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Thursday, May 6, 2010

Mirror, Mirror, On The Wall: Bathroom Divas and A Disclaimer to All...



Good Morning! It’s been a while since I’ve said that on my blog, and it feels good to be back! I thought I would return to blogging (part-time) by playing along with my friend Shelia’s special meme called The Daring Darling Beauty Snapping Divas Party. Only... I broke my glasses!



Yep, I managed to snap that little puppy right off, just below where the pin sits...



Still, I couldn’t let Shelia down, so I played along, blind as could be, snapping photos in our powder room’s “olden” mirror as Shelia would say…



Now, some of you may know that Mrs. Magpie doesn't like to have her picture made mainly because she's...



Hence it was a bit of a challenge to abide by Shelia’s rules and still go by my policy of no pictures on the worldwide web…



But my little friend Stella, who's still visiting from England and who is far more intrepid than I, is an expert at this mirror posing stuff. Stella showed me how she posed at Shelia's house when visiting there (the following photo being shamelessly pinched from Shelia's blog)....

(PHOTO OF STELLA WITH OUR NOTESONGS' SHELIA!)

Then Stella arranged a photo shoot with some of my roommates including: Squidward, Mr. Crab, Cubby, Annie, Jaunty Monkey (the old sock), Lester (the young sock), Miss Fox, and a new little friend named Chloe (to be introduced formerly in a future post but made by the inimitable Patricia)...



Stella said that if they could do it, I could do it. And Stella, who was too busy taking this picture to be in it and who herself has posed for hundreds of pictures across the US, said posing is old hat to her now...



Speaking of old hat, just put me in a costume, and somehow I do better. Knowing this, Stella suggested I put on Mr. Magpie’s cracker hat. That's Florida talk for a cowboy hat (in this case, straw)...



So I did and started snapping away...



Tentatively at first…



Then I got a little bolder…



I had to laugh, though, because this “olden” mirror has old silver backing which has turned over the years and is very streaky and weird…



No, that is not dirt you see in these photos…



That is "pleasing decay"...



Well... and maybe the tiniest bit of dust. But I do clean my mirrors, even if the mirror itself is a little gnarly…



We can't all be perfect, particularly if we are well into our second century (and changing the mirror out decreases the value)...



Mirror aside, the picture taking process went something like this…



I would snap a picture...



And then another...



Go back to my computer, use my lorgnette (that’s a fancy French word for glasses on a stem which mine now resemble)...



And download photographs. Slow process, true, but it's kind of hard when you can't see...



By the way, have you ever noticed how artistic ordinary things can look in a photograph???



Speaking of observations, this bathroom is an homage to Mr. Magpie and done with a very plaidish, Scottish sensibility. I mean, the man loves golf so much he played the Old Course at St. Andrews and every famous golf course in Scotland (while I shopped!)...



Wait a minute. That light is brass and has a silver screw at the base. See right down there??? Hmmmm... how did THAT happen? Better, yet, how did it escape my eagle eye for 'lo these many years???



Ahem, moving right along... in addition to golf courses, they have stag horns or antlers all through Scotland (it’s a manly place, you know). So I added Ralph Lauren golf towels on antlers (my version of a Scottish towel rack) in honor of Mr. Magpie's Scottish fixation. And yes, I blame it on him when it's really MY Scottish fixation (but any excuse will do), and yes, the golf towels and the wallpaper are two different plaids (but I say the more the merrier!)...



Then, as I took these photos, I started thinking how much my fingers looked like the horns…



Eeeeeeeek! SCARY!



And my arm looks rather sinewy like the horns (if horns, indeed, are sinewy)...



Suffice it to say that it was a bit of a challenge to abide by the rules, and I wasn’t sure that arms count for Divahood...



Though Claudie and Julie could identify my arm since they took enough pictures of it in St. Augustine, LOL!…



But back to the rules…



A bit of creamy complexion...



And a smattering of pearly whites in a bathroom mirror....



SCORE!

And that's all she wrote!

Except to say, please join Shelia and her friends at Notesongs by clicking The Daring Darling Beauty Snapping Divas Party! You'll have a blast!



Warmly,

The Illusive Mrs. Magpie (Sheila)


P.S. Fingernails (or lack thereof) courtesy of St. Augustine Spring Maintenance! ;-)


Disclaimer: No little critters (including sock monkeys, squids, crabs, dolls, and foxes) or "Little Old Ladies" (including ones named Shelia/Sheila) were harmed in the making of this blog post.