I spent a good part of this afternoon thinking that maybe I should have just forked out for the flight, the dress, the awards ceremony ticket and headed home to Dublin for the Blog Awards Ireland.
I spent a good part of tonight glued to my phone and then my laptop, barely able to keep up with the #bloggies2015 tweets coming in, telling me who won what and waiting to see the word ‘diaspora’ pop up somewhere.
I spent a good part of the last week telling myself I’m not bothered whether I win or not and telling myself I’ve no chance really anyway. Then thinking maybe I have as much a chance as any of the others.
My name didn’t pop up in any tweets. But one tweet caught my eye and it humbled me a bit
Figures from @BlogAwardsIE
4,000 nominations,
1,400 entries
and 80,000 votes!
Some judges chose me for the longlist. Then some people thought enough of my blog to vote for me and I made it to the shortlist. Some more judges thought my blog worthy of finalist status.
From all of that, I made it into the relatively small circle of finalists. That’s something to be proud of, isn’t it?
So, so what that I didn’t win? I didn’t even know there was such as thing as a blog award when I started out.
Instead of dwelling on what I didn’t win, I’m going to be thankful for what I have won in the past nine months – and that is you, my readers.
Thanks for the votes.
Thanks for the encouragement.
Thanks for reading.
Fionnuala xxx
Post Script:
The evening after I posted the above, I got a lovely e-mail from the Blog Awards Ireland to let me know that I won bronze in the Best Diaspora Blog Category! I am thrilled. Thanks again to all who voted, helping me make it from the shortlist to the longlist, and thanks to the judges too.
Demand a recount!!
Love your blog and you did brilliantly to get to the final xx
But congratulations on that bronze badge! Out of all those entries it's hardly the wooden spoon award. Maybe next year the diaspora category will actually have people at its table 😛
Aw, thanks Charlotte! I found out the day after I posted this piece that I won bronze 🙂 The tweets on the night were almost only about the overall winners so I didn't even know there was a silver and bronze in my category. Feels so nice to get the recognition.
Thanks Rachel! When I posted this, I hadn't been informed yet of the bronze badge yet. It took till Saturday evening for the e-mail to arrive. I'm delighted though.
Yeah, wouldn't it be great if we were all there next year.