Honors

I have been honored again! I’m sure I don’t deserve it, but I LIKE it! My friends at Praying for One Day nominated me for the Shine On award. I think it’s because my fur is so shiny.

And my friends at Collies of the Meadow nominated me for the Super Sweet Blogging Award. I think it’s because I’m sweet.

Thanks, guys! If any of my bloggy friends would like to share these awards, feel free!

I have also been honored to be the Fur Friend of the Month at My Three Moggies. What an honor to actually be featured after reading the stories of other fascinating Fur Friends there. The moggies told my story and also showed my cuteness in pictures. Wow!

Mom has been honored, too. She has received letters from an agent, a couple of magazines, and a picture book publishing company. All rejections. Yay. That’s a good thing…. Right….?

At any rate, Mom has finally decided she hates the mailman. I been trying and trying to tell her he was evil….

Breaking Rules

As a dog, I know without a doubt that rules are made to be broken.

I broke some rules last week, when Mom decided to take me out to breakfast. The restaurant allows dogs at the outdoor tables, and Mom has often seen dogs snoozing under chairs, snacking on table scraps, and generally chilling beside their family. She thought I’d be great at all of these skills. I wasn’t. There was something about the metal chairs scraping on the sidewalk, the window shoppers walking by minding their own business, the motorcycle zooming past, and the firetruck 2 blocks away that just set me on edge.

I twirled and twisted, shivered and struggled, pulled and panted, jerked and jumped,

and eventually sat down IN the water bowl that the waitress gave me.

After Mom choked down part of her bagel and gulped down half of her coffee, we went back to the car. Mom said, “I think my shoulder is dislocated.” and “Why can’t you be normal?” and “You are never leaving the house again. Ever.”

Since when is Mom such a rule follower? She breaks rules all the time in her writing. She loves using sentence parts instead of whole sentences, the picture book rule of three sometimes turns into the picture book rule of five, she calls herself a full-time writer, but she only writes for one hour a day, and once she even wrote a story BACKWARDS. Maybe I should ask why SHE can’t be normal??

Now it’s time for me to break some more rules. I want to thank the blog friends who have so graciously nominated me for awards. If you know anything about me, you know I love winning. I will break the rules of the awards by saying that if you’re reading this, I am nominating YOU to take and enjoy whatever award(s) you like. Post them and follow their rules, like a normal person (or pet). Or not. Normal is definitely overrated.

Thanks to my friends Wallace and Samuel for calling me family with the WordPress Family Award.

Thanks to one of my favorite positive thinkers, Shaun for sending over the Shine On Award.

Thanks to the most mellow and most golden golden retriever, Miss Harper Lee for the Sunshine Award and the Super Sweet Blogging Award. See my answers here and here.

Thanks to a newish friend Nikita (and Val) for a newish award called the Dragon’s Loyalty Award.

Long Overdue Thank You!

I have received some awards, and would like to thank the people who gave them to me (finally). I have learned that being a blogger made me part of a big, giant, always-growing blogging family of friends, and I LOVE that. If you are reading this and you would like to share any of my awards, please grab the badge and go for it. If you don’t do awards, and would just like to share a smile, see something different, or learn something new – take a minute to visit these special blogs.

My friends at Collies of the Meadow awarded me the Blog of the Year Award. I could add another star to my former badge, if Mom could figure out how. Those collies make so much mischief, they may have stolen the stars. (Ginger is like that, sometimes…) To see the rules for this award, click here.

My friend at Another Boomer Blog gave me the Sunshine Award. She always shows me interesting, unusual photographs (sometimes with Duke, Lou, or Augie). She has such a great eye. Click here to see my answers to the Sunshine questions.

My deep-thinking, profound friend at Wiley’s Wisdom surprised me with a new award, that I never had before. Leave it to Wiley to dig up something brand new – The  WordPress Family Blogging Award. Since then, I have also been awarded this honor by SIX more of my cyberfriends. That proves that this is a big family and it keeps growing and growing! Thanks to Granny and Little B. at AngelsWhisper, Chelsea at JennyMac Book Blog, the whole zoo at DogDaz, Buddy, Basil, Nutty, and Nibbles at Hutch A Good Life, Savannah at Savannah’s Paw Tracks and Sue at Kid-Lit Reviews. You all bring us tons of smiles and giggles and great information.

Thanks, friends! xoxo

Inspirational Quote of the Week

There’s a crack in everything – that’s how the light gets in.
~Leonard Cohen~

There seems to be a crack in the head of my laughing dog. Plus his ear is missing.

I think his head accidentally cracked open because Mom turned on the switch and he started laughing too much. I’ve heard of “laughing your head off,” but I’ve never heard of “laughing your head open so the light can get in.”

Mom is always looking for where the light gets in. She says if her story is tight enough, nothing can crack it open. So she checks it and checks it. She says she’s troubleshooting. I don’t like trouble and I don’t like shooting, so I hope she is just kidding. But she reads her story out loud to herself all the time. She says, “Does the ending match the beginning?” and “Is my character believable?” and “How much does the problem really matter?” and “Where is the laughing dog’s ear?!”

Mom keeps deleting and rewriting sections of her story trying to make it perfect before she brings it to show her writing group named DavidLaurieandOtherDavid. She says, “Am I telling too much?” and “Am I showing enough?” and “I guess I’ll have to sew up the rip in his head.”

Mom might be able to make her story perfect, but as you can see, the laughing dog’s head will never be perfect again. I wonder where his ear went…..

Click the video to hear the laughing dog laugh.

Thanks to our writer friend, Chelsea at Jenny Mac Book Blog for giving us the Sunshine Award and to Bubba and Mumma and the gang at Bumpy Road to Bubba for giving us the Why I Love Thee Award. Click here for our Sunshine questions and answers, and here or here for the story of how Mom and I found each other. We love all our sunshiny blogging friends, so feel free to take an award or two and list your own Sunshine answers or Love Story.

Take-My-Picture-Tuesday

This is my new bandana which Mom picked out at Mollie’s blog.  I think I look adorable and Christmas-sy in it. 

I also have a couple of awards to say thank you for today. 

Thanks to Easy for the Super Sweet Award.  He definitely got it right.  I AM super sweet… except when I’m not….  See my super sweet answers here and help yourself to the award if you’re sweet most of the time.

Thanks to AngelsWhisper for the Seven Things About Me Award. 

For this award, I need to tell 7 things about myself, which I love to do. I will also invite anyone who likes telling about themselves to take this award and tell us about yourself.

1. I am part Jack Russell and part something else.  Mom thinks I might be part monkey because of my long monkey tail.

2. I love treats.  My new favorite is called Gooberlicious. It’s not what you think.  They look and taste like peanuts. Yum.

3. I love stuffed animals, but not the mechanical ones.  I think mechanical toys are evil, and I’m pretty sure they’re trying to kill me.

4. I help Mom with her writing a lot.  I take her to the park and for rides in the car so she can get ideas. I bring toys to her while she’s working, so she can get up and play with me and not sit still too long.

5. I want Mom to write a book about me so I can go to school visits with her. I know how to behave… except when I don’t…

6. After I eat my food every day, I try to eat my bowl.  That’s just how delicious my food is!!

7. I love to wear dresses.

Winning!

It’s almost Thanksgiving, and there’s SO much to be thankful for.  Mom and I have many blessings in our lives.  We’re super grateful that we were fine through the storms, and we continue to say prayers for our friends and family members who are still dealing with the sadness and nightmares of what the storm left behind. 

I have a lot of friends to thank today. A ton of awards came our way last week. And I even won a Thanksgiving contest!

Oh and Mom is kind of a winner, too. Her story came out in Turtle Magazine.

It looks really cute with all the fancy illustrations, and she is proud and excited and Blah. Blah. Blah…

But seriously – back to me and my awards. 

Thank you to Chelsea for sending us The Very Inspiring Blogger Award. She inspires us, too. To see some Inspiring facts about me, click here. If you’re inspiring, feel free to take the badge and tell 7 Inspiring things about yourself.

Thank you to AngelsWhisper for another Super Sweet Award.  Mom says there’s no such thing as too sweet. To see my Super Sweet questions and answers, click here. If you are Super Sweet, feel free to take the badge and answer the questions on your blog.

Thank you to Chuck and the Collies for giving us The Champion of the Heart Award. Such a special award from the brave and beautiful Trevor.

Thank you to Misaki for the Blog of the Year 2012 Award. It has stars and everything. Plus a ton of rules!

1 Select the blog(s) you think deserve the ‘Blog of the Year 2012’ Award

2 Write a blog post and tell us about the blog(s) you have chosen – there’s no minimum or maximum number of blogs required – and ‘present’ them with their award.

3 Please include a link back to this page ‘Blog of the Year 2012’ Award – http://thethoughtpalette.co.uk/our-awards/blog-of-the-year-2012-award/ and include these ‘rules’ in your post (please don’t alter the rules or the badges!)

4 Let the blog(s) you have chosen know that you have given them this award and share the ‘rules’ with them

5 You can now also join our Facebook group – click ‘like’ on this page ‘Blog of the Year 2012’ Award Facebook group and then you can share your blog with an even wider audience

6 As a winner of the award – please add a link back to the blog that presented you with the award – and then proudly display the award on your blog and sidebar … and start collecting stars…

Yes – that’s right – there are stars to collect!

Unlike other awards which you can only add to your blog once – this award is different!

When you begin you will receive the ‘1 star’ award – and every time you are given the award by another blog – you can add another star!

There are a total of 6 stars to collect.

Which means that you can check out your favourite blogs – and even if they have already been given the award by someone else – you can still bestow it on them again and help them to reach the maximum 6 stars!

For more information check the FAQ on The Thought Palette.

Whew! That’s a lot of rules (to break), but I can handle it! Feel free to take this badge and follow the rules, if you like stars (and rules). 

Mom sent in my picture for a What Am I Thankful For contest at Pawsitively Pets and I won third place! Yay me! Here’s what I know about numbers – 3 is bigger than 1 and 2. That makes me the biggest winner of all! Thanks Lily and Ann!  Happy Thanksgiving, everybody!

How Sweet Am I?

Prizes! Yay! We have won another award or two or three. We were given the One Sweet Blog Award from our friends at Hutch a Good Life and the Super Sweet Blogging Award from our friend Clowie and the whole zoo at Dog Daz.  Take a look at them!

Cupcakes! Like my name! Mom named me Cupcake because I am so sweet and now my blog is also sweet, just like me!

Mom bakes cupcakes sometimes. She mixes up butter, sugar, eggs, milk, vanilla, flour, and baking powder.  She says, “Baking is like writing.  All the ingredients need to be in there.” and “If I leave anything out, the cupcakes won’t be any good.” and “Get your head out of the oven!”

When Mom writes a new story, she has to get all the ingredients into it. Right now, she’s working on two stories at once. Each one needs original characters, an interesting setting, some scene changes, a fun plot with lots of conflict and a satisfying resolution, opportunity for illustration, poetic language, humor, tension, and dialogue. And vanilla and eggs. (I’m lying about that last part.)

After Mom gets to the end of the story, she has to leave it alone for a while. That’s like when the cupcakes have to cool off. When the story cools off for a while, Mom will put frosting on it.  Oh no! That’s the cupcakes. She’ll revise the story A LOT.  She’ll cut words that slow the story down, add words that move the story along, read it out loud ten million times, do everything she can to make it better, and cover the top with sprinkles. Wait. What? I love sprinkles. And frosting.  And cupcakes. And stories!

There are no rules for the One Sweet Blog Award (except to be sweet). For the Super Sweet Blog Award the rules are:

1. Give credit to the person who chose you.

2. Answer the ‘Super Sweet’ questions below.

3. Nominate a “Baker’s Dozen” (13) blogs.

Super Sweet Questions:

1. Cookies or Cake? Both. And bacon. And anything from the garbage pail. And goose poop.

2. Chocolate or Vanilla? Chocolate is poison, for dogs, so I’ll say chocolate.  I like eating poison every chance I get.

3. What is your favorite sweet treat? Mom’s homemade frozen yogurt dog pops.

4. When do you crave sweet things the most? Every minute of every day.

5. If you had a sweet nickname, what would it be? I already have a sweet name!!

Now I will name 13 blogs that I like.  If you already have the award, then congratulations. Either way, we picked you because we like you, and want lots of other people to like you along with us. 

1. Jenny

2. Charlie Eve

3. Bubba

4. Mollie

5. Misaki

6. Sammy

7. Susanna

8. Hamsters

9. Doggy

10. Collies

11. Bassa

12. Marcie

13. Donna

I wish a baker’s dozen was 100, because we really like a LOT of blogs!