The award nominations are in, and we've been nominated in the Freshest Not for Profit category of the Fresh Digital awards for the Kidney Patient Guide website.

The KPG is a project that we here at Cogapp continue to be proud to have created and to still maintain pro bono ten years after it first went live. It is an information sharing hub and forum for people who suffer from kidney disease and those affected by it. The site has an interactive social media aspect that has been continually active since it was launched - visited by sufferers, their support networks and healthcare professionals alike. We recently revamped the site to give it a sleaker, more modern appearance and better navigation, to even further improve its usefulness for those who use it. Eleanor and I, who both worked on the recent redesign, jet-setted off to Manchester on the train to attend the Fresh Awards ceremony with high hopes for the KPG. While walking through the train, we noticed that the only real difference between the first class carriages and our regular seats was the inclusion of a nice little reading lamp, so we made our own.

Upon our arrival we checked in at the hotel, put on our best frocks and headed to the awards in... an Odeon cinema. Though it was a bizarre choice of venue, we all got some free popcorn and were directed towards our seats usher-style, so the festivities suited the venue. Everything went swimmingly with the compere teetering on the edge of acceptable behaviour throughout. When our category came up, we waited with baited breath as the results were revealed until much to our delight, we were announced as the first place winners and recieved the gold award! The multi-coloured swirling spotlights started flashing, some suitably cheesy 90s song came on and the video camera (pointed at us) was projected onto the cinema screen.

The evening saw us eating hot dogs, pizza and fish and chips, which were oddly advertised as 'nibbles'. We built up a bit of dutch courage, talked to some friendly faces, never quite made it onto the dance floor, then returned to the hotel with a feeling of impending normality. All thanks goes to Fresh for putting together a fantastic, unique evening. I've never gone through such a myriad of emotions in such a short period of time. Waking up in the morning, I couldn't help thinking it may all have been a dream...