JIB AWARDS: UNRATIFIED RESULTS ARE IN

Well, it's been a long month or so, as Jewish and Israeli blogs battled it out, some through amity and others through enmity, in competition for the JIB Awards. Polling is now closed, and the unratified results can be viewed here. But to sum up, for a new blog that isn't overwhelmed by traffic on any given day, we did very well here at My Urban Kvetch. And FOEs (Friends of Esther) did pretty well too.

In Best New Blog, we placed third, behind #1 FOE Jewlicious and Treppenwitz, who I'll have to check out now.

In Best Culture Blog, MUK was fourth and JDatersAnonymous came in eighth. The winners were Jewlicious, Sha and Jewschool (one of the first blogs I started reading a year ago).

In Best Personal Blog, AriGoesDown blew the competition out of the water with help from her minions. But that's okay. Ari was the first person to invite me to cross over from the virtual "I read your blog" world into the actual "we're having a book club, why don't you come and meet other bloggers" world. #2 was Treppenwitz again, then FOE Chayyei Sarah (who was robbed in Best Series--her Shabbat posts were amazing, even if the Jewish blogosphere didn't recognize them...read them all here). Other FOEs in this category were writersbloc and Superjux, so I'm giving them an honorable mention.

And in the most hotly contested category, Best Humor Blog, My Urban Kvetch was a solid second. But with an even solider #1 was Protein Wisdom. #3 was a vocal and determined DovBear. You remember...DovBear accused me of being the Bride of Satan. Whereas we all know full well that if I had been the bride of anything, my parents would have pictures of it. But it's all good. We're all friends. And we can all move on.

A congrats to Lisa On the Face, who took Best Life in Israel blog. (Check out her series on how she got to Israel.)

And since there were many great blogs who didn't place in the top three in categories where I thought they would, I'm including my own list of honorable mentions. They are classy, entertaining, humorous blogs deserving of a click and a blogroll:

An Unsealed Room
Bloghead
Chez Miscarriage
Seraphic Secret
Renegade Rebbetzin
Jack's Shack
Passionate Life

The point of the JIB Awards was not simply to win. (Although it would have been nice.) Dave at IsraellyCool, who organized the awards, always had in mind that the Awards would help us to become aware of other Jewish- and Israel-related blogs, in the hope of bringing we who wander the blogosphere a little closer to a virtual Promised Land. So check them out, and if you like them, stay a while. Leave comments. Become part of the community.

This community has been wonderful to me, and I'm gratified that you keep coming back. Thank you!