:

1. If you got a chance to be your mum or your child for a day, which role would you pick and why?
2. What was that one thing that you really believed in as a child? 
3. Any baby-time friend of yours that you are still in touch with or wish you had been able to keep in touch with?
4. What is that one crazy thing you've done as a grown-up that, when you were younger, you never thought you would ever do?
5. What prompted you to take up blogging? Has the experience been the way you had visualised it?
6. If you became a kid this Christmas, what would you wish for?
7. What is that one thing from your childhood that you wish you could bring back to the present?
8. Do you read to your little one, or if they are now grown-up, did you read to them while they were younger? What has been the most read kiddie book that you read as a parent?
9. One really fun, crazy, carefree thing/ritual that you and your child do together, without thinking what others might think of you.
10. Have you ever felt a misfit among other 'typical' mums. If so, do you care? Would you be your own special self and be the mommy you are, or is there something you would like to change?
11. What does it personally mean about blogging about your parenting experiences? Does it enrich you, inspire you, bring a smile to your face?

11 Bloggers I am nominating for the Liebster Award:

1. Hello Mommyhood
2. Stockpiling Life
3. R's Mom
4. Anecdotes of Two-riffic Twins
5. Of This and That
6. Karma Calling
7. Hip Hop Grandmom
8. On A Wing and A Prayer
9. The Mad Momma
10. Me My Hubby & Our Baby
11. Karmickids

A huge round of applause for all the lovely ladies who very much deserve this award! I look forward to your post on the same and waiting to see your links in the comment box below! Lots of love and hugs :-)

- Debolina Raja Gupta

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And like I always believe in and say:
'Heal the world we live in
Save it for our children' - MJ
Happy Parenting!!!!

Be good to your little one, and to the millions of little ones out there who truly need every bit of love and compassion they can get.....Be a grown up...save the little ones.... Debolina Raja Gupta