Versatile Blogger Award

Thanks to Josh over at The Blog that Helps You Diagnose Your Characters, I was nominated for the Versatile Blogger Award! This is exciting, especially since I hop over to his blog every time it updates because it is fascinating.

So.  The rules in accepting this award: thank the person who nominated you (thanks again!). Share 7 things about yourself so that your readers can learn more about you (see below!), and nominate 7 other newly-discovered bloggers and let them know you nominated them (see below, and I will!).

Things About Me:

1. I can wiggle my ears.  Both at once and one at a time.  I can't do it while smiling, though, which makes it tricky when I try to show people.
2. I've got brown hair and brown eyes.  My husband has black hair and green eyes.  My three-year-old has golden-brown hair and hazel eyes.  And my one-year-old has golden-brown hair and blue eyes.  The blondish hair and the blue eyes surprised us--we expected our darker-hair-and-eye-genes to win out!
3. Me and my husband picked up Marilynne Robinson once and drove her from her hotel to a reading at the library.  So I've met one of my favorite authors.  She sat in my car.  She is very, very smart.
4. Apparently I love working with ice cream or writing.  I was a manager at Dairy Queen in high school, worked odd ice cream and editing jobs during my undergrad at BYU, and entered my current job teaching writing at the University of Utah when I started my graduate program. I did work at a plastics company, a hotel, and as a painter during some of the summers, but I didn't like pretending to be busy when I really had nothing to do, so those jobs were somewhat painful. Writing and ice cream rock, though!
5. I'm the oldest of four girls, but now I'm outnumbered by boys in our house.  Unless you count our two female cats...then we're even.
6. I love Portal.  And Portal 2.  And the Half Life games, because Valve is awesome.  I used to play more Blizzard games (never World of Warcraft, but I've beat the others), but I haven't played those as much since I had children.
7. As I child I loved My Little Ponies, and I am glad they now have a TV show that is fun and hilarious.  It's all about the writing (well, the writing is the base, at least, although you still need the animation and the voice acting and the music and the directing and so on...).

Let me know if there's other random stuff you want to learn about me, and I shall share more sometime...

Now to the list of seven bloggers!

1. Monica the Mighty: A blog about a super-amazing mother of seven who happens to be a fantastic writer.  You should read the archives. In fact, you should read everything she writes.  Because she is awesome. (She's my sister-in-law, so I can attest to her awesomeness in person as well!)
2. The Quintessentially Questionable Query Experiment: This one is probably already known to everyone, but I've been enjoying it.  Especially the recent series on monsters! Very useful for writers, and fun, too.
3. C'MERE: Website of K. Marie Criddle.  Pictures of surly unicorns.  Facts about butterflies.  Makes me smile every time.
4. Walking in a Writer's Wonderland: The blog of my romance-writing critique partner of coolness. Personal tidbits about another writer's experience in this big, bad writing world.  Also, mini muffins!
5. Rebecca Mahoney--Writer: She's busy revising right now, but she's got great information, and she's a terrific and supportive writer!
6. Losing Sanity: A new discovery from the recent Pay It Forward blogfest.  I love the happiness project! And I'm enjoying the archives too.
7. Winget Family: I love the photos! This is another sister-in-law blog, and she is a foodie and a mother of three very cute little girls! The Wingets are the best hosts ever, by the way.  Just so you know.

Whew!