Heart Mandala Award

People in this house are doing better for now - mending. I'm still praying no one else gets that stomach bug.

And in the meantime, especially since I am unable to paint right now (quarantine still on between certain rooms, and I, contagious, am exiled on the wrong side from my paintings) I have a well timed moment to reflect on the lovely award The Pagan Sphinx gave me over a week ago. Until today I've had little time to reflect on it, much less post it...

I am moved to be receiving this Heart Mandala Award, and I'll happily display it in my sidebar. I love the idea behind the award - open heart - and the beauty of the symbol for it, created by another artist I admire, Susan of Adventures Ink and Phantsythat.

As for awarding it to three other bloggers - people who, it seems to me, have their hearts open in their blogging and are sharing their inner selves to the help of others, I am greatly aided in my choice that several of my favorite open hearted bloggers have already received this award since its inception. So I didn't need to work as hard to limit it to three... You know who you are.

But the first choice for me would have been REALLY easy anyway. I'm going to first award it to my Dearest - not because she's my wife (though that's a great reason for all kinds of things) but because it's her blog that first inspired me to have one, and it's still her blog that most influences the style and openness of my own. So if I deserve the award, then she doubly deserves it for being that open hearted herself AND for being a major reason my blog follows suit. Many an introvert has been helped by reading things on Moomin Light which have not been uttered elsewhere. We're not so weird after all - it always looks more normal if someone else feels it... Many thanks. She is the main reason I am starting to make real peace with my own introversion.

And I'm awarding it to Phoenix Bearies - another lady who shares rich detail from her heart, her dreams, and her faith. It's the most heart wrenching posts, or the most gleeful, that usually move me the most, and instruct me the most. It's great fun to be reliving having our first little one through her feelings and thoughts.

And I'm awarding it to Linda, who shares her sufferings, pain, pleasures, and the spectacle of making heartfelt art on her blog Vulture Peak Muse. Her open hearted approach to her art and her blog is helping me to further open mine to my art, to my work, and to my family.

To ye awarded, please feel free to do as much or as little with this as you wish. I hate to place obligations on people. (Another thing for that list...)