I got a very pleasant surprise last night to find out that one of my photos - "A lifetime" - has won the 2nd place Merit of Excellence award in "Fine Art" category of  the 7th annual Black & White Spider Awards ( http://www.thespiderawards.com/gallery/7th/gallery.php?x=a&cid=107&g=w ). Two other photos - "Solo" and "Blessings" were nominees in the Silhouette and People categories respectively. Considering that there were more than 7000 contestants from around the world, & the judging panels included prestigious institutions like National Geographic, getting the award and nominations is a deeply satisfying moment for me, & gives me motivation to continue to try and improve my photographic skills moving forward. 
Thanks to this awards, I can now display the following winner's button on my site:

And here are the photographs.