Liebster Award!!!

Well, this is an interesting turn of events. I was nominated for the Liebster Award by Leyla Wright, a young lady who shares her inspiring thoughts on a wonderful blog, which you can find by clicking here.



Thank you so much, Leyla!

The rules that come with this award are:

1. Answer 11 questions asked by your nominator, and tell your readers 11 facts about yourself.
2. Choose 3-5 other bloggers with less than 200 subscribers to pass the award onto.
3. Make 11 questions for them to answer, and then go on their blogs and tell them about your nomination.

11 facts about myself that you may or may not have known (I'll try to go quick because this post is turning out to be more lengthy than I'd expected):

1. My favorite Disney movie is Tangled.
2. One of my favorite songs is Back and Forth by Lanae' Hale.
3. I have a retainer.
4. I am your stereotypical Asian child. I study a ton, play the violin, and am pretty quiet/thoughtful. I also watch anime and listen to K-pop.
5. I've been playing the violin for roughly 8 years now--8 years!! It's so hard for me to wrap my head around the fact that it's been this long.
6. While we're on violins, my violin's name is Shamrock.
7. I have enjoyed writing as a hobby since about fourth grade, when my best friend and I wrote stories about these cats on wide-ruled sheets of notebook paper.
8. My favorite food adobo, which is a Filipino dish with pork/chicken, egg, and fuzzy melon, prepared with soy sauce, garlic, and vinegar.
9. I graduated 5th rank from high school.
10. I came up with the pen name Riley because I thought that saying it out loud gives you the tendency to smile when pronouncing the "ey" sound, and it's a gender-neutral name.
11. My closest friends and I nick-named ourselves after the Mystery Inc. characters from Scooby Doo. We were going to be the Furious Five from Kung Fu Panda, but no one wanted to be Monkey, haha. (I'm Daphne.)

Here are Leyla's questions:

1. What is your favourite childhood memory?
This is an interesting one because I don't really think about my childhood very much. It's kind of weird to say, isn't it? When I look back, I actually just see trends, like a set of days playing with my best friend that are just melded together. I did have a great childhood overall. But my favorite one would have to be when I was eating dinner at my best friend's house, and her yellow lab (about a year old at the time) sat outside at the patio table as if he were an actual person, front paws at the arm rests, and hind legs crossed. This is my favorite memory because although it's not so epic, it inspired a lot of laughter. I also love dogs. So much.

2. What song sums up your mood right now?
It is in Korean (yay K-pop), and the English translation is a little vague. The tone matches my mood because although upbeat, there is also a slight bit of melancholy as well--just a little bit that is sort of a badge of the lessons I've learned.

3. Who is your celebrity crush?
Logan Lerman for sure. I love the characters he's performed as, and that lopsided grin of his is awkward and friendly at the same time.

4. Summer or Winter?
Although I love Christmas, I'd have to say that summertime is better for me. When the trees and flowers are blooming and bright, and the sky is clear, my mood follows that. I also prefer using natural light in my room, so summer gives that another plus.

5. Where would you dream holiday be?
It's not really about where I go as much as it is who I'm with. I would love to take a cruise to Alaska with my friends, family, and other half--just be surrounded by the ones I care most about, you know? It definitely is a dream, though. My family is scattered everywhere, so it would be very difficult to arrange a time convenient for each person, and my grandparents wouldn't be able to fly all the way to Alaska. Plus, I haven't found my other half yet. But a girl can dream, right?



Image from National Geographic.

6. If you could be any celebrity for the day, who would you pick?
Benedict Cumberbatch, so I could be Sherlock Holmes. **Nerd Alert**

7. What is your favourite inspirational quote?
Thank you, Leyla, for giving me an opportunity to squeeze a quote in here. I've heard many variations of this quotation, but whenever I think about it, I sing it to Julianne Hough's Hallelujah Song.

Life is more than just how many breaths you take, but the moments that take your breath away.

8. If you could change something about yourself, what would you change?
I definitely pray for more patience. I'm not saying that I have an extremely short temper, or even that it's my worst attribute. I would like to change this, however, because there are a couple of situations that I know I would've handled better if only I'd had some more patience.

9. What is your favourite colour?
Purple.

10. What is your biggest fear?
Watching someone die a violent death and being helpless to stop it.  

11. What made you want to start blogging?
I actually started blogging in the seventh grade. At the time, I just wanted to practice writing and liked how easy it was to navigate through posts. My first blog was definitely an experiment--I barely knew much anything about blogs before I began--so it was more like an online journal, just channeling thoughts and figuring out some HTML with widgets/templates. In my second blog, I wrote some more commentaries, but also enjoyed doing creative writing prompts, where I would find a photograph and then compose a scene that matched it. But Smiles No Matter has a clearer purpose because so much happened last semester. The personal trials I encountered made me realize that I want to blog for you guys, the people who read. After having such a whirlwind experience, I did find reasons to smile, and I hope this blog shares a bit of that with you :)

I just wanted to take this opportunity to thank you all for reading my blog, whether you've been here from Day 1 or if this is the first time you've stopped in. I appreciate your support and hope that Smiles No Matter is giving as much to you as your comments and readership bring to me.

Time to nominate others for this award! *Drumroll, please*

Cercalicious, at cercalicious.wordpress.com
Keys2Change, at keys2change.wordpress.com
Younjoo, at pinkstoryofme.blogspot.com
Scooby, at http://myawkwardlifeandnonsense.blogspot.com/
and Callum, at unhelpfulteen.blogspot.co.uk

I nominated fellow teenage bloggers who share some valuable thoughts and have provided good LOLs when I've needed them. Please feel free to check them out sometime.

And here are 11 questions for these great individuals!

1. What is a topic that you can talk about for hours?
2. What is your favorite movie?
3. If you could go anywhere in the world and with anyone, where would you go and with whom?
4. Why do you blog?
5. If you only had five sentences left to say before losing the ability to speak, what would you say?
6. Who is your favorite character in fiction?
7. What is a song you could listen to on replay for hours?
8. Describe yourself in 3 words!
9. There is a snow day and school was cancelled--what do you do?
10. What is your favorite book, and why?
11. What is your favorite quotation?

So, yeah. There's the Liebster Blog Award for you all! I hope you all enjoyed this post and that it helped you get to know me a little better. Thank you yet again, and I hope to see you around sometime soon!

Take care,
-Riley XO



Love you all ^_^