Stop The Presses: The Blogger Recognition Award!

Yes, I’m fully aware you came here today expecting a Pocky cake. Since The Boy’s birthday isn’t until Saturday he didn’t want me to make him his cake yet. I couldn’t complain; I spent most of Wednesday driving around to three different doctor appointments and ended up with a migraine. In lieu of cake, here’s some more Poké Ball Candy Piñatas:

PokeBalls — From L to R: Great Ball, Master Ball, Ultra Ball. If you enjoy living and wish to attempt this, decorate with icing only. Candy Melts on top of more Candy Melts are the devil.

Expect an over-the-top Pocky cake on Saturday. Fear not, today’s not a total wash-out! I’ve been nominated for my fourth award! Feast your eyes upon the Blogger Recognition Award:

bloggerrecognitionaward2

I was nominated at the end of August by blogger Yen of Little Calico’s Journal. Thanks, Yen! Yen writes book reviews, poetry… a little bit of everything, really. I love her writing style. Stop by for a visit, maybe you’ll like her too. I swore I’d get around to writing this eventually; now seemed like a good time. Ready? Let’s go.

We Call These ‘Guidelines’:

Select 15 other blogs you want to give the award to
You cannot nominate yourself or the person who has nominated you
Write a post to show your award
Give a brief story of how your blog started
Give a piece of advice or two to new bloggers
Thank whoever nominated you and provide a link to their blog
Attach the award to the post (right click and save, then upload)
Comment on each blog and let them know you have nominated them
Provide a link to the award post you created

How It All Began:

It was November 2014. I was bored. So. Incredibly. Mindnumbingly. Bored. And probably having a minor existential crisis of sorts. I’m told they’re relatively common for someone of my age. My creative passion was slowly being crushed in a call center. I had recently read an article from one of my favorite food bloggers detailing how to start your own food blog. I thought, “I like cooking! I have ideas!”

I decided that the only way I could start a food blog and enjoy myself would be to base my culinary creations off of my favorite video games, TV shows, movies, and other geeky stuff I like. Okay, there’s a niche. Great. The problem is, I hate cookbooks. Entirely. I start reading recipes in a sort of posh, condescending English accent in my head. I don’t know where that comes from, honestly. Cooking isn’t always perfect, I don’t care who you are. There’s experimentation! Learning! Tasting! Techniques! Slip-ups! Burns! And, in my case, a lot of sarcasm and cursing.

So I came up with a final compromise:

Skill Up Skillet would be founded as a geek and game themed food blog, written (dangerously) in my own voice. I’m a fan of transparency. Hey, newsflash: Things don’t always work out the way you want them to. You forget the damn baking soda. You overheat oil and burn fingers. The recipe is more challenging in practice than what you read. These are the things I want to know, so these are the things I’m going to tell you about. For better or worse.

I Wouldn’t Recommend Asking Me For Advice:

Write for you and fuck the haters. I’m mouthy, sarcastic, and kind of asocial. And I like myself that way. I’m writing to satisfy myself before I care about what you think. Try not to care about what people think, you won’t get anywhere like that.
Be patient. Being successful doesn’t happen overnight. I wouldn’t even consider myself to be particularly successful, really. But hey, I’ve gained over 600 followers in less than a year. That’s something. That’s a damned good start.
Don’t suck. I know everyone’s going to be highly self-critical and accuse themselves of sucking. This may or may not be true, but here’s a few bullet points to suck less:
Use spell check. For the love of all that’s holy, at least make it look like you tried rather than publishing a poorly spelled, badly formatted brick of verbal diarrhea.
Practice. Take a Blogging 101 course. Take ten. Refine your skills. Practice more. If you’re doing it right, you will never stop learning.
A little Research a la Google never hurt anyone. Just because someone wrote it and slapped a picture on it doesn’t make it a fact.

Nominations: Geeky stuff, food stuff, good humor, and those who have helped me off my feet.

Thanks again to Yen for nominating me! I’ll get to sending out nomination notifications over the next few hours. If you see yourself on the list of nominees, sit tight; I’m working on it!

Coming Up Next: Pocky Birthday Cake on Saturday! Why does everyone have to have a September birthday?

Later: A month of The Nightmare Before Christmas with CuppaGeek

Cheers,

Leisel