We got home, and I immediately plunged into Christmas shopping. We got home Thursday evening to this:
When we left, there was no snow on the ground, but when we watched the news Wednesday night, we saw that there was a big snow storm going on. I had called my mom that evening (she and Lynn had gone out to Denver to see Ann), and she said that the roads were terrible up by the airport when they got in (my brother picked them up), but by the time we got in Thursday evening, the roads had been cleared and we didn't have any trouble. Except that Bob had to clean about a foot of snow off the car in the parking lot before he could come back and pick us up, snug and warm inside the terminal.
We flew out last Sunday afternoon, and were treated to this sunset from the plane:
I'm very pleased with the new camera. (It's a Canon Powershot SD200 Digital Elph.) I'm still figuring it out, and have just been leaving it on Automatic, but there are a lot of different things you can do with it. It takes wonderful pictures, very clear and sharp. It would have taken better pictures, probably, if we had had more sun . . .
It's December, of course, and even in Florida that means iffy weather. We had sun the first day, but after that, it was cloudy and a little cool, although not as cool as it was last year--last year I think I wore the same pair of jeans all week, since I only brought one pair, and bought a sweatshirt and wore that every day, too. This year I was able to wear shorts a couple of days with a sweatshirt on top, and only switched to jeans the last day.
The pool at our hotel:
We couldn't get a room at our favorite hotel (Port Orleans), so we ended up at Disney's Pop Century Resort. The room was fine, just a little smaller than at the more expensive hotels. I didn't mind the decor, although it wasn't exactly relaxing (not that I really needed relaxing decor, since I was pretty much exhausted by the time we got back to the room at night); the only thing that I did find annoying was that they absolutely blasted Christmas music from 7:00 a.m. to 1:00 a.m. every day.
The first night I noticed it, I thought it was a television or radio in someone's room. To be fair, the rooms are pretty well insulated, so it was more of a background noise than anything else, but I definitely found it odd.
There never really seems to be enough time to do everything, and this year we had one day less than usual because we couldn't get the room for another night, but we did have a good time. Barb met us, so that was fun.
I love the monorail:
We spent quite a bit of time in England at Epcot. We had lunch at the Rose & Crown one day:
I was getting ready to take a picture of Bob at the phone box (we always think of Dr. Who when we see this red phone box), and a family walking by stopped, and the guy asked if we wanted him to take a picture of all of us by the phone box. We said, well, okay, sure, and he started choreographing us, telling me to get in the box and pretend to make a call while Bob and Barb stood outside. It was sort of annoying, but nice, I guess, for the guy to offer, although you have to wonder, really, what he does for a living. Or I do, anyway. I mean, who would stop and offer to take a picture and then tell you how to pose?
I just now realized, too, that I suppose he could have just run off with the camera (Barb's, it must have been, since I don't have the picture on mine), like that scene in the National Lampoon Christmas Vacation movie . . .
Bob and Barb had a beer:
We had lunch at the Brown Derby at MGM Studios on Wednesday. Bob posed outside for me while we were waiting for our table:
Since we came home to a foot of snow, Bob didn't want me going out by myself on Friday until he'd assessed the situation, so he took me out to breakfast, then we went to the hardware store and bought a new snow shovel and some miscellaneous things, went to the post office and picked up the mail that had been held, then he brought me home and I went back out (the streets were fine) to start Christmas shopping while he stayed home and shoveled snow. I'm not sure who had the better deal . . .
I feel more disorganized this year than ever, I think. Obviously, I waited too long to sit down and make lists and figure things out (and start shopping!), but having vacation coincide so closely with my sister's accident made things even more disorganized than usual.
My sister is doing much better. I'm so grateful for all the good thoughts and prayers that I know were being sent our way last week. The first news I had sounded very bad, and I was awfully scared and worried, but she has improved tremendously since then, and it looks like everything is going to be fine.
I don't think I mentioned it in all the confusion, but Karen in Clarkton, Missouri was the winner of the Indigo Wild sample pack that I gave away for my birthday. A couple of weeks ago I got an email from the owner of Indigo Wild, who had apparently noticed that several people had requested catalogs and mentioned that I had referred them. When I got home from vacation, there was a package on the porch with a full size bar of Frankincense and Myrrh soap, plus some more lotion and soap samples. Their stuff just smells absolutely heavenly. I keep a dish of soap slivers in the bathroom, and it scents the whole room. They would probably also be wonderful put into a suitcase or drawer--I wish I'd thought of that when I was packing!