The Sunshine Award and The 7 Facts Tag

As I mentioned yesterday the lovely Shah passed me the Sunshine Award. It is such a happy, positive sounding award. So after I answer the required questions I will tag ten bloggers who make me smile and definitely brighten my days! I am going to kill two birds with one stone so the people I tag for the Sunshine Award are also the people I am tagging in the '7 Facts Tag' that Juliana tagged me in. I don't want anyone to feel pressured to answer all the questions but I also am trying to make it manageable for myself!!

First, the Sunshine Award questions. For such simple questions I was amazed at how hard to answer I found many of them but I tried my best!

1) Favourite colour? - Maybe a nice antique rose pink.


2) Favourite animal? - I like dogs (and am scared of cats!) but if we are going outside of the house I often think I would like a chimpanzee :)


3) Favourite number? - For some reason the number ten came to mind.I'm not sure if it is a favourite but that is what my gut reaction was.


4) Favourite non-alcoholic drink? - Coke. I try to drink diet but I just prefer the 'full fat' version. I like it at room temperature rather than chilled and prefer it without ice and lemon.


5) Facebook or Twitter? Tricky, tricky! Facebook is how I keep up with all my school/university friends who are now all over the place but nothing beats twitter for getting to know people and for lovely links to blogs. I also follow several of my writing heroes which I love. Can I have a bit of both?!


6) My passion? Again gut instinct is my friends and family. I am passionate about my job (teaching Nursery children) but friends and family sprung to mind.


7) Getting or giving presents? I am not going to lie, I love getting presents! I do think though, when you have found something you know someone is going to LOVE then it is so exciting to give it to them. Sometimes I find it hard to keep things a secret before the actual giving but I try hard ;)

8) Favourite pattern? I love love love Cath Kidston. She does lovely floral prints and I covet most of the things she sells. Lovely.

9) Favourite day of the week? I think Saturday. It is a non-work day and seems full of possibilities. You get a lie in and you know you might get one the next day too. Saturday is a fun day.

10) Favourite flower? I like sweet peas. I often say if I get married I would have them but they don't last long once cut but they are pretty and they smell divine.

So, now to pick ten lovely people who make me smile. I hope you all get time to answer the questions but if not I just want to tag you anyway! Please do check them out if you get the chance!

1) Newtowritinggirl
2) Nicole Basaraba
3) Lauren Garafalo
4) Nadja Notariani
5) Lena Corazon
6) Marie Andrews
7) Kat Morrisey
8) Juliana Haygert
9) Gene Lempp
10) Claudia Lefeve

Now onto 'The 7 Facts Tag'. Juliana wrote 7 facts about her 'writing life' so I am going to do the same. Some of these lots of you will already know :)

1) I am anonymous in the writing world much to the amusement of some of my ROW80 friends (Lauren and Juliana I am looking at you!). No-one knows what I look like or even my full name. I can't really explain why I am still in the writing closet but I don't feel ready to be 'out there'. It might be a confidence thing but I think a large part is as a teacher I am constantly in the 'public eye' and I like to be able to say what I think and feel without worrying about how I appear.

2) Only one person in my 'real' life knows I am writing a chick-lit book. She too is writing a chick-lit book so of course I can confide in her and it is lovely the support she gives me. I haven't told anyone else because like having a 'secret' hobby and I am waiting until I have actually finished something!

3) I took part in NaNoWriMo last November and won! I wrote a murder mystery book set in Devon before World War II. It remains unedited in a folder on my laptop and I am not sure if I will ever edit it or do anything with it.

4) NaNo helped me through a tricky break-up. I was all set to write chick-lit but I couldn't write about love but I found I could write about murder! It gave me structure, purpose and a lovely community of online writing friends. I nearly met real writers in my local area but the times of meetings never worked for me.

5) I am hopeless at backing up my work. Appalling. And since my laptop has recently packed up I am glad I have a clever brother-in-law who got my files backed up for me. Not that he knows what is in those files....!

6) I got scarily addicted to biscuits when I was writing during NaNo to the point that my laptop keys crunched with all the crumbs scattered around. I couldn't write without biscuits and coffee and it wasn't a god habit. I am now trying hard to not buy them because then I can't eat them. I still drink the coffee though.

7) I cannot write in silence. I tend to put something on the telly that I have seen many times (Harry Potter always works well) and that way I get background noise but I don't get distracted. I sometimes write to Beyonce when I need energy and I once sobbed along to Adele when writing a break-up scene. I think I need to investigate some soundtracks/classical music without words as they can be so emotive.

So there you have it, lots of information all about ME!!!! I hope you are still awake and you go and check out those lovely people tagged above when you get a chance if you don't know them already. They will put the kettle on and make you feel very welcome.