One year later and an award!

Well here I am one year after starting this blog. 176 posts was all I could manage in a year. I had rather hoped to post everyday and it started out that way, but then I took on more and more projects... I just can't say no to interesting collaborations!

However, I'm still here and I still hope for time to post more often. There are some 200+visitors a day which I find mind-boggling. I have heard from so many people! Some looking into research, others are people hoping to sell antique pieces of needlework, still others are people looking for appraisals!

I never even thought about what I would do about receiving messages from people... it never occurred to me that anyone would write to me. Now I am often overwhelmed by the amount of email to be answered and have some messages still in my inbox from last August!

I recently received an award from a fantastic blogger named Racaire who lives in Vienna. You can read her blog here. I received the same award from Eva in Finland, you can read her blog here. The requirements of receipt of this award as I understand them is to answer the following questions and then nominate five other blogs. I have to say that blogging myself has made me much more aware of other bloggers and it is difficult to choose only five gorgeous blogs but I will list my choices at the end of this post, they of course follow my interests!

Gorgeous Blogger Award questions:
When did you start your blog?
I started this (my one and only blog) on March 21, 2010.
What do you write about?
I write about Italian needlework and pretty much anything Italian textile related.
What makes this special?
When I first discovered the Italian needlework arena, what I noticed most was how little was known about it to the English-speaking world and how many treasures were just waiting to be brought to light. The more needleworkers and textile enthusiasts I met, the more I wanted to show them the wonders of the Italian needlework and textile world.
What made you start writing?
After 10 years of collecting and exploring and researching, I felt it was time to share what I had discovered as I don't feel that all the information that I have collected should be closeted away for my own enjoyment. I am still learning so much that I think I will never run out of things to blog about!
What would you change in your blog?
If I could change anything it would be the amount of time I have to blog. I wish there were more hours in the day and I could post more often!

Five Gorgeous Blogs I pass on this award to:
Elisabetta - ricami a mano
The Textile Blog
Ricamo, fichi e fichi d'india
Dentelles d'abord
Ricami e... altro

There are so many others but I must stop at five.
Thank you dear readers for a very pleasurable year of blogging, I hope to deliver more interesting things to you in the year to come!